by Terry Grosz
When the meal was done, the men gathered around the hot fire, smoked and got reacquainted. The women and children in the meantime gathered behind the men and caught up on the latest gossip with Singing Bird and the happenings at the rendezvous. Leo and Jeremiah, being new to this kind of event, just sat there on several logs around the central fire learning, listening and adding another chapter to their lives—a chapter that included learning about an Indian culture other than that of their earlier captors, the Utes, as well as making and better understanding sign language.
The next morning, the men quietly sat on their horses several miles from their camps. They observed a great herd of buffalo feeding off in the distance from a hidden, downwind position. Steam rose from the horses’ bodies and nostrils to announce that winter had indeed arrived with Jack Frost and all his minions.
Jacob seemed to get an idea and moved his horse over to Standing Elk. Jacob said, “Maybe we five Mountain Men with our heavy rifles should sneak closer to the buffalo and use our heavy firepower to kill those buffalo we need to make meat for everyone.”
Standing Elk chewed over the proposal for a moment and then translated the suggestion to Lame Deer, chief of the band.
Lame Deer said nothing for a long time. So long in fact that Jacob thought he might have taken offense to the suggestion, especially in light of the cultural thing with the reputation of his warriors as the tribes’ providers at stake. Then Lame Deer turned to Standing Elk and responded in Lakota.
Standing Elk repeated back to Jacob in English: “Lame Deer says we will watch how the white men kill a large number of buffalo. When the white men are finished, our warriors will ride into the herd and show the white men how we hunt buffalo with our bows and arrows.”
Jacob smiled at Lame Deer’s clever wisdom and looked up at the chief, who nodded in stoic agreement.
Jacob led his company and soon the five of them were lying in the light snow cover on a windblown sagebrush ridge some eighty yards from the great herd of feeding buffalo. They laid out their Hawkens alongside their possibles sacks and took their extra Hawkens in hand. They quietly laid out their plans: They would shoot the edge of the herd, cows if possible for starters because bulls made for coarser and stringier meat than the females. If any animals became alarmed and began moving off, they would kill them next until they had the entire herd in a confused stand. Then they would continue to kill those on the outside of the herd until they had all they needed.
Jacob figured one hundred buffalo would do the trick for their winter’s meat. Besides, if the snow didn’t get much deeper, they could repeat the hunt on a later date since they now had so many hands to help in the butchering, transporting and processing.
Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Five rapid gunshots started the killing as the Hawkens broke the cold morning’s stillness. At first, the buffalo were nervous at the sounds of shooting, but, not seeing anything to cause them great alarm other than a little smoke from a distant ridge, they continued to paw up and graze in the valley’s lush, dried grasses slightly covered by the snow. The guns continued their deadly work as the men’s aiming proved accurate and true in the placement of the heavy lead bullets. Buffalo after buffalo dropped as if pole-axed. Soon the first guns became too hot to hold or to shoot. The men placed them sizzling in the snow alongside where they lay to cool and grabbed their extra Hawkens. The bullets continued to fly true and in a matter of less than thirty minutes, one hundred and six buffalos’ dark bodies dotted the snow-covered valley.
Jacob determined they had plenty of meat. He turned and waved to the thirty or so mounted warriors patiently sitting on their horses below the ridgeline.
With a whoop from Lame Deer, the Lakota warriors streamed up over the ridge in a long fluid motion of horseflesh and humankind. The snow muffled the thunder of so many horses’ hooves, more than matched by the rumbling of the buffalo that began swiftly moving away from the now realized threat. Soon the Indians and buffalo were in a swirling dance of death, illustrated by emotion, commotion and motion. Arrows thumped into the sides of the great running beasts, with many of the shaggy buffalo hitting the ground in loud sliding crumps. Within moments, the white valley floor had many more dark and bloody bodies littering its once pristine winter landscape.
Then it was over just as fast as it had happened. The buffalo rumbled off into the distance and quiet descended over the land once again, except for the excited squeals of delight from the onrushing Indian women and children heading for the nearest inert life-giving forms.
