Captured by the Navajos

by Charles A. Curtis

  Produced by Suzanne Shell, Sankar Viswanathan, and theOnline Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net

  "EVERY ONE HELD HIS RIFLE IN READINESS TO SHOOT THE ESCAPING APACHES"]

  CAPTURED BY THE NAVAJOS

  BY CAPTAIN CHARLES A. CURTIS U.S.A.

  ILLUSTRATED

  NEW YORK AND LONDON HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS

  Copyright, 1904, by HARPER & BROTHERS.

  CONTENTS

  CHAP.

  I. INTRODUCES THE BOYS

  II. ATTACKED BY NAVAJOS

  III. WARLIKE PUEBLOS

  IV. IN A NAVAJO TRAP

  V. A SIEGE AND AN AMBUSCADE

  VI. CROSSING THE RIVER

  VII. A SWOLLEN STREAM AND STOLEN PONY

  VIII. OVER THE DIVIDE--A CORPORAL MISSING

  IX. THE RESCUING PARTY

  X. THE CORPORALS ARE PROMOTED

  XI. BOTH PONIES ARE STOLEN

  XII. INDIANS ON THE WAR-PATH

  XIII. THE BOY SERGEANTS DO GOOD SERVICE

  XIV. ON THE DESERT WITHOUT WATER

  XV. THE PONIES ARE FOUND

  XVI. APACHES IN SKULL VALLEY

  XVII. PURSUIT OF THE APACHES

  XVIII. ON THE TRAIL OF THE APACHES

  XIX. THE ATTACK ON THE APACHE CAMP

  ILLUSTRATIONS

  "EVERY ONE HELD HIS RIFLE IN READINESS TOSHOOT THE ESCAPING APACHES" Frontispiece

  "MOUNTED, THE BOYS PRESENTED A WARLIKEAPPEARANCE"

  "CORPORAL HENRY ASKED CAPTAIN BAYARD TOINQUIRE FOR MANUEL PEREA"

  "'GOD HAS GIVEN ME AMONG MANY FRIENDS,TWO THAT ARE SOMETHING MORE'"

  CAPTURED BY THE NAVAJOS

  I

  INTRODUCES THE BOYS

  It was late in the fall of the second year of the civil war that Irejoined my company at Santa Fe, New Mexico, from detached service inthe Army of the Potomac. The boom of the sunrise gun awoke me on themorning after my arrival, and I hastened to attend reveille roll-call.As I descended the steps of the officers' quarters the men of the fourcompanies composing the garrison were forming into line before theirbarracks. Details from the guard, which had just fired the gun andhoisted the national colors, were returning to the guard-house, andthe officers were hastening to their places.

  At the conclusion of the ceremony I turned again towards my quarters,and noticed two handsome boys, evidently aged about fifteen andthirteen, dressed in a modification of the infantry uniform of thearmy, and wearing corporals' chevrons. They stood near the regimentaladjutant, and seemed to be reporting their presence to him.

  At breakfast, the adjutant chancing to sit near me, I asked him whothe youthful soldiers were.

  "They are the sons of Lieutenant-Colonel Burton, Corporals Frank andHenry," he replied. "They hold honorary rank, and are attached tohead-quarters, acting as messengers and performing some light clericalwork."

  "How do they happen to be in Santa Fe?"

  "Mother recently died in the East, and the colonel had them sent herein charge of a tutor who is to fit them for college, I believe."

  Later, on the same day, being desirous of looking over this ancientIndian and Mexican town, I was making a pedestrian tour of itsstreets, and chanced to be opposite San Miguel School in the easternsection during the pupils' recess. Half a dozen boys were engaged inthrowing the lasso over the posts of the enclosing fence, whensuddenly from a side street appeared the young corporals whom I hadseen at reveille.

  The Mexican boys instantly greeted them with derisive shouts andjeers. They called them little Gringos and other opprobrious names,and one young Mexican threw the loop of his lasso over the smallercorporal's head and jerked him off his feet. His companions laughedloudly. The older corporal instantly pulled out his knife and cut therope. Then the two brothers stood shoulder to shoulder, facing thecrowd, quite ready to defend themselves. The young Mexicans,gesticulating and shouting, crowded round the two brothers, and blowsappeared imminent.

