Christopher Carson, Familiarly Known as Kit Carson Part 18

The third side of our triangle was a dry swamp, covered with a dense growth of willow bushes. By order of the colonel, these bushes were cut down for a distance of sixty or eighty yards, so that no foe could approach unseen. By four o'clock in the afternoon, the labor of establishing our camp was completed. At some distance from us there was a large and constantly increasing band of Indians, curiously watching our proceedings. They were all well armed with their native weapons of lances, bows and arrows.

As I was talking in one part of the camp with Joe Walker, Colonel Hoffman approached us and said,

"I want one of you to go and have a talk with the Indians."

"Very well sir," I replied, and turning to Joe, added, "will you go, or shall I?"

"You had better go, I guess," Joe replied.

I at once set out towards the Indians, and when I arrived within speaking distance, hailed them in Spanish, saying that I wished to see their chief and to have a talk. I had left my rifle in the camp, but still had my revolvers, and my knife. A young fellow, tall, of splendid proportions, and one of the fiercest looking Indians I ever saw, stepped out towards me, with his bows and arrows. He was entirely naked except his breach clout and a small plaid shawl thrown over his shoulders. The ends were fastened down by a piece of black tape. On this tape was strung a pair of common shears, apparently as an ornament.

His color was like a new piece of copper, clear, brilliant and exceedingly beautiful, like one of the most majestic statues in shining bronze. "How do you do?" said he, in Spanish, as he approached me and held out his hand. I took his hand, returning the salutation in the same language.

"Why do you come here?" he then promptly said. "This is our country. We have nothing to give you, for yourselves or your horses."

I gave him some tobacco in token of good will, and then replied: "We have come to look at the country. We do not wish you to give us anything. If you are friendly, we shall give you presents. If you attack us, we shall kill you." I then added: "Some of the Indians of this country ma.s.sacred a party only a year ago. We shall have no more killed by them. We shall build a fort here, to protect our emigrants."

He replied a little angrily, "I am a Mohave. My people own this country. I shall kill whoever I please." I had not any doubt that the shawl and the shears came from the party they had ma.s.sacred. I pointed to the shawl and said:

"Where did you get that?"

"I bought them," he replied, evidently annoyed. "I bought them from the Piute Indians."

"My brother," I replied, "does not talk with a straight tongue. It is forked, and his words are crooked." He now added, with considerable warmth:

"Go to your own camp, and prepare for war. I will not kill you. Your guns are short. I will take your horses, and my men shall have a big feast.

Your horses are fat and good. I have many men many braves. You have but few. Go to your camp and prepare for war."

"Indian," said I, "I go, but remember that our short guns kill an Indian every time. We never stop to load them."

I turned to go back to the camp. It is not etiquette on such an occasion to back out, watching your opponent, as though you were a coward and feared an attack. I turned squarely round, with my back to the Indian, when I saw the boys at the fort suddenly raise their rifles with their muzzles directed towards us. At that moment, an arrow whizzed through my buckskin shirt, just making a flesh wound on the shoulder. I had slightly turned as the arrow left the bow, otherwise I should probably have received my death-wound. Instantly, with my revolver already in my hand, I discharged in quick succession, two shots at the savage, who was distant but a few feet from me. The first bullet broke his arm; the second pa.s.sed through his heart. I instantly seized the shawl and shears and taking a little of his hair to remember him by, started on a jump towards our men, who were rushing towards me as fast as possible. The arrows flew so thick and fast, that you would have thought it was hailing. Night soon came on, and the Indians retired, probably to get recruits and to renew the battle in the morning with the certainty of our destruction. We doubled our guard for the night, during which I was awakened but once. Joe Walker and I slept together. So much used were we both to such little affairs, that I do not believe we should have awakened at all, had we not been called.

About twelve o'clock, a sentry came to where we were sleeping, and touching me, said:

"Guide, I believe there is an Indian creeping up behind a bush." Joe says, "Bill, get up and see what it is. My eyes are not as good in the night as yours."

So out of my blanket I got, grabbed my revolver and went towards the bluff. The sentinel accompanying me, pointed out the bush. I did not like to fire into it, lest I should give a false alarm. I watched it about ten minutes, and there was not the least movement. "I guess," I said, "it is nothing but a bush." But at that moment, I perceived a very slight agitation of the branches. It proved that there must be somebody there.

"Oho! Mr. Indian," I exclaimed, "at your old tricks." I raised my revolver, took deliberate aim at the very heart of the bush, and fired.

Mr. Indian gave a hideous yell, and he had gone to his happy hunting grounds. In the morning, we prepared to leave. The Indians, as we afterwards learned, had fifteen hundred warriors within a radius of five miles. We numbered but about fifty men. But we had rifles, they had only bows and arrows. The superiority of our arms raised us above all fear.

