The Indian War of 1864 - Chapters 4-6



CHAPTER IV.
FORT KEARNEY.--DOBYTOWN.--SHOOTING TELEGRAPH POLES.--QUARTERMASTER 
STORES.--COMMISSARY STORES.--POST BUILDINGS.--THE CHIMNEY REGISTER.--POST 
GARDEN.--THE BUFFER STRIP.--GREYHOUNDS.--TO START A FRONTIER POST.--
SUPPLIES.--THE BUFFALO HUNT.--THE POKER GAME.--THE START.  

   FORT KEARNEY at that time was an old frontier post. It was said to have 
been established in 1848. It was situated south of the river, and somewhat 
east from the crossing of the Platte, so that the trains going west, and 
crossing the river, would not come past the post, but would cross above 
and west of it. There was a tough collection of frontier habitations just 
on the west edge of the reservation; this place, called Dobytown, was two 
miles west of the Fort. All of the buildings, so far, west of Columbus, 
had been covered with clay roofs. We first noticed them at Columbus. The 
roofs were made of poles, in the interstices of which willow brush had 
been placed, over these swale-grass from the bed of the river, and on top 
of it all from six to ten inches of hard clay dug out from the lower 
portion of some of the gullies. This clay had been tamped and pounded 
down, forming a complete shelter from rain and cold. It was almost like 
cement. In fact, there was nothing in the country to make any other kind 
of a roof out of. There were no shingle machines, or wood from which 
shingles could be made. Dobytown was a collection of adobe buildings of 
Mexican style, containing the toughest inhabitants of the country, male 
and female.

   Fort Kearney was at the junction of the two regular roads, one coming 
west from Omaha, and the other up to the Platte from Fort Leavenworth, the 
trail being augmented by roads from Weston and St. Jo. These all united at 
Dobytown and went together in one track west. The volume of travel was 
much the larger on the southern prong, and these two great currents of 
overland commerce meeting at Dobytown fixed the spot there where the 
toughs of the country met and had their frolics. Large quantities of the 
meanest whisky on earth were consumed here, but, strange as it may appear, 
there were also quantities of champagne sold and drunk here. Persons 
suddenly enriched, coming from the west and the mines, met here with old 
chums and cronies and with them drank champagne; or met old enemies, and 
with them fought a duel to the death. The cemetery was larger than the 
town. Three of the men of my company disappeared immediately upon our 
arrival, and it was suggested that I would find them in Dobytown. The next 
morning a man who lived in Dobytown being down at the Fort, offered to go 
up with me and go around, as he was acquainted with the places, and help 
me find the men. There was a row of telegraph poles between the Fort and 
Dobytown, and after we had started, this new acquaintance of mine, who had 
on two Colt's pistols, told me he could ride the line as fast as his horse 
would run, and put six bullets out of each revolver into successive 
telegraph poles; that is to say, he could hit a telegraph pole with every 
shot. Being somewhat experienced myself from a couple of years' service in 
the cavalry, I did not think he could do it, but I rode along with him, 
and he did it with the missing of only one telegraph pole in twelve shots. 
The road along was about eighteen feet from the poles. He afterwards told 
me he had practiced on it hundreds of times. I often practiced on it 
myself after that, but never could quite attain so good an average. His 
name was Talbot.

   There was at Fort Kearney a vast warehouse in which supplies for the 
west were stored in great quantities. In this big warehouse were rations 
enough for an army. And this at that time was needed, because under the 
law as it then stood, the commissary had the right to sell provisions to 
indigent and hungry persons who made a requisition approved by the Post 
Commander, and these sales were made at the Government cost price. There 
were a great many people who through accidents and improvidence ran out of 
provisions in the wild barren country, and there was a constant sale by 
the post commissary. Post commanders were very particular in these 
matters, and quite frugal in their way of giving orders, yet nevertheless 
in the aggregate the sales were large, and it was necessary that large 
storehouses of provisions should be kept, so that Fort Kearney and other 
frontier posts west of it could be supplied in cases of emergency. In 
addition to that, a post commander always had the right to gratuitously 
feed the Indians, and the Indians were very prone to come in and see, in 
their way of expressing it, "What the white brother would do for them." 
These stores were all rated at cost according to a schedule prepared by 
the assistant quarter-master-general at Leavenworth. When we went there 
this great warehouse was almost full. And in the warehouse there was a 
large room almost as big as a small house, which was built up with heavy 
planks. The commissary unlocked it one day to show me, and there he had 
racks in which barrel upon barrel of liquor was stored. He said that there 
had been liquor piled in there since 1849, and that owing to the 
difficulties and troubles which ensued from its sale and use, it was 
carefully handled and only used for issue to fatigue parties. He then 
said, "The report is that you are going west to build a fort, and if so I 
will let you have a barrel, at cost price." He then kicked the head of a 
barrel in one of the lower racks, and said: "Here is a barrel that has 
been here since 1849, as you see by that mark. That is rye whisky, 
invoiced at twenty-six cents a gallon." It was fully fifteen years old. He 
said, "There must have been considerable evaporated out of it, so you will 
have to buy it at what its marked capacity is." Thereupon I told him to 
save it for me in case the time came. There was also a large quartermaster 
depot for everything in the shape of necessary tools, and frontier 
utensils. There were axes, whip-saws, anvils, blacksmith and carpenter 
tools, shovels, spades, plows, and almost everything that would be needed 
at a frontier post.