  "Muchachos," suddenly cried a ringing voice from the rear, in Spanish,"are you not ashamed? A hundred against two!"

  A handsome lad forced his way through the crowd, placed himself besidethe two corporals, and faced his young countrymen. Before the Mexicansrecovered from their surprise the bell of San Miguel summoned them toschool. They hurried away, leaving the two corporals with the youngMexican who had come to their assistance.

  "My name is Frank Burton," said the older corporal, extending hishand to the Mexican, "and this is my brother, Henry."

  The Mexican boy grasped the proffered hand, and said, "My name isManuel Perea, of Algodones."

  "We are the sons of the commanding officer at the fort. Can't you comeand see us next holiday?"

  "I should much like to; I will ask the fathers if I may."

  "Come over, and we will try to make your visit pleasant."

  "How well you speak Spanish! It will be a great pleasure to visitAmerican boys who can speak my language, for I know but few Englishwords."

  "Next Saturday, then?"

  "At ten o'clock, if the padres consent. Good-bye," and Manueldisappeared into the school-room.

  The following Saturday I saw the two corporals and their newlyacquired companion at the post and at dinner in the mess-room, and afriendship was then formed which was to continue for many years.

  One evening, nearly a month afterwards, I received an order to marchmy company into the Jemez Mountains to co-operate with other detachedcommands in a war being carried on against the Navajo Indians. Just asI had laid aside the order after reading it, Colonel Burton entered,and, taking a seat by my fireside, announced that he had been orderedon detached service to northern Colorado, on a tour of inspection,which would require him to be absent for a considerable period, andthat he had been thinking of allowing his sons to accompany me to mycamp at Los Valles Grandes.

  "The hunting and fishing are fine in those valleys, and Frank andHenry would enjoy life there very much," he said. "They have done sowell in their studies that they deserve a well-earned recreation."

  "I should much like to have their company, sir," I replied, "but wouldit not be exposing them to great danger from the Indians?"

  "The officer whom you are to relieve has been in the valleys nearly ayear, and he reports that he has not seen a Navajo in all that time.Of course, it may be your fortune to meet them, but I do not thinkso. If you do, then the boys must give a good account of themselves.In any engagement that involves the whole command they must not forgetthey are the sons of a soldier. Still, I do not want them needlesslyexposed. You are quite sure it will give you no trouble to take them?"

  "Few things could afford me greater pleasure on such isolated duty,sir. They will be good company for me."

  "Thank you for your kindness. The lads will report to you to-morrowmorning. I will see that they are properly fitted out, and will writeyou now and then during my absence, and as soon as I return to SantaFe they can be sent back."

  Colonel Burton then took his departure, and I turned to a localhistory to learn from its pages something of the tribe with which Imight be brought in contact.

  The home of the Navajos lay between the Rio Grande del Norte on theeast, the Rio Colorado on the west, the Rio San Juan on the north, andthe Rio Colorado Chiquito on the south, but from time immemorial theyhad roamed a considerable distance beyond these borders.

  They had always been known as a pastoral race, raising flocks andherds, and tilling
the soil. They owned, at the time we began war uponthem, sheep and ponies by the thousand, and raised large quantities ofcorn, wheat, beans, and other products.

  They numbered between twelve and fifteen thousand, and could put threethousand mounted warriors in the field. They were industrious, the mendoing all the hard work instead of putting it upon the women, as dothe Indians of the plains and all of the marauding tribes. Theymanufactured their wearing apparel, and made their own weapons, suchas bows, arrows, and lances. They wove beautiful blankets, often verycostly, and knit woollen stockings, and dressed in greater comfortthan did most other tribes. In addition to a somewhat brilliantcostume, they wore numerous strings of fine coral, shells, and manyornaments of silver, and usually appeared in cool weather with ahandsome blanket thrown over the shoulders.

