Army Letters from an Officer's Wife, 1871-1888 Part 11

It makes me utterly wretched to think of the long year he was away from us at Baton Rouge. But what could we have done? We could not have had him with us, in the very heart of New Orleans, for he had already been stolen from us at Jackson Barracks, a military post!

With him pa.s.sed the very last of his blood, a breed of greyhounds that was known in Texas, Kansas, and Colorado as wonderful hunters, also remarkable for their pluck and beauty of form. Hal was a splendid hunter, and ever on the alert for game. Not one morsel of it would he eat, however, not even a piece of domestic fowl, which he seemed to look upon as game. Sheep he considered fine game, and would chase them every opportunity that presented itself. This was his one bad trait, an expensive one sometimes, but it was the only one, and was overbalanced many times by his lovable qualities that made him a favorite with all.

Every soldier in the company loved him and was proud of him, and would have shared his dinner with the dog any day if called upon to do so.

NATIONAL HOTEL, HELENA, MONTANA TERRITORY, May, 1878.

TO hear that we are no longer at Camp Baker will be a surprise, but you must have become accustomed to surprises of this kind long ago.

Regimental headquarters, the companies that have been quartered at the Helena fair grounds during the winter, and the two companies from Camp Baker, started from here this morning on a march to the Milk River country, where a new post is to be established on Beaver Creek. It is to be called Fort a.s.siniboine. The troops will probably be in camp until fall, when they will go to Fort Shaw.

We had been given no warning whatever of this move, and had less than two days in which to pack and crate everything. And I can a.s.sure you that in one way it was worse than being ranked out, for this time there was necessity for careful packing and crating, because of the rough mountain roads the wagons had to come over. But there were no accidents, and our furniture and boxes are safely put away here in a government storehouse.

At the time the order came, Faye was recorder for a board of survey that was being held at the post, and this, in addition to turning over quartermaster and other property, kept him hard at work night and day, so the superintendence of all things pertaining to the house and camp outfit fell to my lot. The soldiers were most willing and most incompetent, and it kept me busy telling them what to do. The mess-chest, and Faye's camp bedding are always in readiness for ordinary occasions, but for a camp of several months in this climate, where it can be really hot one day and freezing cold the next, it was necessary to add many more things. Just how I managed to accomplish so much in so short a time I do not know, but I do know that I was up and packing every precious minute the night before we came away, and the night seemed very short too. But everything was taken to the wagons in very good shape, and that repaid me for much of the hard work and great fatigue.

And I was tired--almost too tired to sit up, but at eight o'clock I got in an ambulance and came nearly forty miles that one day! Major Stokes and Captain Martin had been on the board of survey, and as they were starting on the return trip to Helena, I came over with them, which not only got me here one day in advance of the company, but saved Faye the trouble of providing for me in camp on the march from Camp Baker. We left the post just as the troops were starting out. Faye was riding Bettie and Cagey was on Pete.

I brought Billie, of course, and at Canon Ferry I lost that squirrel!

After supper I went directly to my room to give him a little run and to rest a little myself, but before opening his box I looked about for places where he might escape, and seeing a big crack under one of the doors, covered it with Faye's military cape, thinking, as I did so, that it would be impossible for a squirrel to crawl through such a narrow place. Then I let him out. Instead of running around and shying at strange objects as he usually does, he ran straight to that cape, and after two or three pulls with his paws, flattened his little gray body, and like a flash he and the long bushy tail disappeared! I was en deshabille, but quickly slipped on a long coat and ran out after him.

Very near my door was one leading to the kitchen, and so I went on through, and the very first thing stumbled over a big cat! This made me more anxious than ever, but instead of catching the beast and shutting it up, I drove it away. In the kitchen, which was dining room also, sat the two officers and a disagreeable old man, and at the farther end was a woman washing dishes. I told them about Billie and begged them to keep very quiet while I searched for him. Then that old man laughed. That was quite too much for my overtaxed nerves, and I snapped out that I failed to see anything funny. But still he laughed, and said, "Perhaps you don't, but we do." I was too worried and unhappy to notice what he meant, and continued to look for Billie.

But the little fellow I could not find any place in the house or outside, where we looked with a lantern. When I returned to my room I discovered why the old man laughed, for truly I was a funny sight. I had thought my coat much longer than it really was--that is all I am willing to say about it. I was utterly worn out, and every bone in my body seemed to be rebelling about something, still I could not sleep, but listened constantly for Billie. I blamed myself so much for not having shut up the cat and fancied I heard the cat chasing him.