   The post itself was a little old rusty frontier cantonment. The 
buildings were principally made out of native lumber, hauled in from the 
East. The post had run down in style and appearance since the regulars 
left it. The fuel was cottonwood cordwood, cut down on the island of the 
Platte. The parade-ground was not very large, and had around it a few 
straggling trees that had evidently been set out in large numbers when the 
post had been made; a few had survived, and they showed the effect of the 
barrenness and aridity of the climate. They looked tough. On the south 
side of the square was the largest building, and on the second floor of it 
was a large room which seemed as if it had at one time been used as a sort 
of officers' club. There was a large brick fireplace, and above it the 
masonry of the chimney had been plastered with a hard, smooth finish. Upon 
this white surface on the breast of the chimney were written a large 
number of names. It looked as if it had been a sort of register of all the 
officers who from first to last had ever visited the post. Each one had 
taken a little space and written his name. And it was one of the most 
interesting experiences of my stay there that I put in the afternoon 
reading the names of Captain So-and-so, Lieutenant So-and-so, and Major So-
and-so, who since that time had become well-known celebrities in the 
military service, North or South, in the civil war then pending. It seems 
as if about all the officers then being distinguished in the war from the 
regular army, had at one time registered their names upon that chimney-
front. Among them was Lieut. R. E. Lee. I will speak more particularly of 
Fort Kearney further on.

   There was no cultivation whatever in and around Kearney. It was too 
desolate and arid. A little garden was in use, down a distance from the 
post, surrounded with some barriers made of post and brush. The refuse of 
the stable had been spaded under, a shallow well dug, and soldiers from 
time to time on fatigue duty had been put to work in those gardens. But 
the result was very feeble, and outside of that nothing was raised. I 
remember during the few days that we were at Fort Kearney there came up a 
violent wind-storm which carried the sand and gravel freely, and the next 
morning I was up at Dobytown, and saw them shoveling away from the doors 
the accumulated drifts. In some places the sand and gravel had piled up 
against the doors fully a foot high. Out on the tableland the sand was on 
the surface, except that in the swales there was grass. I was told that 
Fort Kearney marked the western line of the rights of the Pawnee Indians; 
that they were forbidden by either military order or treaty from going any 
farther west than the line of Fort Kearney. There was also said to be a 
buffer territory, and that the western Indians were not allowed to come 
east within forty miles of Fort Kearney; so that there ran a strip north 
and south of forty miles wide upon which no Indians by right could go. But 
it was only a talking point. As a matter of fact, the Indians went where 
they pleased. The travel from the west at this time was very great, and 
the trains were full of armed men, and they all reported that rumors of 
Indian trouble were prevailing all through the west towards Denver.

   Around Fort Kearney at that time was a large number of splendid 
greyhounds. Major Wood, of our regiment, to whom I have heretofore 
referred, was directed to take command of Fort Kearney. He did so, and 
acted as post commander until further orders. The greyhounds around the 
post seemed to be sort of common property, and Major Wood gave Captain 
O'Brien one, and me one -- two of the most beautiful animals of the kind I 
ever saw, and to which the Captain and I became very much attached. The 
origin of these greyhounds was as follows, which I give as it was told to 
me: sometime back in the '50s an English nobleman by the name of Lord 
George Gore came to this country for the purpose of hunting big game. As 
one person described it to me, Lord George Gore came with forty horses, 
forty servants, forty guns, forty dogs and forty of everything else. He 
stopped at Fort Kearney and hunted, and several litters of those 
greyhounds, and some of the original bunch, were left at the post, and 
became sort of public property, subject to the direction of the post 
commander.

   The moment of our arrival at the post we had all our horses re-shod, 
and were told we would be sent to build a fort at Cottonwood Canyon, one 
hundred miles farther west. We drew from the post quartermaster axes, 
saws, augers, chisels, bar iron for horseshoes, anvils and bellows, and 
all the necessary paraphernalia to start housekeeping out in the wild 
country. And I had the commissary take the barrel of whisky which he had 
promised, fill it from another barrel, and box it up as hardware. It was 
loaded in the wagon with our other stuff, so that when we moved we started 
with eight large Government wagons piled high with rations, supplies, 
corn, ammunition, and tools for the creation of a frontier post.

