Woman on the American Frontier Part 27

Our heroine, dismounting, dragged her unconscious comrade to the bank of the creek, and, throwing water in his face, quickly restored him to his senses; but, before he could handle his gun, the Indians had come within a hundred paces, whooping fiercely to call back their companions, who just before abandoned the pursuit. They were luckily only armed with bows and arrows, and, circling about the fearless pair, they launched arrow after arrow, though without doing any execution. One of them fell before the rifle of Mrs. Coolidge. A second was brought to earth by the guide, who had by this time revived sufficiently to join in the fight. The third turned and galloped off towards his two companions, who were now hastening to the scene of conflict.

This gave our heroine and her a.s.sociate in danger time to reload their rifles and to shield their horses behind the bank of the creek. Then, lying prostrate in the gra.s.s, they completely concealed themselves from sight.

The three Indians, seeing them disappear behind the bank of the creek, and supposing that they had taken to flight again, rode unguardedly within range, and received shots which tumbled two of them from their saddles. The only remaining warrior gave up the contest and galloped away, leaving his comrades dead upon the field. One of the Indian mustangs supplied the place of the guide's horse, which was wind broken, and the two now pursued their journey at a moderate pace, reaching Fort Leavenworth without encountering any more dangers.

Mrs. Coolidge (under her pseudonym of James Brown), after delivering her despatches, was promoted to the rank of sergeant, and was, at her own request, detached from the New Mexican division of the army and ordered to Matamoras, where she did garrison duty without any suspicion being awakened as to her s.e.x. She afterwards entered active service, and accompanied the army on the march to the city of Mexico. She took part in the storming of Chepultepec, and never flinched in that severe affair, covering herself with honor, and proving what brave deeds a woman can do in the severest test to which a soldier can be put.

During the recent war between the North and the South woman's position on the frontier was similar to that which she occupied in the war of 1812. The greater part of the army of the United States, which, in time of peace, was stationed along the vast border line from the Red River of the North to the Rio Grande, had been withdrawn. The outposts, by means of which the blood-thirsty Sioux, the savage Comanches, the remorseless Apaches, and numerous other fierce and war like tribes had been kept in check, were either abandoned, or so poorly garrisoned that the settlements upon the border were left almost entirely unprotected from the treacherous savage, the lawless Mexican bandit, and the American outlaw and desperado.

What made their position still more unguarded and dangerous was the absence of their fathers, husbands, and brothers, as volunteers in the armies. The war fever raged in both the North and the South, and nowhere more hotly than among the pioneers from Minnesota to Texas. This brave and hardy cla.s.s of men, accustomed as they were to the presence of danger, obeyed the call to arms with alacrity, and the women appear to have acquiesced in the enlistment of their natural protectors, trusting to G.o.d and their own arms to guard the household during the absence of the men of the family.

The women were thus left alone to face their human foes, and the thousand other perils which beset them. They were, to all intents and purposes, soldiers. They belonged to the home army, upon which the frontier would have mainly to rely for security. Ceaseless vigilance by night and day, and a steady courage in the presence of danger, had to be constantly exercised.

Sometimes the savage foe came in overwhelming numbers, and in such cases the only safety lay in flight, during which all woman's address and fort.i.tude was called into requisition, either to devise means of successfully eluding her pursuers, or to endure the toils and hardships of a rapid march. Sometimes she stood with loaded gun in her household garrison, and faced the enemy, either repelling them, or dying at her post, or, what was worse than death, seeing her loved ones butchered before her eyes, and their being led into a cruel captivity.

On the Texas border, in 1862, one of these home-warriors, during the absence of her husband in the Southern army, was left alone not far from the Rio Grande, and ten miles from the house of any American settler. Three Mexican horse thieves came to the house and demanded the key of the stable, in which two valuable horses were kept, threatening, in case of refusal, to burn her house over her head. She stood at her open door, with loaded revolver, and told them that not only would she not surrender the property, but that the first one that dared to lay violent hands upon her should be shot down. Cowed by her intrepid manner, the bandits slunk away.

On another occasion she was attacked by two American outlaws, while riding on the river bank. One of them seized the bridle of the horse, and the other attempted to drag her from the saddle. Turning upon the latter, she shot him dead, and the other, from sheer amazement at her daring, lost his self-possession and begged for mercy. After compelling him to give up his arms, she allowed him to depart unmolested, as there was no tribunal of justice near by where he could be punished for his villainy. These exploits gained for the borderer's wife a wide reputation throughout the region, and either through fear of her courage, or through an admiring respect for such heroism, when displayed by a lone woman, she was never again troubled by marauders.