After a long, long time, it seemed hours, I heard a faint noise like a scratch on tin, and lighting a lamp quickly, I went to the kitchen and then listened. But not a sound was to be heard. At the farther end a bank had been cut out to make room for the kitchen, which gave it a dirt wall almost to the low ceiling, and all across this wall were many rows of shelves where tins of all sorts and cooking utensils were kept, and just above the top shelf was a hole where the cat could go out on the bank. I put the lamp back of me on the table and kept very still and looked all along the shelves, but saw nothing of Billie. Finally, I heard the little scratch again, and looking closely at some large tins where I thought the sound had come from, I saw the little squirrel.

He was sitting up in between two of the pans that were almost his own color, with his head turned one side, and "hands on his heart," watching me inquisitively with one black eye.

He was there and apparently unharmed, but to catch him was another matter. I approached him in the most cautious manner, talking and cooing to him all the time, and at last I caught him, and the little fellow was so glad to be with friends once more, he curled himself in my hands, and put two little wet paws around a thumb and held on tight. It was raining, and he was soaking wet, so he must have been out of doors. It would have been heartbreaking to have been obliged to come away without finding that little grayback, and perhaps never know what became of him. I know where my dear dog is, and that is bad enough. We heard just before leaving the post that men of the company had put up a board at Hal's grave with his name cut in it. We knew that they loved him and were proud of him, but never dreamed that any one of them would show so much sentiment. Faye has taken the horses with him and Cagey also.

The young men of Helena gave the officers an informal dance last night.

At first it promised to be a jolly affair, but finally, as the evening wore on, the army people became more and more quiet, and at the last it was distressing to see the sad faces that made dancing seem a farce.

They are going to an Indian country, and the separation may be long. I expect to remain here for the present, but shall make every effort to get to Benton after a while, where I will be nearly one hundred and fifty miles nearer Faye. The wife of the adjutant and her two little children are in this house, and other families of officers are scattered all over the little town.

COSMOPOLITAN HOTEL, HELENA, MONTANA TERRITORY, August, 1878.

YOU will see that at last I decided to move over to this hotel. I made a great mistake in not coming before and getting away from the cross old housekeeper at the International, who could not be induced by entreaties, fees, or threats, to get the creepy, crawly things out of my room. How I wish that every one of them would march over to her some fine night and keep her awake as they have kept me. It made me so unhappy to leave Mrs. Hull there with a sick child, but she would not come with me, although she must know it would be better for her and the boy to be here, where everything is kept so clean and attractive. There are six wives of officers in the house, among them the wife of General Bourke, who is in command of the regiment. She invited me to sit at her table, and I find it very pleasant there. She is a bride and almost a stranger to us.

The weather has been playing all sorts of pranks upon us lately, and we hardly know whether we are in the far North or far South. For two weeks it was very warm, positively hot in this gulch, but yesterday we received a cooling off in the form of a brisk snowstorm that lasted nearly two hours. Mount Helena was white during the rest of the day, and even now long streaks of snow can be seen up and down the peak. But a snowstorm in August looked very tame after the awful cloud-burst that came upon us without warning a few days before, and seemed determined to wash the whole town down to the Missouri River.

It was about eleven o'clock, and four of us had gone to the shops to look at some pretty things that had just been brought over from a boat at Fort Benton by ox train. Mrs. Pierce and Mrs. Hull had stopped at a grocery next door, expecting to join Mrs. Joyce and me in a few minutes.

But before they could make a few purchases, a few large drops of rain began to splash down, and there was a fierce flash of lightning and deafening thunder, then came the deluge! Oceans of water seemed to be coming down, and before we realized what was happening, things in the street and things back of the store were being rushed to the valley below.

All along the gulch runs a little stream that comes from the canon above the town. The stream is tiny and the bed is narrow. On either side of it are stores with bas.e.m.e.nts opening out on these banks. Well, in an alarmingly short time that innocent-looking little creek had become a roaring, foaming black river, carrying tables, chairs, washstands, little bridges--in fact everything it could tear up--along with it to the valley. Many of these pieces of furniture lodged against the carriage bridge that was just below the store where we were, making a dangerous dam, so a man with a stout rope around his waist went in the water to throw them out on the bank, but he was tossed about like a cork, and could do nothing. Just as they were about to pull him in the bridge gave way, and it was with the greatest difficulty he was kept from being swept down with the floating furniture. He was dragged back to our bas.e.m.e.nt in an almost unconscious condition, and with many cuts and bruises.