   On October 7th Major Wood, the post commander, desired to bid us adieu 
by having a buffalo-hunt. Large quantities of buffaloes were over in the 
hills south of the post. So, at noon, Captain O'Brien and I and the Major, 
with a scout, went out to look for the buffalo, but were charged to be 
careful, because Indians from the west might be following the buffalo, and 
they might take advantage of the situation and get us before we got back. 
But we never saw any Indians. We went out with nothing but Colt's 
revolvers, calibre .44, and we had a very exciting afternoon. The buffalo 
had a strange way of moving across the country. The bulls would be 
together in large flocks off on one of the wings of the moving herd. They 
were the most exciting game. They were savage, and often put up a good 
fight. Our horses were much scared, and it was with great difficulty we 
could get anywhere near the buffalo. During the afternoon, while we killed 
several buffaloes, it is a fact that the buffaloes chased us as much as we 
did them. Captain O'Brien had a very ornamental "McClellan cap," as it was 
called, an officer's cap embroidered with a gold corps badge, and cross-
sabers, and on the inside of it in the top was a piece of red patent 
leather. The Captain picked out the biggest buffalo of the bull herd as 
they were going, and managed to get near enough to hit the buffalo, and 
slightly wound it, not seriously. The buffalo started after the Captain, 
and his horse became frantic. In the jolting that ensued the Captain's cap 
fell off, and the red top showing up attracted the eye of the buffalo. He 
got down on his front elbows and bored his horn right through the top of 
that cap and pranced off with it on his left horn. The Captain was unable 
with his revolver to bring him down. We cut out the tongues of the 
buffaloes we killed, and brought them back after sunset. Swarms of wolves 
were seen in every direction, hanging on the flanks of the buffalo herd.

   All arrangements having been made to start west, we bade adieu to the 
officers of the various companies after supper, and went to our tents, 
which were pitched near the Fort, ready to start early in the morning. In 
a little while an officer came out to us, and told us they wanted to have 
some ceremonies before we started, as we would not meet again soon, and we 
went with him to the quartermaster's office and a jollification began. 
Among those present was an officer of a Missouri regiment. I do not now 
remember his regiment, but he was a First Lieutenant. He had been sent 
with dispatches through to Colorado, and was on his way back. This officer 
along during the evening suggested a game of poker; to use his language, 
"ten cents ante and one dollar limit"; and he said, "I'll be banker." Soon 
a party of six were engaged with this Missouri officer, who acted as 
banker; he issued the grains of coffee which were used upon the occasion. 
About one o'clock the party broke up, and lo and behold the banker had had 
bad luck and was unable to redeem the chips. He had gone broke, and more 
too -- he owed everyone around the board. Being unable to pay out he was 
asked why he had suggested a game like this when he bad no money to go 
into it, and he said that he was going back to St. Louis and he thought he 
could make enough to pay his expenses. Thereupon Captain O'Brien took out 
his pocket-knife and cut one of the buttons off of the officer's coat. "I 
will take this in full of what you owe me."

   The buttons on the officer's coat, although he was in the United States 
service, were not United States buttons, but were gilt buttons of the 
State of Missouri. The arms of the State were on them; they were such as 
had been used by the officers of the National Guard of the State. But 
State pride of this officer had caused him to use these buttons on his 
United States uniform. In about two minutes the officer had very few 
buttons on his uniform. Each one of us took a large one from the front 
row, and gave a verbal receipt in full. We never heard of him afterwards. 
I sent the button home by mail for preservation, and owing to its 
ridiculous history have preserved it ever since and still have it.

   The next morning, October 8th, we left Fort Kearney, and went west to a 
fortified ranch called Gardner's Ranch, which was kept by a Mr. James 
Heemstreet.



CHAPTER V.
OCTOBER 9, 1863.--FRENCH'S RANCH.--BUFFALO.--CAPTURED A PRAIRIE-DOG.--
BOUGHT BUGLER.--A DRY RIVER.--THE UPLAND.--THE CANYONS.--INDIAN GRAVE.--
PRAIRIE-FIRE.--VOUCHER FOR BEEF.--THE PLATTE.--CHILLY NIGHT.--INDIAN 
TRADE.--GILMANS' RANCH.--COTTONWOOD SPRINGS.--THE ISLAND AND CANYON.--
OCTOBER 11, 1863.  

   OUR course was now west along the south bank of the river. From time to 
time we passed pools that had sticks driven near them, upon which some 
person had written "Alkali," meaning that the water was so impregnated 
with alkali that it might be harmful. The wind seemed to blow constantly 
from the time that we left Fort Kearney. The road was a broad, smooth, 
beaten track, fully three hundred feet wide, swept clean by the wind, and 
along the sides for some distance the grass was pretty well eaten out. We 
fed our horses morning, noon and night, each time a quart of shelled corn. 
We had a wagon-load or more of it in sacks; each sack held sixty-four 
quarts, and was said to weigh one hundred and twelve pounds, net. In the 
evening of the second day, October 9, 1863, we camped near new cedar 
ranch, with sod inclosure for stock built, by a man named French. There 
was some very good grass down near the river. Mr. French had been keeping 
everybody off from grazing on it, and endeavored to keep us off, but it 
was Government land, and we were in the service of the Government, and we 
did not recognize his sovereignty over the broad country. Mr. French 
became very boisterous, and we had some words with him. Afterwards we were 
told that he was a Confederate deserter from a Southern regiment, and was 
not very fond of blue uniforms, and felt inclined to be as disagreeable as 
possible.

   That evening we were overtaken by a stage going through under an 
escort, and out of the stage jumped a Mr. William Redfield, who notified 
us that he was one of the Vote Commissioners of Iowa. While the soldiers 
were away from home the Legislature had given the soldiers the right to 
vote, so that they could keep down the Copperhead element, which was 
strong in some portions of the State of Iowa, as also elsewhere. These 
Vote Commissioners mustered the troops, examined their muster-rolls, and 
found out who were voters. And having fixed the voting strength of the 
various companies and regiments, checked up the voting returns afterwards, 
and delivered them in Iowa. French's ranch was said to be fifty miles west 
of Kearney.