It was manifest however, with the earliest dawn, from the large number of warriors a.s.sembled, and the menacing cries they raised, that we must have a fight. Colonel Hoffman detached every fourth man, each one to hold four horses. The rest of the dragoons were marshalled on the bluff, which as I have mentioned, lined one side of our encampment. As our rifles could throw a bullet more than twice as far as any arrow could be thrown, the battle was rather a source of amus.e.m.e.nt to us, than of terror. No Indian could approach within arrow shot of our ranks, without meeting certain death. It must be confessed that we had no more compunctions in shooting an Indian than in shooting a bear or a wolf. As they dodged from tree to tree, a.s.sailing us with their impotent arrows, our keen marksmen watched their opportunity to strike them down with the invisible death-dealing bullet.

Old Joe Walker practiced with our Hawkins' rifles and revolvers, as he said, "just to keep his hand in." After an hour or two of this strange battle, in which the Indians suffered fearful carnage, and we encountered no loss, our foe in rage and despair retired. They left sixty of their number dead, besides taking with them many wounded. We continued our march without further molestation.

And now my friend, if you shall find anything interesting to you in this short sketch, I shall be satisfied. I have written a great deal more than I expected to write, when I began. And yet you have but a very brief narrative of my adventures in California.

Yours truly,

(signed) William E. Goodyear.

CHAPTER XVII.

Frontier Desperadoes and Savage Ferocity.

Original Friendliness of the Indians.--The River Pirates, Culbert and Magilbray.--Capture of Beausoliel.--His Rescue by the Negro Cacasotte.--The Cave in the Rock.--The Robber Mason.--His a.s.sa.s.sination.--Fate of the a.s.sa.s.sins.--Hostility of the Apaches.

Expedition of Lieutenant Davidson.--Carson's Testimony in his Favor.--Flight of the Apaches.

We have occasionally alluded to the desperadoes who infested the frontiers. They were often much more to be dreaded than the Indians.

Indeed the atrocities which these men perpetrated were the main cause of the hostility of the savages. It is the uncontradicted testimony that the natives were, at first, disposed to be friendly. It was only when exasperated by unendurable wrongs that they appealed to arms. When seemingly unprovoked a.s.sailants, they were seeking revenge for some great outrage which they had already experienced, from the depraved vagabonds of the wilderness.

When St. Louis was under Spanish rule, there had sprung up quite a brisk commerce between that settlement and New Orleans. But the sh.o.r.es of the majestic Mississippi were then infested by large bands of robbers, watching to attack and plunder boats, as they ascended and descended the stream. There were two leaders of one of these large bands, by the name of Culbert and Magilbray, who, occupying commanding points, were carrying on a regular system of river piracy.

In the year 1739, a merchant by the name of Beausoliel, had sailed from New Orleans, in a barge richly freighted with goods, bound for St. Louis.

The robbers, pushing out from the sh.o.r.e in their light canoes, and well armed, captured the boat without a struggle. They ordered the owner and the crew into the little cabin and fastened them in.

There was a negro on board, a very remarkable man, by the name of Cacasotte. Though carved in ebony, he had great beauty of countenance, and wonderful grace and strength of person. His native, mental endowments were also of a high order. This man, Cacasotte, as soon as the barge was taken, a.s.sumed to be greatly overjoyed. He danced, sang and laughed, declaring that he would no longer live in irksome slavery, but that he would join the band, and enjoy liberty among the freebooters as their attendant.

He was so jovial, and so attentive, in antic.i.p.ating all their wants, that he won their confidence, and they all thought that he would be a valuable addition to their company. He was thus permitted to roam over the boat, unmolested and unwatched. He formed a plan in all its details, for the recapture of the boat, and the liberation of the crew. This plan he succeeded in communicating to his master. Mr. Beausoliel had his earthly all in the boat, and he also expected that the pirates would take their lives. He was therefore ready to adopt any plan, however desperate, which gave any promise of success. We have the following account given in "The Great West," of the plan the negro formed and of its successful accomplishment.

"Cacasotte was cook, and it was agreed, between him and his fellow conspirators, likewise too negroes, that the signal for dinner should also be the signal for action. When the hour arrived, the robbers a.s.sembled in considerable numbers on the deck, and stationed themselves on the bow and stern and along the sides, to prevent any rising of the men. Cacasotte went among them with the most unconcerned demeanor imaginable. As soon as his comrades had taken their a.s.signed stations he placed himself at the bow, near one of the robbers, a stout herculean fellow, who was armed cap-a-pie. Cacasotte gave the preconcerted signal, and immediately the robber near him was struggling in the water. With the speed of lightning he ran from one robber to another, as they were sitting on the sides of the boat and, in a few seconds' time, had thrown several of them overboard. Then seizing an oar he struck on the head those who had attempted to save themselves by grappling the running boards. He then shot with rifles, which had been dropped on deck, those who attempted to swim away. In the meantime his companions had done almost as much execution as their leader."