  The Navajos and the New Mexicans were almost continually at war.Expeditions were frequently fitted out in the border towns by theclass of New Mexicans who possessed no land or stock, for the solepurpose of capturing the flocks and herds of the Navajos. The Indiansretaliated in kind, making raids upon the settlements and pasturelands, and driving off sheep, horses, and cattle to the mountains.Complaints were made by the property-holders, and war was declaredagainst the Indians.

  The military department of New Mexico was in fine condition to carryon a successful war. Besides our regiment of regular infantry, it hadtwo regiments of California volunteer infantry and one regiment eachof California and New Mexican cavalry.

  The Navajo upon the war-path was terribly in earnest, and his methodsof waging war were like those of the redman everywhere. With theknowledge that the American soldier was an ally of his old-time enemy,and that the Mexican was wearing the uniform of the "Great Father," heno longer hesitated to look upon us as his enemies also, and resolvedto combat us up to the very walls of our posts.

  No road in the Territory was safe to the traveller; no train daredmove without an escort. Towns were raided, and women and childrencarried into captivity. Frightful cases of mutilation and torture wereconstantly occurring in the mountain fastnesses. Troops took thefield, and prosecuted with vigilance a war in which there was littleglory and plenty of suffering and hard service.

  Every band of Indians captured was taken to the Bosque Rodondo, on theRio Pecos, where a large fort had been established. It was occupied bya strong garrison of infantry and cavalry.

  I had found social life in Santa Fe very pleasant during my brief staythere, so I was not overjoyed when I received the order to march mycompany to Los Valles Grandes, there to relieve the California companyalready referred to. But the order being peremptory, we packed ourbaggage during the first hours of the night, and were on the road soonafter daybreak.

  It was the 3d of October when the boy corporals and myself, mounted onsturdy Mexican ponies, rode out of Fort Marcy for our new station, onehundred miles due west. The regimental band escorted the companythrough the plaza and for a mile on our way, playing, afterimmemorial custom, "The Girl I Left Behind Me," and adding, I thoughtwith a vein of irony, "Ain't Ye Glad You've Got Out th' Wilderness?"

  On the morning of the 8th, after four days of gradual and constantascent from the valley of the Rio Grande, which we had forded at SanIldefonso, we began the slower ascent of the most difficult portion ofour march.

  The woods were full of wild turkeys and mountain grouse, made fat onthe pine-nuts, and Frank and Henry and the soldier huntsmen secured agenerous supply for our first meal in our new military home.

  It took us from early morning until noon of the last day's march toreach the highest point of the road. What with the frequent halts forthe men to fasten a rope to the wagon-poles and aid the severely taxedmules up the steepest places, to fill gullies and sloughs with stonesand brush, to pry mired wheels up to firm ground, and repair brokenharnesses and wagons, we were over half a day in going a distancewhich could have been accomplished in two hours by soldiersunencumbered with a baggage and supply train.

  The downward march on the western slope of the mountain-range wasrapidly made over a smooth road through a continuous avenue ofoverarching forest trees, and without a halt. From the lower limit ofthe forest we caught the first glimpse of the Great Valleys. Thevalley before us was fourteen miles long, and of a nearly uniformwidth of eight miles. It was almost surrounded by mountains; in fact,while there were many trails leading out of it, there was but onepracticable wagon-road--that by which we had entered. But at thesouthern extremity there was a precipitous canon, through which floweda considerable stream. To the west was another canon, a dry one,called La Puerta--the doorway--which led into the second valley,called the Valley of San Antonio.

  The Great Valley, on the eastern edge of which I had halted thecompany for a few moments' rest and observation, was lower through thecentre than at the sides. It was not unlike an oblong platter, and wasabsolutely treeless, except that opposite us a bold, pine-clad pointjutted out from the western mountain-range about three miles, like aheadland into the sea.

  The whole valley was verdant with thick grass. The two boys, sittingon their ponies a few yards in advance of the company line, were inraptures over the prospect.

  "This is the first bit of country I've seen in New Mexico that lookslike Vermont," said Frank.