   Buffalo were visible with a field-glass on both sides of the river, but 
in small numbers, and much scattered. They were not in herds. With a field-
glass the antelope could be seen on the north of the river in myriads, and 
in great numbers towards the hills south and in front of us. In the road I 
captured a prairie-dog. He was large and fat, and was going from one mound 
to another. I headed him off, and finally caught him on foot. Our two 
dogs, "Kearney," owned by Captain O'Brien, and "Lady," owned by me, given 
to us, as stated, at Fort Kearney, were great companions. They were 
constantly coursing out and around, and stirring up game; wolves and jack-
rabbits were frequent. The dogs gave some beautiful runs after antelope, 
but the antelope, having much the start, was able to outrun the dogs. Here 
we found out for the first time that the "jack-rabbit" was swifter than 
the antelope. A pilgrim on the road who watched our dogs run, told us that 
if we wanted to have good fun we must get a stag-hound to go with the grey-
hounds, because, he said, the greyhound courses by sight, and often misses 
the game, but the stag-hound by scent will keep the track, and recover the 
pursuit. So, thereupon, we kept our eyes open, and bought a stag-hound of 
a passing train, and named him, from his loud, sonorous voice, "Bugler," 
and with the three afterwards we often caught antelope and jack-rabbits.

   From Fort Kearney, for many miles up, there was no water in the river. 
The water seemed to be in "the underflow." We not infrequently rode down 
to the river, and with shovels dug watering-places in the sand of the bed. 
We always found permanent water within eighteen inches of the top, no 
matter how dry the sand on top appeared to be. We were told that 75 miles 
of the river were then dry, and that generally about 125 miles of it were 
dry in the dryest season. At French's ranch the water began to appear on 
the surface in the shape of damp places and little pools.

   The next morning, being the morning of October 10th, another stage with 
escort passed us, and we were joined by the assistant surgeon of our 
regiment, who had been ordered to overtake us, and act as our medical 
attendant at the post which we were about to establish. We started bright 
and early in the morning, and having made about fifteen miles, halted to 
rest the horses. Buffalo were noticed over in the hills south of us, and 
many antelope. The hills were constantly rising higher, and canyons were 
running into them south from the river. Leaving the company to proceed to 
a certain designated place seventy-five miles west of Kearney, called 
Smith's ranch, Captain O'Brien and I and the Doctor and the Vote 
Commissioner, Mr. Redfield, went out into the hills. Our horses were 
fresh, and we saw the buffalo scattered seemingly at great distances, as 
far as the eye could reach, all apparently driving to the south. We had 
now got into the country where Indians were making occasional raids, 
stealing horses, and killing heedless travelers. We did not care to pursue 
the buffalo nor kill them unnecessarily, but we desired to watch their 
movements, and to view the country. We found a tableland as level as a 
floor as far as the eye could reach, with buffalo scattered over it, that 
was ever and anon disappearing. The reason of it was that the canyons were 
cut down straight from the level of the plain, and showed no signs of 
existence; nor could the depressions be noticed until arriving almost at 
their brinks. Then beautiful valleys were seen, narrow and deep, full of 
enormous cedar trees, box elders, hackberry, plum trees, and shrubbery. 
There were always places that we could find to descend into the canyons, 
and come out on the other side. We rode along this plain, over these 
beautiful valleys, for fully ten miles. Down in the valleys the buffalo 
were plenty, and there were very many deer; wolves in droves were observed 
sneaking along the sides. Our two dogs were constantly hunting and 
developing game. There had never been an ax put into these canyons, except 
a little at their openings near the river. The cedar trees were as 
straight as arrows, very numerous, and all sizes up to two feet in 
diameter. They grew mostly from the bottom of the canyon, yet no tree-tops 
were seen rising above the level of the plain.

   Having killed what buffalo we wanted, and taken the tongues and humps, 
we turned obliquely towards the river to resume our place with the 
command. At a point on the corner of a canyon as it opened out into the 
broad plain of the Platte River we came across a new Indian grave. It was 
on a scaffold made of four poles. These poles had evidently been lodge-
poles, and were set into the ground. About ten feet from the ground, 
thongs had been stretched across from pole to pole, and a scaffold made; 
the Indian, wrapped up in a fresh buffalo-hide and bound up with a 
horsehair lariat, had been left to dry. Some portion of a horse had been 
tied to each lodge-pole; perhaps the horse had been quartered, and the 
legs tied up; at any rate, there were the bones off which the wolves had 
eaten, but they had not been able to get up to disturb the Indian, who had 
probably been killed soon before in a raid down the road. The Captain and 
I rode northwest, while the Doctor and Vote Commissioner, separating from 
us, went north towards the river. We could from our high elevation see our 
company of cavalry in the rear, miles away, coming slowly and silently up 
the plain, with a cloud of dust drifting to the north.