Thus every one of these robbers found a watery grave. Mr. Beausoliel had his property restored to him, and pressing all sail went on his way rejoicing.

A few years after this, about the year 1800, there was a noted robber named Mason, who occupied what is called, "The Cave in the Rock." This renowned cavern was about twenty miles below the Wabash river. Its entrance was but a few feet above high water-mark, and opened into a very remarkable chamber, two hundred feet long, eighty feet wide and twenty-five feet high. Throughout the whole central length the floor was quite level, and on each side of this central aisle the sides rose in tiers, like the seats of an amphitheatre.

This remarkable cave is connected with another a little above. Here this Mason, a man of gigantic stature, and of inferior education and intellect, had his concealed retreat, with two sons and several other desperadoes, organized into a band of land and water pirates. With great skill they prosecuted their robberies, plundering boats as they descended the river, but more often watching the return boats, to rob the owners of the money which they had received from the sale of their cargoes.

As the population of the Ohio valley increased, Mason deemed it expedient to abandon the Cave in the Rock and established himself with his gang, on a well known and much frequented trail called the Nashville and the Natches Trace. Here his gang became the terror of the whole travelling community. Sometimes, with his whole band decorated in the most gaudy style of Indian warriors, with painted faces, and making the forest resound with hideous yells, they would swoop down upon a band of travellers, inflicting outrages which savages could not exceed.

The atrocities of which this desperate gang were guilty, at length became so frequent and daring, accompanied with the most brutal murders, that Governor Claiborne, of the Mississippi Territory, offered a large reward for the capture of Mason dead or alive. But the wilderness of prairie, forest and mountain was very wide. Mason was familiar with all its lurking places. For a long time he baffled all the efforts of the authorities for his capture.

Treachery at last delivered him to the hands of justice, or rather brought his ignominious career to a close, inflicting upon him the violent and b.l.o.o.d.y death which he had so often inflicted upon peaceful and innocent merchants and travellers. Two of his own band, tempted by the large reward which was offered, and perhaps maddened by his tyranny, for he ruled his gang with a rod of iron, conspired to kill him. They watched their opportunity and one day, as Mason was counting out the money he had just gained by the robbery of some merchants, one of them advancing from behind him, struck a hatchet into his brain. The accomplices then cut off his head, and carried it to the Governor at Washington, which was the seat of the Territorial government. They received their reward. They, however, received another reward which they had not antic.i.p.ated.

The proclamation of the governor had contained no promise whatever of pardon to any of the gang. These two men were immediately arrested, as robbers and murderers. They were tried, condemned and hung. The robber band, thus deprived of its leader and of two of its most desperate men, was broken up and the wretches dispersed, to fill up the measure of their iniquities in other regions.

But let us again cross the Rocky mountains, and contemplate some of the strange scenes of violence and blood which were occurring there. We have mentioned, that Kit Carson had been appointed, by Government Indian Commissioner. This gave him much satisfaction, for it was an office he felt perfectly competent to fill. It also was an evidence that, at last, his ability and services had been appreciated. He at once accepted the appointment and entered upon its duties.

He soon found the office no sinecure. The Apaches began to commit depredations upon the property of the settlers in the northern part of New Mexico. Some of the citizens fell a sacrifice to their barbarity. Mr.

Carson at once sent Lieutenant Bell, a United States officer, with quite a force of dragoons, in pursuit of them. Although the red men were quite willing to scalp peaceful and unarmed citizens, when they found their own ranks torn and bleeding by the b.a.l.l.s of their foes, and their chiefs biting the dust in the death agony, then courage gave place to terror, and flight became their resource.

Not long after, news came to Mr. Carson that another insurrection had appeared among the Apaches. They were encamped about twenty miles from Taos, upon quite a little ridge of mountains. Mr. Carson proceeded unattended, to their lodges, to meet the chiefs for a friendly talk.

Having been among them for so many years, he was well known by nearly all the Rocky mountain tribes. Mr. Carson, by his gentle words and his personal influence, succeeded in pacifying them, and obtaining promises of friendly relations. Hardly had he left their lodges, when the treachery of the Indian became manifested in new crimes and barbarities. Carson, distrusting them, was not unprepared; but with a band of tried men inflicted such blows as were not soon forgotten.