The water was soon in the bas.e.m.e.nts of the stores, where it did much damage. The store we were in is owned by a young man--one of the beaux of the town--and I think the poor man came near losing his mind. He rushed around pulling his hair one second, and wringing his hands the next, and seemed perfectly incapable of giving one order, or a.s.sisting his clerks in bringing the dripping goods from the bas.e.m.e.nt. Very unlike the complacent, diamond-pin young man we had danced with at the b.a.l.l.s!

The cloud-burst on Mount Helena had caused many breaks in the enormous ditches that run around the mountain and carry water to the mines on the other side. No one can have the faintest conception of how terrible a cloud-burst is until they have been in one. It is like standing under an immense waterfall. At the very beginning we noticed the wagon of a countryman across the street with one horse hitched to it. The horse was tied so the water from an eaves trough poured directly upon his back, and not liking that, he stepped forward, which brought the powerful stream straight to the wagon.

Unfortunately for the owner, the wagon had been piled high with all sorts of packages, both large and small, and all in paper or paper bags.

One by one these were swept out, and as the volume of water increased in force and the paper became wet and easily torn, their contents went in every direction. Down in the bottom was a large bag of beans, and when the pipe water reached this, there was a white spray resembling a geyser. Not one thing was left in that wagon--even sacks of potatoes and grain were washed out! It is a wonder that the poor horse took it all as patiently as he did.

During all this time we had not even heard from our friends next door; after a while, however, we got together, but it was impossible to return to the hotel for a long time, because of the great depth of water in the street. Mrs. Pierce, whose house is on the opposite side of the ravine, could not get to her home until just before dark, after a temporary bridge had been built across the still high stream. Not one bridge was left across the creek, and they say that nothing has been left at Chinatown--that it was washed clean. Perhaps there is nothing to be regretted in this, however, except that any amount of dirt has been piled up right in the heart of Helena. The millionaire residents seem to think that the great alt.i.tude and dry atmosphere will prevent any ill effects of decaying debris.

We went to the a.s.say building the other day to see a brick of gold taken from the furnace. The mold was run out on its little track soon after we got there, and I never dreamed of what "white heat" really means, until I saw the oven of that awful furnace. We had to stand far across the room while the door was open, and even then the hot air that shot out seemed blasting. The men at the furnace were protected, of course. The brick mold was in another mold that after a while was put in cold water, so we had to wait for first the large and then the small to be opened before we saw the beautiful yellow brick that was still very hot, but we were a.s.sured that it was then too hard to be in danger of injury. It was of the largest size, and shaped precisely like an ordinary building brick, and its value was great. It was to be shipped on the stage the next morning on its way to the treasury in Washington.

It is wonderful that so few of those gold bricks are stolen from the stage. The driver is their only protector, and the stage route is through miles and miles of wild forests, and in between huge boulders where a "hold-up" could be so easily accomplished.

CAMP ON MARIAS RIVER, MONTANA TERRITORY, September, 1878.

AN old proverb tells us that "All things come to him who waits," but I never had faith in this, for I have patiently waited many times for things that never found me. But this time, after I had waited and waited the tiresome summer through, ever hoping to come to Fort Benton, and when I was about discouraged, "things come," and here I am in camp with Faye, and ever so much more comfortable than I would have been at the little old hotel at Benton.

There are only two companies here now--all the others having gone with regimental headquarters to Fort Shaw--otherwise I could not be here, for I could not have come to a large camp. Our tents are at the extreme end of the line in a grove of small trees, and next to ours is the doctor's, so we are quite cut off from the rest of the camp. Cagey is here, and Faye has a very good soldier cook, so the little mess, including the doctor, is simply fine. I am famished all the time, for everything tastes so delicious after the dreadful hotel fare. The two horses are here, and I brought my saddle over, and this morning Faye and I had a delightful ride out on the plain. But how I did miss my dear dog! He was always so happy when with us and the horses, and his joyous bounds and little runs after one thing and another added much to the pleasure of our rides.