The Sioux war in Minnesota, in 1862, was remarkable for the sufferings endured and the bravery displayed by women whose husbands had left them to join the army.

A notable instance of this description was that of two married sisters who lived in one house on the Minnesota River, some eighty miles above Mankato.

One morning in the spring of that year their house was surrounded by Sioux Indians, but was so bravely defended that the savages withdrew without doing much damage. Two weeks of perfect peace pa.s.sed away, and the two sisters renewed their outdoor work as fearlessly as ever, as their secluded situation prevented them from hearing of the ravages of the Indians in the eastern settlements.

Late one afternoon, while both the women were sitting in a small grove, not far from the house, they heard the war-whoop, and, stealing through the bushes, saw ten savages, who had dragged the three children from the house and cut their throats, and, after scalping them, were dancing about their mangled corpses. They then set fire to the house and barns, and, butchering the cow, proceeded to prepare a great feast.

Not knowing how long the monsters would remain, and having no food nor means to procure any, the hapless women set out for the nearest house, which was situated ten miles to the east. They succeeded in reaching the spot at ten o'clock that night, but found nothing but a heap of ashes and two mangled bodies of a woman and her child.

Grief, fear, and fatigue kept them from obtaining that rest they so much needed, and before daylight they resumed their march towards the next house, eight miles farther east. This had also been destroyed. The younger sister, who was the mother of the three children who had been butchered, now gave up in grief and despair, and declared that she would die there.

But she was at length induced to proceed by the urgent persuasions of the older and stronger woman.

The borders of the river at this point were covered with woods rendered impervious to the rays of the sun by the herbs, and shrubs that crept up the trunks, and twined around the branches of the trees. They resumed their melancholy journey; but observing that following the course of the river considerably lengthened their route, they entered into the wood, and in a few days lost their way. Though now nearly famished, oppressed with thirst, and their feet sorely wounded with briars and thorns, they continued to push forward through immeasurable wilds and gloomy forests, drawing refreshment from the berries and wild fruits they were able to collect.

At length, exhausted by hunger and fatigue, their strength failed them, and they sunk down helpless and forlorn. Here they waited impatiently for death to relieve them from their misery. In four days the younger sister expired, and the elder continued stretched beside her sister's corpse for forty-eight hours, deprived of the use of all her faculties. At last Providence gave her strength and courage to quit the melancholy scene, and attempt to pursue her journey. She was now without stockings, barefooted, and almost naked; two cloaks, which had been torn to rags by the briars, afforded her but a scanty covering. Having cut off the soles of her sister's shoes, she fastened them to her feet, and went on her lonely way.

The second day of her journey she found water; and the day following, some wild fruit and green eggs; but so much was her throat contracted by the privation of nutriment, that she could hardly swallow such a sufficiency of the sustenance which chance presented to her as would support her emaciated frame.

That evening she was found by a party of volunteers who had been in pursuit of the Indians, and she was brought into the nearest settlement in a condition of body and mind to which even death would have been preferable.

Notwithstanding the dangers and distractions of this quasi-military life led by wives and mothers on the frontier they did not neglect their other home duties.

When the scarred and swarthy veterans returned to their homes on the border there were no marks of neglect to be erased, no evidences of dilapidation and decay. "They found their farms in as good a condition as when they enlisted. Enhanced prices had balanced diminished production. Crops had been planted, tended, and gathered, by hands that before had been all unused to the hoe and the rake. The sadness lasted only in those households--alas! too numerous--where no disbanding of armies could restore the soldier to the loving arms and the blessed industries of home."

These women of the frontier during the late war may be called the irregular forces of the army, soldiers in all respects except in being enrolled and placed under officers. They fought and marched, stood on guard and were taken prisoners. They viewed the horrors of war and were under fire although they did not wear the army uniform nor walk in files and platoons.

All these things they did in addition to their work as housewives, farmers, and mothers.

Many others took naturally to the rough life of a soldier, and enlisting under soldiers' guise followed the drum on foot or in the saddle, and encamped on the bare ground with a knapsack for a pillow and no covering from the cold and rain but a brown army blanket.