   The wind had very much freshened, and as we got down into the valley, 
which was here two or three miles wide on each side of the stream, Captain 
O'Brien started to light a cigar. This was a great feat for any one to do, 
in such a wind, on horseback. But the Captain from his former service in 
the army claimed that he could light a cigar in a tornado. The Captain did 
light a cigar and threw the match away, which he thought had gone out. In 
a flash a blaze started up in a northerly course towards the river. The 
grass was fine and silky; the "prairie-grass" had not got in that country 
at that time, and there was only short, matted buffalo-grass. The flame 
went with the speed of a railroad train, enlarging as it went. Towards the 
river the blaze widened and the fire went with a hoarse rumble. In the 
track ahead of this fire were some cattle grazing. They immediately took 
flight, and fled towards the river in front of the fire. The fire soon 
reached the river in a path about one-half mile wide, and became soon 
extinguished. Several of the cattle were injured jumping down the river-
bank, and a man rode out to us and demanded pay. The Captain told the man 
that the circumstances were entirely an accident, and sympathized with the 
man, and drawing up his canteen, which was nearly full of whisky (which 
the Captain partook very little of), he handed it to the man, who pulled 
away at it as if he had met an old friend that he had not seen for years. 
The result was that he rode down with us to the river, and when they saw 
the cattle there, our teams soon came up, and we got the few injured 
cattle out, killed and skinned them, hung them up to dry over-night, and 
Captain O'Brien gave a voucher to the man for so many pounds of beef, 
averaging five hundred pounds to the animal, at six cents a pound. It 
turned out all right. They were nice fat cattle, and we needed the meat, 
and the man got his pay through the department quartermaster.

   We camped for the night between seventy-five and eighty miles west of 
Fort Kearney. At the place where we camped the water was visible in the 
river, but there was no distinct current. The nights were becoming chilly, 
the elevation higher, and the wind more constant. About every ten miles 
from French's ranch west there was a store-building with a high, thick, 
sodded inclosure used as a corral. These places were also stage stations, 
and some had sod structures like bastions, built out on the corners, so as 
to make places of defense. And with each of these places there was 
generally a herd of cattle, a bunch of Indian ponies, some herders, and a 
lot of Indian-trading goods; for during the previous summer the Indians 
had come in to trade all along the line of the Platte valley from French's 
ranch west. They brought in lots of well-tanned buffalo-robes, quantities 
of antelope-skins, tanned and untanned, great quantities of buckskin, and 
many other articles of peltry. But trading with the Indians had stopped, 
for there was a growing feeling of hostility, although there were still 
some white men living with the Indians, who had joined them years before, 
learned the languages and married into the tribes. But unless the white 
man could speak the language and had lived among them for several years, 
and had married into the tribe, he was not liked, and his life was in 
danger. These white men had all come in, and were to be found idling away 
their time at the various ranches which we passed; some were acting as 
herders. There were also white hunters and trappers who picked up a great 
deal of fun, and much money, along the Platte, because at certain places 
there were beaver and other fur-bearing animals.

   We started early on October 11th, and passed Gilmans' ranch, which was 
built of cedar, and, going fifteen miles farther, camped at a spring 
called Cottonwood Springs. A man by the name of Charles MacDonald had 
built a cedar ranch at the mouth of Cottonwood Canyon, which canyon came 
down to the river near Cottonwood Springs. Cottonwood Springs was merely a 
seep in a gully which had been an old bed of the river, and which had 
curved up towards Cottonwood Canyon. The water-bed of the river being 
largely composed of gravel, the water came down in the underflow, and 
seeped out at a place down in the bank where there had grown a large 
cottonwood tree. This spring had been dug out, and was the only spring as 
far as known along the Platte for two hundred miles. It was at the mouth 
of Cottonwood Canyon that we were to build our military post. The place 
was a great crossing for the Indians going north and south. The valley 
here was several miles wide. There was a large island in the river of 
several thousand acres, upon which grew the finest grass to be found in 
the country, and there were some scrubby willows and cottonwoods; so that 
the Indians coming from the north found it a good stopping-place to feed 
their ponies either in summer or winter, because in the winter the ponies 
could eat the cottonwood brush. In addition to this, Cottonwood Canyon 
gave a fine passage to the south. A road went up on the floor of the 
canyon, between the trees, until it rose onto the tableland twenty miles 
south. The canyon furnished fuel and protection. It was for the purpose of 
breaking up this Indian run-way that we were ordered to build a post at 
the mouth of the canyon. We arrived there at eleven o'clock in the morning 
of October 11, 1863.



CHAPTER VI.
THE SETTLEMENT AT COTTONWOOD SPRINGS.--MACDONALD'S RANCH.--CUTTING TREES.--
OCTOBER 31, 1863.--BUILDING BARRACKS.--BUILDING QUARTERS AND STABLES.--
NOVEMBER 3, 1863.--THE ELECTION.--THANKSGIVING.--THE GILMANS.--INDIAN 
NAMES.--MASONIC CEREMONIES.--SKUNKS.--ARTILLERY AND INDIANS.--INDIAN 
VISITORS.--LOYAL LEAGUE.--DECEMBER 15, 1863.