  "Yes, and what a change in the space of a few miles!" observed Henry."On the opposite side of this range were only bunch-grass, cactus, andsand, and here we have fine turf and waving grass. What are thoseobjects in that farther corner, sir?" he continued, turning to me andpointing to the southwest. "Look like deer or grazing cattle."

  "There is a small herd of deer there, sure enough," I replied, aftermaking out the objects through my glass. "We shall not want forvenison if we have good luck with our rifles."

  "Deer, antelope, turkeys, ducks, geese, sand-hill crane, and trout!"exclaimed Frank. "We've hit a hunter's paradise."

  "And bears and catamounts, too, I suspect," said Henry, looking alittle lugubrious.

  "My, but wouldn't I like to kill a bear!" said Frank.

  "Well, I don't believe I shall hunt for one, and I hope a bear won'thunt for me," said the younger lad. "I'll be satisfied with turkeys,grouse, ducks, and trout."

  Six miles due west, a little south of the wooded point, detached fromit about half a mile, we perceived a line of small cabins, which weinferred was the volunteer encampment. They stretched across a littlelevel space, enclosed by a gently sloping ridge of horseshoe shape.The ridge, in fact, proved to be of that shape when we examined itlater. The row of sixteen cabins stretched across the curve, andlooked out of the opening towards the eastern side of the valley.Fifty yards in front of the cabins, running across the horseshoe fromheel to heel, flowed a crystal stream of water twenty feet wide andtwo feet deep, which rose from forty-two springs near the northern endof the valley. The ridge enclosing the encampment was nowhere morethan twenty-five feet above the level parade.

  The cabins were built of pine logs laid up horizontally, flanked onthe north by the kitchen and stable, and on the south by a storehouse.Behind the cabins, at the centre of the horseshoe curve, two-thirdsthe way up the slope of the ridge, and overlooking the encampment fromits rear, stood the guard-house, in front of which paced a sentinel.

  Resuming our march, a brisk step soon brought us to the encampment. Atthe brook before the parade I was met by the volunteer officers, whodid not disguise their joy at the prospect of leaving what theyconsidered a life of unbearable exile. Even before the customarycivilities were passed, the captain asked me if my animals were in acondition to warrant his loading the wagons with his company propertyas soon as I unloaded mine, as he wished to make an evening's marchtowards Santa Fe.

  I told him I thought they were, provided he took the two wagonsbelonging to the camp in addition, so that the loads would be light.He approved of my suggestion, and promised to send back the wagons assoon as he reached Fort Marcy.

  The wood-yard being well supplied with fuel, I saw no reason why thewagons and mules could not be spared the ten da
ys necessary to makethe round trip.

  One reason for doing all I could to facilitate the immediate departureof the Californians was that my men were anxious to move into thecabins at once.

  With my first glance at the encampment, it had seemed to me too opento surprise. The adjacent forest-clad point crept up near the leftflank, offering an effectual screen to an attacking party, and theoverlooking sentinel at the guard-house did not have a range of visionto the rear of more than fifty yards. He was not on the summit of theridge by at least half that distance, and walked along the side of theguard-house next the cabins. He could see nothing of the surface ofthe valley to the west of the ridge, and when passing along the frontof the building, as he paced backward and forward, he saw nothing tothe rear of his beat.

  I expressed my opinion of the situation to the volunteer captain, buthe replied, "Pshaw! you might as well take the sentinel off, for allthe good he does as a lookout for Indians."

  "Have you seen none?"

  "Not a solitary moccasin, except an occasional Pueblo, since I've beenhere--eleven months."

  "I suppose you have scouted the country thoroughly?"

  "There isn't a trail within thirty miles that I do not know. Thesebundles of wolf-skins and other pelts you see going into the wagonsare pretty good evidence that my men know the country."

  We walked to the kitchen, and found, hanging on the walls of thestore-room, a dozen quarters of venison, the fat carcass of a bear,and several bunches of fowl.

  "We are not obliged to kill our cattle to supply the men with meat,"added the captain. "We butcher only when we need a change from wildmeat."

  "I saw from the edge of the valley where I entered it that you havedeer."

  "Pretty much everything but buffalo is here."

  "I hear your brook is full of fish."