One of these heroines was Miss Louisa Wellman of Iowa. Born and nurtured on the border, habituated from childhood to an outdoor life, a fine rider, as well as a good shot with both a rifle and a pistol, it was quite natural that she should have felt a martial ardor when the war commenced, and having donned her brother's clothes, should have enlisted as she did in one of the Iowa regiments. Her most serious annoyance was the rough language and profanity of the soldiers. While in camp she managed to a.s.sociate with the sober and pious soldiers, of whom there were several in the company.

This was afterwards known as "the praying squad;" but she did not in consequence of her reluctance to a.s.sociate with the others lose her popularity, owing to her unvarying cheerfulness, her generosity and her disposition to oblige often at the greatest inconvenience to herself. If a comrade was taken sick she was the first to tender her services as watcher and nurse, and in this way came to be known as "Doctor Ned."

She took part in the storming of Fort Donelson where she was slightly wounded in the wrist. Afterwards she served often in the picket line and distinguished herself by her courage, vigilance, and shrewdness. The boldness with which she exposed herself on every occasion, led to such a catastrophe as might have been expected. The battle of Pittsburgh Landing was an affair in which she figured with a cool bravery that kept her company steady in spite of the terrible fire which was decimating the ranks of the Federal Army. The pressure, however, was at last too great. Slowly driven towards the river, and fighting every inch of ground, the regiment in which she served seemed likely to be annihilated. They had just reached the shelter of the gun-boats when a stray sh.e.l.l exploded directly in the faces of the front rank, and Miss Wellman was struck and thrown violently to the earth, but instantly sprang to her feet and was able to walk to the temporary hospital which had been established near the river bank.

Like Deborah Samson, her s.e.x was discovered by the surgeon who dressed her wound. The wound was in the collar bone and was made by a fragment of sh.e.l.l. Although not a dangerous one it required immediate attention. When the surgeon desired her to remove her army jacket she demurred, and not being able to a.s.sign any good reason for her refusal, the surgeon coupling this with the modest blush which suffused her features when he made his requisition for the removal of her outside garment, immediately guessed the truth. With chivalrous delicacy he immediately dispatched her with a note to the wife of one of the Captains who was in the camp at the time, recommending the maiden soldier to her care, and begging that she would dress the wound in accordance with a prescription which he sent. Although Miss Wellman begged that her secret might not be disclosed and that she might be permitted to continue to serve in the ranks, it was judged best to communicate the fact to the commanding officer, who, though he admired the bravery and resolution of the maiden, judged best that she should serve in another capacity if at all, and having notified her parents and obtained their consent she was allowed to do service in the ambulance department.

She was furnished with a horse, side-saddle, saddle-bags, etc., and whenever a battle took place she would ride fearlessly to the front to a.s.sist the wounded. Many a poor wounded soldier was a.s.sisted off the field by her, and sometimes she would dismount from her horse, and, aiding the wounded man to climb into the saddle, would convey him to the hospital. She carried bandages and stimulants in her saddle-bags, and did all she was able to relieve the sufferings of such as were too badly wounded to be removed.

During this service she was often exposed to the enemy's fire. She was with Grant in the Vicksburg campaign, and on one occasion; being attracted by a tremendous firing, rode rapidly forward, and missing her way found herself within one hundred yards of a battalion of the enemy, whose gray jackets could be seen through the smoke of their rapid firing. Wheeling her horse she galloped out of range, fortunately escaping the storm of bullets which flew about her.

She shared the hardships as well as the perils of the soldiers, and in the bivouac wrapped herself in her blanket and lay on the bare ground, with no other shelter but the sky, rising at the sound of reveille to partake with her comrades of the plain camp fare. All this she did cheerfully and with her whole heart. Her sympathy was not bounded by the wants and sufferings of the soldiers of the federal army, but embraced in its boundless outpouring those of her countrymen who were then ranged against her as foes. Many a sick and suffering Southerner had cause to bless the kindness and devotion of this n.o.ble girl. Herein she showed herself a Christian woman and a practical example of the teachings of Him who said,--"Love your enemies." Such deeds as her's shine amid the terrible pa.s.sions and carnage of war with a heavenly radiance which time can never dim.

Either in the army or in close connection with it, woman's affectionate devotion was ill.u.s.trated in all those relations of life in which she stands beside man. As a mother, as a wife, and as a sister, she brightly displayed this quality. The following instance of wifely devotion is related of a woman who came from the Red River of Louisiana with her husband, who was a Southern officer.