   COTTONWOOD SPRINGS, when we arrived there, was one of the important 
points on the road. MacDonald, who had a year or so before our arrival, 
built, as stated, a cedar-log store-building. The main building was about 
twenty feet front and forty feet deep, and was two stories high. A wing 50 
feet extended to the west. The latter was, at the eaves, about eight feet 
high and fifteen feet deep in the clear. Around it in the rear was a large 
and defensible corral, which extended to the arroyo coming out of the 
canyon. It had been a good trading-point with the Indians, and there was a 
stage station there, and a blacksmith shop kept by a man named Hindman. In 
the stage station was a telegraph office. There was also on the other side 
of the road a place where canned goods and liquors were sold, kept by a 
man named Boyer, who had lost a leg, and whom the Indians called
"Hook-sah," which meant "cut leg." MacDonald had dug, in front of his 
store, and cribbed up, an inexhaustible well, which was said to be forty-
six feet deep; it was rigged with pulley, chain, and heavy oaken buckets. 
MacDonald and those at the place had formerly had a good trade with the 
Indians, but now it was all ended, and they were in danger.

   We immediately pitched our tents, and marked out the quadrangle for 
company quarters, officers' quarters, and guard-house. The next day was 
spent in unloading our supplies, putting them under shelter, and 
organizing the squads for going up into the canyon for cedar logs. We had 
only about seventy-five men that were really effective for hard work, but 
many of them were very skillful in the use of the ax, and many knew how to 
handle tools. The end room of the wing of MacDonald's cedar structure was 
used as "pilgrim quarters." It had a heavy clay roof, and a large simple 
cast-iron cook stove, with sheet-iron stovepipe running up through the 
roof. Our "Post Headquarters" used that room for office and mess, but we 
slept in our tents. On October 13th we started up the canyon; six of our 
men had worked in the pineries, and were expert axmen. They went to work 
as three couples to fell the trees. Their axes were sharp, the weather 
stimulating, and they tumbled the trees rapidly. Other squads trimmed the 
branches; others with a crosscut saw worked in constant reliefs, cutting 
the logs the right length. Our quarters had been planned to be built of 
twenty-foot logs. These logs were about a foot in diameter. We had our 
pick. After getting down a lot of the logs, we organized squads with our 
team mules to snake them out of the canyon. The men made rapid work, and 
every night every man who had worked in the canyon got a good snifter from 
my barrel of 1849 whisky. We were racing against the weather, and I never 
saw men work with more activity. The main barracks for the men were 
designed as six square rooms, which made a long building one hundred 
twenty feet long by twenty feet wide on the outside. Among our number were 
those who had built log cabins, and knew how to "carry up a corner," as 
the expression was. So the logs were snaked down, and with assistance the 
men at the corners notched them up, and it was but a few days before the 
cabins seven feet high in the clear were ready for the roof. The best logs 
were kept out to build Company Headquarters with. In a little while we had 
the pole roof on, with the interstices filled with cedar boughs, and about 
ten inches of good hard clay tamped down; but we were still without doors 
and windows, although we had places for them sawed out in the log walls. 
The large logs, of which there were many over twelve inches in diameter, 
were reserved for lumber. We dug out a place on the bank of the arroyo as 
a saw-pit, and having two whip-saws, the men were started sawing out 
lumber one inch in thickness. The men took turns at the top, and the 
bottom, with the saw, sawing the length of a log. Then they were relieved 
by two others, so that the whip-saws were kept running all the time, but 
no one had more than one round a day at that particular work. With smaller 
cedar poles cut, and used as joists, we soon had bunks made in each of the 
rooms of our company's quarters. We had drawn "hay bags" from the 
quartermaster at Fort Kearney. These we used as straw-ticks, and filled 
with whatever the soldiers wanted to put in. The boys chose partners, and 
began to occupy the bunks. We had drawn a lot of sheet-iron for the 
purpose of making stoves, and stovepipes. Our blacksmith rapidly fixed the 
company up with sorts of funnel-shape sheet-iron stoves, in which the 
cedar chips burned like tinder. These company quarters were rather close, 
there being no communication between the different rooms. Sixteen men 
occupied a room, and between the bunks was a space where they had their 
mess-cooking, and their mess-eating. With the whipsaw, lumber enough was 
got out for a door in front of each room, and a window shutter in the rear.

   One or more non-commissioned officers were established in each room, 
and the north end room was a non-commissioned officers' mess. In our kits 
were two broadaxes, and there were men who knew how to use them, so the 
Company Headquarters building was made of logs that had been "scored and 
hewed." The scoring was a simple process. The man stood on the top of the 
log, and chopped into a line through the whole length of the log, and then 
the man with the broadax hewed in and straightened it. By working in 
reliefs, in a few days the Company Headquarters building, eight feet high 
and twenty feet square, with a puncheon floor and cedar door, and with an 
oil-paper window, was ready. Then we put up a house in which to store 
supplies. This was forty by twenty. Then across the road -- for we had 
built alongside of the road and quite near to MacDonald's ranch -- across 
the road we put up a hospital building of twenty-foot square-hewed logs, 
with a sort of porch. These buildings were all "chinked and daubed." That 
is, blocks and chips were driven in between the logs, and clay was mixed 
into mortar by the wagon-load down near the springs, and hauled up, and 
the walls plastered up inside and out so that they were air-tight. 
Afterwards, the roof having become settled, the clay was dampened and 
plastered with a trowel. Then we built a guard-house twenty feet square, 
divided across the middle so that the back half of it was as dark as a 
dungeon, with a big heavy plank door with hinges extending across, which 
our blacksmith had made. Then it became necessary to look after our 
horses, and to build a stable to protect them. These were built upon the 
palisade principle. We made the outline of our stable just about two 
hundred feet long, although it bent with an angle so that we could fill in 
the other angles, and have a square with an open interior. We dug a trench 
three feet deep. We cut the posts only twelve feet long, and putting them 
on end in the trench, we filled the trench, leaving the posts standing 
side and side. When the walls were up, which did not require very long 
time, the tops of the posts were sawed off level, and a plate-rail spiked 
on top of them, with spikes made by the blacksmith, one to a log. Upon 
this we placed a roof, and then fitted up the interior with poles, and got 
our horses under cover. Between these upright palisades we drove blocks, 
put in filling, and on the west and north plastered them up. It was very 
interesting to watch work go forward in such a case as this. There were 
men in the company who collectively knew how to do everything, and do it 
well. Everyone was desirous of getting fixed before the cold weather, and 
there was no laziness or shirking.