  "There's where you make a mistake," he replied. "There is not a fishin this valley. The water is spring water, and must possess somemineral property distasteful to trout, for they never run up here. InSan Antonio Valley, six miles to the west, in a brook less clear thanthis, you can catch them by the cart-load."

  "I suppose you intend to take this venison with you?"

  "Not if you will accept the gift of all but a few quarters, which wewill take for friends in the city."

  "Thank you and your men. It will be a treat to us, and keep us goinguntil we can put in a hunt on our own account."

  We went back to the parade, and stood looking at the surroundingmountains in the deepening twilight.

  "What other ways are there in and out of the valley, besides the onewhich we entered?" I asked.

  "Well, on the east and south sides there is a trail between the peaks,four in all, and one good bridle-path to the Pueblo of Jemez. Thatdescends from the valley level to the Jemez River bottom, a drop ofnearly three thousand feet, in a distance of three miles, zigzaggingtwice that distance."

  "And to the west and north?"

  "To the north there is a trail to Abiquiu, rarely used, and to thewest there is only La Puerta, into which all the other trails from theeast and south concentrate. It is to watch La Puerta that this campwas established."

  "And you say you have seen no Navajos or signs of them since youcame?"

  "Yes, plenty of signs, but no Indians. Parties have passed here in thenight, but none were driving stock."

  I learned all I could of the captain while his men hurried theirbaggage into the wagons, but he was too much excited over the prospectof leaving the Great Valleys, as well as curious to know of events inSanta Fe, to give me much information. When the guard of regularsrelieved the volunteer guard, I placed my sentinel on a beat a dozenyards in rear of the guard-house, which enabled him to see severalhundred yards back of the ridge, and yet not show himself prominentlyto an approaching foe.

  The volunteers at last marched away, and I made a casual examinationof the cabins. I noticed that the inner surface of the log walls hadbeen hewn smooth, and the names, company, and regiment of the formeroccupants had been carved with knives or burned in with hot pokersalong the upper courses. Each had a wide, open, stone fireplace andchimney set in one corner, after the Mexican fashion.

  No uniform design had been observed in the construction of the cabins,the occupants having followed their own ideas of what would provecomfortable. Height, width, and depth were variable, but their frontswere in perfect alignment.

  The hut which had been occupied by the officers and which fell to theboys and myself was at the right of the line, next the storehouse, alittle removed from the others. It was twenty by twenty feet,partitioned on one side into two alcoves in which were rude bedsteads,one of which was assigned to the boys and one to myself. A door openedon the south side, and a window, the only glass one in camp, lookedout upon the parade. Floors in all the cabins were of earth, raised afoot higher than the outside surface of the ground, smoothed with atrowel and carpeted with blankets, until later, when skins of wildanimals took their place. Doors were made of puncheons, swung onwooden hinges and fastened with wooden latches operated bylatch-strings.

  Our first day in camp was principally spent in making ourselvescomfortable. The men were busy in filling bed-sacks from thehay-stacks, and in repairing the cabins and articles of furniture. Tenhead of beef cattle had been turned over to me with the other propertyof the camp. I had placed them in charge of a soldier, with orders toherd them in the valley immediately in front of the opening, wherethey could be plainly seen from the parade as well as the guard-house.

  At noon two Mexican hunters, father and son, rode up to my door, theformer mounted on a mule and the latter on a burro, or donkey. Theelder said their names were Jose and Manuel Cordova, of Canoncito,that they were looking for deer, and would like permission to make thecamp their place of rendezvous. I gave them permission to do so, andtheir animals were turned loose with our stock.

  About four o'clock in the afternoon the boy corporals and myself,tired with our work of repairing and arranging quarters, sat down to alunch of broiled grouse.

  We were busily picking the last bones when we were startled by loudshouts. Quickly running to the centre of the parade, where the menwere rapidly assembling with their arms, I saw the soldier-herdsmancoming towards camp as fast as he could run, waving his hat andshouting. Behind him the steers were running in the oppositedirection, driven by six Indians on foot. They were waking the echoeswith their war-whoops.