In the fall of 1863, during the bombardment of Charleston by the federal batteries, this young woman, being tenderly attached to her husband, who was in one of the forts, begged the military authorities to allow her to join her husband and share the fearful dangers and hardships to which he was daily and nightly exposed. All representations of the difficulties, privations, and perils she would encounter failed to daunt her in her purpose. The importunities of the loving wife prevailed over military rules and even over the expostulations of her husband, and she was allowed to take her post beside the one whom she regarded with an affection amounting to idolatry. Sending her two children to the care of a maiden aunt some miles from the city, she was conveyed to her husband's battery, a large earth-work outside of the city.

Here she remained for sixty days, during which the battery where she was, made one of the princ.i.p.al targets for the federal cannon. For weeks together she lay down in her clothes in the midst of the soldiers. The bursting of the sh.e.l.ls and the sound of the federal hundred-pounders, with answering volleys from the fort, scarcely intermitted night or day. Sleep was for several days after her arrival out of the question. But at length she became used to the cannonade and enjoyed intermittent slumbers, from which she was sometimes awakened by the explosion of a sh.e.l.l which had penetrated the roof of the fort and strewed the earth with dead and wounded.

Her only food was the wormy bread and half-cured pork which was served out to the soldiers, and her drink was brackish water from the ditch that surrounded the earth-work. The cannonading during the day was so furious that the fort was often almost reduced to ruins, but in the night the destruction was repaired. A fleet of gunboats joined the land batteries in bombarding the fort, and at last succeeded in making it no longer tenable.

Guns had been dismounted, the bomb-proof had been destroyed, and the sides of the earth-work were full of breaches where the huge ten-inch b.a.l.l.s had ploughed their way.

During all these terrifying and dreadful scenes, our heroine stayed at her post of love and duty beside her husband. When the little garrison evacuated the fort at night and retired to the city, she was carried in an ambulance drawn by four of the soldiers in honor of her courage and devotion.

One of the most singular and romantic stories of the late war, is that of two young women who enlisted at the same time, and were engaged in active service for nearly a year without any discovery being made or even a suspicion excited as to their true s.e.x.

Sarah Stover and Maria Seelye, for these were the names of these heroines of real life, being homeless orphans, and finding it difficult to earn a subsistence on a small farm in Western Missouri, where they lived, determined to enlist as volunteers in the Federal Army. Accordingly, having donned male attire and proceeded to St. Louis early in 1863, they joined a company which was soon after ordered to proceed to the regiment, which was a part of the army of the Potomac.

Within two weeks after their arrival at the scene of conflict in the East, the battle of Chancellorsville was fought, the two girls partic.i.p.ating in it and seeing something of the horrors of the war in which they were engaged as soldiers. In one of the minor battles which occurred the following summer they were separated in the confusion of the fight, and upon calling the muster, Miss Stover, known in the regiment as Edward Malison, was found among the missing. Her comrade, after searching for her among the killed and wounded in vain, at last ascertained that she had been taken prisoner and conveyed to Richmond.

Miss Seelye, although she was well aware of the serious consequences which might follow, decided to adopt a bold plan in order to reach her friend whom she loved so devotedly, and who was now suffering captivity and perhaps wounds or disease. Through an old negress she obtained a woman's dress and bonnet, and disguising herself in these garments, deserted at the first favorable opportunity. She reached Washington in safety and was successful in an application for a pa.s.s to Fortress Monroe, from which place she made her way after many difficulties to the lines of the Southern Army. By artful representations she overcame the scruples of the officers and pa.s.sed on her way to Richmond, where she soon arrived, and overcoming by her address and perseverance all obstacles, obtained admission to Libby Prison, representing that she was near of kin to one of the prisoners.

Her singular success in accomplishing her object was due doubtless to her intelligence, fine manners, and good looks, with great tact in using the opportunities within her reach.

She found her friend just recovering from a wound in her arm. The secret of her s.e.x was still undiscovered; and after her wound was entirely healed they prepared to attempt an escape which they had already planned. Miss Seelye contrived to smuggle into the prison a complete suit of female attire, in which, one night just as they were relieving the guard, she managed to slip past the cordon of sentries, and joining her friend at the place agreed upon, the two immediately set out for Raleigh, to which city Miss Seelye had obtained two pa.s.ses, one for herself, the other for a lady friend. They traveled on foot, and after pa.s.sing the lines struck boldly across the country in the direction of Norfolk. When morning dawned they concealed themselves in a wood and at night resumed their march.