   Upon Tuesday, November 3, 1863, the election came off. A strong 
Copperhead and "peace-at-any-price" party had grown up in Iowa, and the 
election was centered upon the governorship. The National Democratic party 
had McClellan for a nominal head; it was trying to bring the war to a 
close, and was propounding all kinds of arbitrations and compromises. The 
only position for the soldiers to take was that of fighting the thing 
right straight through to the bitter end, and making the United States, in 
the language of Lincoln, "All slave or all free." Such was the grim 
determination of the men in the field, and in the ranks; such was the 
sentiment of most of the officers. There were several in the company of 
whom I had begun to have suspicions, but I think by desertion afterward 
they mostly eliminated themselves, and their influence, from the company. 
Capt. O'Brien got the company together at noon on election day, and made 
them a speech. So did I. It wasn't very much of a speech, only I told them 
we couldn't afford to let Iowa get into the hands of the Copperheads, 
because then they would stop recruiting, and try to bring the war to a 
close. We made the speeches a little bit bitter, and got the men worked up 
pretty thoroughly. I was the election officer who was to receive and count 
and forward the ballots. The Captain was as ardent as I was, and a better 
talker. I was pleasantly surprised that the men stayed with us; only eight 
voted the opposite ticket. Capt. O'Brien was much delighted. I made every 
effort to find out from among the boys who it was that voted those eight 
votes. It was, of course, somewhat difficult to find out, but I think five 
of the eight became deserters, and of the other three one was killed by 
whisky, and two had poor military records. Assisted by the soldier vote, 
the State of Iowa was saved, and retained in the ranks of loyal States. On 
looking back it seems to me strange how hard we had to fight and yet how 
much exertion we had to put forth to control those in the rear so that we 
could be permitted to put down the Rebellion. As I look back on it I don't 
see how it was that the Union was saved; and I cannot comprehend, although 
I was in the middle of it, how it was that we managed to keep things going 
until the end came, in a satisfactory manner.

   At a ranch below us, where there was a good valley in the Platte, a man 
had brought out a mowing-machine, and had put up for the use of the 
overland travelers about two hundred tons of hay. After we arrived, he 
came to see us, and told us that although grass was dead, and dry, that he 
could still cut considerable more of it, and that horses could live upon 
it. We made arrangements with him for some of this poor hay, and also 
enough of the other to carry us through. In addition to this, squads of 
horses tied together by the halter, two and two, were sent out under 
charge of a soldier to allow them to graze and frolic day by day; and our 
horses, having nothing else to do at the time, improved and kept in 
excellent condition.

   On November 28th we were all under cover, and although there was still 
much to do, we determined to celebrate Thanksgiving, supposing that to be 
the day. Down at Gilmans' Ranch, fifteen miles east of the post, they 
wanted to furnish us some fat cattle, and some additional hay. Captain 
O'Brien and I rode down there, and found the "Gilman Brothers." There were 
two of them. They had been engaged in the Indian trade. They told us that 
the Indians were liable at any time to make a lot of trouble, and they 
told us much about Indian character, disposition, and methods. The elder 
of the two had a strange history. He had joined the Walker filibustering 
expedition which went to Cuba years before, in which so many were 
garroted. He said that he was a young man, and was from Portsmouth, New 
Hampshire, and understood the sea and understood the Cubans. And instead 
of going ashore in Cuba, he got onto a piece of wood or wreckage and 
stayed out in the Gulf Stream until he was picked up by a freight vessel. 
He said that if he had gone ashore the Spanish officers would have 
executed him. After that he started for California with his brother. Their 
team got wrecked, and they stopped, got to trading with the Indians, and 
finally built their ranch. They now had a very fine built and defensible 
ranch. They told us how they made their money. They said that the train 
oxen not being generally shod, their feet on the overland travel finally 
became sore, and the oxen became unable to pull, and that the ranchmen 
traded one well animal for two footsore animals -- even trade, two for 
one. Then they kept the footsore animal for a time until their hoofs grew 
out, and traded again. By keeping a supply of well-broken oxen which could 
be put right under the yoke, they had managed to build up a large 
business, and occasionally to sell yokes of oxen at large prices for cash, 
and they had made considerable money. They had a large stock of goods.