Fort Benton is ten miles from camp, and Faye met me there with an ambulance. I was glad enough to get away from that old stage. It was one of the jerky, bob-back-and-forth kind that pitches you off the seat every five minutes. The first two or three times you b.u.mp heads with the pa.s.senger sitting opposite, you can smile and apologize with some grace, but after a while your hat will not stay in place and your head becomes sensitive, and finally, you discover that the pa.s.senger is the most disagreeable person you ever saw, and that the man sitting beside you is inconsiderate and selfish, and really occupying two thirds of the seat.

We came a distance of one hundred and forty miles, getting fresh horses every twenty miles or so. The morning we left Helena was glorious, and I was half ashamed because I felt so happy at coming from the town, where so many of my friends were in sorrow, but tried to console myself with the fact that I had been ordered away by Doctor Gordon. There were many cases of typhoid fever, and the rheumatic fever that has made Mrs.

Sargent so ill has developed into typhoid, and there is very little hope for her recovery.

The driver would not consent to my sitting on top with him, so I had to ride inside with three men. They were not rough-looking at all, and their clothes looked clean and rather new, but gave one the impression that they had been made for other people. Their pale faces told that they were "tenderfeet," and one could see there was a sad lacking of brains all around.

The road comes across a valley the first ten or twelve miles, and then runs into a magnificent canon that is sixteen miles long, called p.r.i.c.kly-Pear Canon. As I wrote some time ago, everything is brought up to this country by enormous ox trains, some coming from the railroad at Corinne, and some that come from Fort Benton during the Summer, having been brought up by boat on the Missouri River. In the canons these trains are things to be dreaded. The roads are very narrow and the grades often long and steep, with immense boulders above and below.

We met one of those trains soon after we entered the canon, and at the top of a grade where the road was scarcely wider than the stage itself and seemed to be cut into a wall of solid rock. Just how we were to pa.s.s those huge wagons I did not see. But the driver stopped his horses and two of the men got out, the third stopping on the step and holding on to the stage so it was impossible for me to get out, unless I went out the other door and stood on the edge of an awful precipice. The driver looked back, and not seeing me, bawled out, "Where is the lady?" "Get the lady out!" The man on the step jumped down then, but the driver did not put his reins down, or move from his seat until he had seen me safely on the ground and had directed me where to stand.

In the meantime some of the train men had come up, and, as soon as the stage driver was ready, they proceeded to lift the stage--trunks and all--over and on some rocks and tree tops, and then the four horses were led around in between other rocks, where it seemed impossible for them to stand one second. There were three teams to come up, each consisting of about eight yoke of oxen and three or four wagons. It made me almost ill to see the poor patient oxen straining and pulling up the grade those huge wagons so heavily loaded. The crunching and groaning of the wagons, rattling of the enormous cable chains, and the creaking of the heavy yokes of the oxen were awful sounds, but above all came the yells of the drivers, and the sharp, pistol-like reports of the long whips that they mercilessly cracked over the backs of the poor beasts. It was most distressing.

After the wagons had all pa.s.sed, men came back and set the stage on the road in the same indifferent way and with very few words. Each man seemed to know just what to do, as though he had been training for years for the moving of that particular stage. The horses had not stirred and had paid no attention to the yelling and cracking of whips. While coming through the canons we must have met six or seven of those trains, every one of which necessitated the setting in mid-air of the stage coach. It was the same performance always, each man knowing just what to do, and doing it, too, without loss of time. Not once did the driver put down the reins until he saw that "the lady" was safely out and it was ever with the same sing-song, "balance to the right," voice that he asked about me--except once, when he seemed to think more emphasis was needed, when he made the canon ring by yelling, "Why in h.e.l.l don't you get the lady out!" But the lady always got herself out. Rough as he was, I felt intuitively that I had a protector. We stopped at Rock Creek for dinner, and there he saw that I had the best of everything, and it was the same at Spitzler's, where we had supper.

We got fresh horses at The Leavings, and when I saw a strange driver on the seat my heart sank, fearing that from there on I might not have the same protection. We were at a large ranch--sort of an inn--and just beyond was Frozen Hill. The hill was given that name because a number of years ago a terrible blizzard struck some companies of infantry while on it, and before they could get to the valley below, or to a place of shelter, one half of the men were more or less frozen--some losing legs, some arms. They had been marching in thin clothing that was more or less damp from perspiration, as the day had been excessively hot. These blizzards are so fierce and wholly blinding, it is unsafe to move a step if caught out in one on the plains, and the troops probably lost their bearings as soon as the storm struck them.