On one occasion, just as they were emerging from a wood in the evening, they were discovered by a cavalryman. Their appearance excited his suspicions that they were spies, and he told them that he should have to take them to headquarters. But their lady-like manners and straightforward answers persuaded him that he was wrong, and he allowed them to proceed.

Another time they narrowly escaped capture by two soldiers who suddenly entered the cabin of an old negro where they were pa.s.sing the day.

After a tedious journey of a week, they reached the Federal pickets, and finally were transported to Washington on the steamer. This was in the autumn of 1863; their term of service would expire in two months, but after great hesitation they resolved to report themselves to the headquarters of their regiment as just escaped from Richmond. Accordingly, procuring suits of men's attire, they again disguised their s.e.x and proceeded to rejoin their regiment, which was encamped near Washington.

The desertion of Miss Seelye having been explained in this manner, she escaped its serious penalty, and both the girls were soon after regularly discharged from service. As we have already remarked, no suspicion was excited as to their s.e.x, each shielding the other from discovery, and it was only after their discharge that they themselves revealed the secret.

The stories of women who have served as soldiers often disclose motives which would have little influence in impelling the other s.e.x to enter the army. Love and devotion are among the most prominent of the moving causes of female enlistment. Sometimes a maiden, like Helen Goodridge, followed her lover to the war; sometimes a mother enlisted in the hospital department in order to nurse a wounded or sick husband or son. It was often some species of devotion, either to individuals or to her country, that led gentle woman to march in the ranks and share the dangers and privations of army life. Such an instance as the following furnishes a singularly striking ill.u.s.tration of this unselfish love and devotion of which we are speaking.

While the hostile armies were fighting, in the summer of 1864, those desperate battles by which the issues of the war were ultimately decided, a small, slender soldier fighting in the ranks, in General Johnson's division, was struck by a sh.e.l.l which tore away the left arm and stretched the young hero lifeless on the ground. A comrade in pity twisted a handkerchief around the wounded limb as an impromptu tourniquet, and thus having staunched the flowing blood, placed the slender form of the unfortunate soldier under a tree and pa.s.sed on. Here half an hour after he was found by the ambulance men and brought to the hospital, where the surgeon discovered that the heroic heart, still faintly beating, animated the delicate frame of a woman.

Powerful stimulants were administered, and as soon as strength was restored the stump of the wounded limb was amputated near the shoulder. For a week the patient hovered between life and death. But her vitality triumphed in the struggle, and in a few days, with careful nursing she was able to sit up and converse. One of those n.o.ble women, who emulated the example and the glory of Florence Nightingale in nursing and ministering to the sick and wounded in the army, won the maiden-soldier's confidence, and into her ear she breathed her story.

She and a brother aged eighteen had been left orphans two years before.

They were in dest.i.tute circ.u.mstances and had no near relations. They both supported themselves by honest toil, and their lonely and friendless situation had drawn them together with a warmth of affection, that even between a brother and sister has been rarely felt. They were all in all to each other, and when, in the spring of 1864, her brother had been drafted into the army, she learned the name of the regiment to which he had been a.s.signed, and unknown to him a.s.sumed male attire and joined the same regiment.

She sought out her brother, and in a private interview made herself known to him. Astonished and grieved at the step she had taken he begged her to withdraw from the army, which she could easily do by disclosing the fact of her true s.e.x. She remained firm against all his affectionate entreaties, informing him that if he was wounded or taken sick she would be near to nurse him, and in case of such a disaster she would reveal her secret and get a discharge so that she could attend constantly upon him. On the morning of the battle in which she had been wounded they had met for the last time, and, as they well knew the battle would be a b.l.o.o.d.y one, agreed that each one would notify the other of their respective safety in case they both survived. A note had reached her just after the battle, that her brother was safe, and she on her part had sent a message to him that she was alive and well, believing that she would recover, and not wishing to alarm him by telling the truth. Since that time she had heard nothing from him, and begged with streaming eyes that the lady would inquire if he had been wounded in any of the recent severe battles. The lady hastened to procure the much desired information. After diligent inquiries she discovered that the brother had been shot dead in a battle which occurred the day following that in which his sister had been wounded.