   There was an Indian sitting down in front of this ranch when we went 
there, but the Gilmans said that the Indian was a poor, worthless and 
harmless fellow, who would do nobody any injury. The Indian name of the 
elder brother, J. K. Gilman, was We-chox'-cha, and of the younger, Jud 
Gilman, the Indian name was Po-te'-sha-sha. I was told that the first name 
meant "the old man with a pump," and the other, "red whiskers." There was 
an iron pump out in front of the house, and the younger had red whiskers. 
The Indians gave every white man a name. They could not understand why a 
white man should have a name that did not mean anything. We made 
arrangements with the Gilmans for beef for the post, subject to the 
approval of the district quartermaster. And we also arranged that they 
should not sell all of their hay, so that in case we needed some in the 
spring we could have it. The Gilmans told us that the Indians would not 
begin their depredations until the grass was high enough for their ponies. 
That we might expect trouble about the first of June next. All the 
prophecies J. K. Gilman made came true, and the information which he gave 
proved to be sound and sensible. He was a very capable, intelligent man, 
as was also his brother, although the older was better informed. They were 
men who would make good citizens anywhere, and how they should be out 
there in that lone ranch trading with Indians and pilgrims, was a great 
deal of a mystery, unless it could be explained by the profits of their 
business. The older Gilman told me that their stuff there around them was 
worth more than $50,000, and that they had large quantities of supplies in 
back rooms for the purpose of handling the trade. They also said that they 
had gotten acquainted with all the chiefs of the Sioux and Cheyennes, and 
had induced men as agents to go out and live with them, and sort of take 
orders; that is, to influence trade to come to them, the Gilmans, on a 
percentage.

   Gold was discovered in Colorado May 7, 1859, at Idaho Springs, by a 
man, it was claimed, named George Washington Jackson. Soon afterwards a 
heavy emigration from the States to there set in.

   Shortly after Thanksgiving, about the first of December, a large train 
came down from the west. There must have been fully two hundred persons in 
it, and about the same time some travelers came up from the east, so that 
one evening MacDonald, the owner of the ranch, announced that they were 
going to have Masonic services in the second story of his ranch building. 
I was not a member of that organization, but I saw a number going there, 
and it was a surprise to me how all of the persons of that congregation 
could get into that one upper room. I afterwards spoke of it to MacDonald, 
and he went and got out his Masonic apron and a lot of paraphernalia, and 
said that he had been at the head of a lodge in the East, and was going to 
establish one as soon as enough people in the country could come to it.

   One thing that was remarkable was the number of skunks in the Platte 
valley. They were playing hide-and-seek all over Fort Kearney while we 
were there, and ranchmen said that they were plentiful, and a great 
nuisance. We had hardly got established before they were in and out the 
floors and the stables, and other places where they could hide, and they 
appeared to be as tame and playful as kittens. It was not long before in 
our new post they became an insufferable pest.

   We still kept on at work improving our quarters. We dug and curbed up a 
well. We made a flag-pole out of cedar trees trimmed down, and joined up 
by the blacksmith. It was a great occasion. It was a beautiful tall and 
slender pole, and we set it deeply in the ground. We needed some more 
supplies; and were told that we could have two twelve-pound mountain 
howitzers from Fort Kearney. So we sent down our teams with an escort of a 
sergeant and ten men that brought us back the two howitzers, a lot of 
artillery ammunition, new tools, rations, and supplies. These two 
howitzers we mounted on the parade-ground. Captain O'Brien had belonged to 
the artillery early in the war, and thoroughly understood the handling of 
these light guns. Squads were put to work drilling on these howitzers, so 
that in course of time every man in the company could fill any place on a 
gun squad. About the fifteenth of December, while drilling the squad, some 
Indians were seen over on the island of the Platte north of the post. It 
was thought best to give them a scare; so the two pieces were run to a 
good place north of the post, near the river, and fired at the Indians. 
Our shells fell short, but the Indians scampered to the north bank, and 
were soon out of sight. In a day or two afterwards there suddenly appeared 
in the post an old Indian, together with a young buck of about twenty. He 
came up to me, saying, "How-cola, How-cola," the word "Cola," in the Sioux 
language, meaning "friend." He made a sign that he wanted something to 
eat, so I took them both to the storehouse, and told the commissary 
sergeant to draw out a quart of molasses into a mess-pan, and give it to 
the Indians with a box of hard-tack and let them eat what they wanted. The 
amount which they consumed was enormous. I went out to inquire how these 
Indians got in, and where they were from. Some civilian whom I didn't 
know, talked with the Indians, and they said they were with their tribe a 
long distance south, but had come north to see their white brother, and 
see what their white brother would do for them. They were probably spies. 
Several of the boys stood around in wonderment, watching these Indians 
eat. Each one of them ate as much as five men ought to be able to hold. 
The weather was cold, and they were not very warmly clad, but each one had 
a fine tanned buffalo-robe as soft and flexible as velvet. I wanted to 
find out something from them, but while I was hunting for the man that 
knew, these Indians started on a trot, and went up the canyon one behind 
the other, and were seen no more. We ought to have put them in the guard-
house and held them.

   Ever since I came to the post I had made it a custom to give the Loyal 
League hailing-sign to the men who were passing in the trains, but I 
rarely got a response. Not one man in five hundred knew what it meant. Not 
one in five hundred seemed to care whether the Government won or lost in 
the Civil War. They were either deserters from the army, North or South, 
or were out for cash only.