It was almost dark when we got in the stage to go on, and I thought it rather queer that the driver should have asked us to go to the corral, instead of his driving around to the ranch for us. Very soon we were seated, but we did not start, and there seemed to be something wrong, judging by the way the stage was being jerked, and one could feel, too, that the brake was on. One by one those men got out, and just as the last one stepped down on one side the heads of two cream-colored horses appeared at the open door on the other side, their big troubled eyes looking straight at me.

During my life on the frontier I have seen enough of native horses to know that when a pair of excited mustang leaders try to get inside a stage, it is time for one to get out, so I got out! One of those men pa.s.sengers instantly called to me, "You stay in there!" I asked, "Why?"

"Because it is perfectly safe," said a second man. I was very indignant at being spoken to in this way and turned my back to them. The driver got the leaders in position, and then looking around, said to me that when the balky wheelers once started they would run up the hill "like the devil," and I would surely be left unless I was inside the stage.

I knew that he was telling the truth, and if he had been the first man to tell me to get in the coach I would have done so at once, but it so happened that he was the fourth, and by that time I was beginning to feel abused. It was bad enough to have to obey just one man, when at home, and then to have four strange men--three of them idiots, too--suddenly take upon themselves to order me around was not to be endured. I had started on the trip with the expectation of taking care of myself, and still felt competent to do so. Perhaps I was very tired, and perhaps I was very cross. At all events I told the driver I would not get in--that if I was left I would go back to the ranch. So I stayed outside, taking great care, however, to stand close to the stage door.

The instant I heard the loosening of the brake I jumped up on the step, and catching a firm hold each side of the door, was about to step in when one of those men pa.s.sengers grabbed my arm and tried to jerk me back, so he could get in ahead of me! It was a dreadful thing for anyone to do, for if my hands and arms had not been unusually strong from riding hard-mouthed horses, I would undoubtedly have been thrown underneath the big wheels and horribly crushed, for the four horses were going at a terrific gait, and the jerky was swaying like a live thing.

As it was, anger and indignation gave me extra strength and I scrambled inside with nothing more serious happening than a bruised head. But that man! He pushed in back of me and, not knowing the nice little ways of jerkies, was pitched forward to the floor with an awful thud. But after a second or so he pulled himself up on his seat, which was opposite mine, and there we two sat in silence and in darkness. I noticed the next morning that there was a big bruise on one side of his face, at the sight of which I rejoiced very much.

It was some distance this side of the hill when the driver stopped his horses and waited for the two men who had been left. They seemed much exhausted when they came up, but found sufficient breath to abuse the driver for having left them; but he at once roared out, "Get in, I tell you, or I'll leave you sure enough!" That settled matters, and we started on again. Very soon those men fell asleep and rolled off their seats to the floor, where they snored and had bad dreams. I was jammed in a corner without mercy, and of course did not sleep one second during the long wretched night. Twice we stopped for fresh horses, and at both places I walked about a little to rest my cramped feet and limbs. At breakfast the next morning I asked the driver to let me ride on top with him, which he consented to, and from there on to Benton I had peace and fresh air--the glorious air of Montana.

Yesterday--the day after I got here--I was positively ill from the awful shaking up, mental as well as physical, I received on that stage ride.

We reached Benton at eleven. Faye was at the hotel with an ambulance when the stage drove up, and it was amusing to look at the faces of those men when they saw Faye in his uniform, and the government outfit.

We started for camp at once, and left them standing on the hotel porch watching us as we drove down the street. It is a pity that such men cannot be compelled to serve at least one enlistment in the Army, and be drilled into something that resembles a real man. But perhaps recruiting officers would not accept them.

FORT SHAW, MONTANA TERRITORY, October, 1878.

MY stay at the little town of Sun River Crossing was short, for when I arrived there the other day in the stage from Benton, I found a note awaiting me from Mrs. Bourke, saying that I must come right on to Fort Shaw, so I got back in the stage and came to the post, a distance of five miles, where General Bourke was on the lookout for me. He is in command of the regiment as well as the post, as Colonel Fitz-James is still in Europe. Of course regimental headquarters and the band are here, which makes the garrison seem very lively to me. The band is out at guard mounting every pleasant morning, and each Friday evening there is a fine concert in the hall by the orchestra, after which we have a little dance. The sun shines every day, but the air is cool and crisp and one feels that ice and snow are not very far off.