The five trappers rose from their concealed positions on the ridgeline, reloaded their Hawkens, picked up their equipment and headed for the horses they had tied off in the adjacent ravine.
After that, they loaded their excess gear onto the horses and led their pack animals towards the dark forms now cooling in the morning cold, with Singing Bird keeping the pack string in line. In just moments, everyone fell to the huge job of gutting and boning out the great beasts. Jacob worked with the boys to show them the proper technique of quickly sharpening the gutting and skinning knives as they dulled. Then, he made each boy responsible for one-half of the company’s knives as the blades dulled. By the end of the day, both boys had the knife-sharpening skills down pat. Then Singing Bird and the boys each took a pack string of three horses loaded down with great slabs of still bleeding and steaming meat back to camp to begin the lengthy job of processing.
Ben, Jacob and Martin, however, continued skinning out the beasts and laying the fresh hide hair-down in the snow, to pile more buffalo meat high on the “mountain rug.” The tongues, hearts and some of the intestines favored by Singing Bird, along with a number of livers, were carefully set off to one side in the snow to cool. All the men took a few moments to recover those lead balls that had not passed clean through the buffalo bodies—used lead bullets were so valuable that they would be melted down once again at a later date for reuse.
On and on the work went without stopping until around two in the afternoon. Then a group of women began a hot fire and slabbed a mountain of meat on roasting sticks near the coals. It didn’t take long for the hard working men and women in the meadow to drift towards the good smells coming from the fires. Soon gangs of Indians polished off huge mounds of steaming meat alongside their sharp-shooting trapper friends.
During the wolfing-down session, Chief Lame Deer came over to Jacob. In the universal sign language of the Indians, he praised the shooting skills of the trappers and thanked them for their generosity in sharing the meat. He also asked that when they had a moment of time back at camp, he, Ben, Martin and Jacob needed to sit and smoke the Sacred Pipe of Friendship. Jacob nodded and with a smile accepted the offer. Then Jacob and Lame Deer happily “fell to” on several more slabs of smoking buffalo hump ribs
Jacob took in the cold, clear air and looked out at the majestic mountains. To nature in general and no one in particular, he said, “Now this is a moment I will never forget.”
All day and into the evening pack strings and Indian travois snaked back to the winter camp loaded with huge loads of still steaming buffalo meat. Many times Jacob saw the Lakota utilizing even their dogs to pull smaller travois loaded with meat as well; the hunt had been so abundant, much work still remained in processing the meat, but it had to come off the valley floor before the coyotes and wolves began filling their stomachs. By midnight, the work in the valley was done. They stripped all the readily useable meat from one hundred and thirty-one buffalo and carted it back to the winter camp. They also stripped off all the hides to bring back to camp. Behind them lay a bloodied, trampled snowfield littered with buffalo carcasses and many skulking wolves and coyotes silently slipping around the remains. Come the dawn, the air would be full of eagles, ravens, magpies, jays, and crows gathering in their fill as well. Not much would be wasted.
For the next ten days, the trappers and Indians processed the meat to their way of choosing and lifestyle. Great racks of meat were smoked, much was made into jerky,
some was salted down, some covered with hides to keep the birds away and hung in the trees to freeze, and much eaten on the spot around the many campfires. Even the Indians’ dogs, normally thin and always hungry for a meal, waxed fat over the next several days as they fed on the scraps thrown their way.
Back out on the valley floor, white buffalo skeletons glistened like the newly fallen snow. Wolves, gray fox, coyotes, ravens, crows, magpies and jays continued feasting on the remains until many could only walk around with full bellies and crops. Life was good as Old Man Winter laid claim to the valley once again with a vengeance that covered the recent killing field with another white blanket of snow as if to hide the scene of death and destruction from the Maker’s eyes.
* * *
Winter snows swirled around the two camps off and on for the next few months but everyone was happy. The winter camp was out of the wind and shielded from the path of much of the driven snows. Food was plentiful and in great quantity, thanks to that buffalo hunt and others that followed. There was still a mountain of firewood in both camps for the really cold days and nights, and visiting between the camps occurred daily. That made Ben, Jacob and Martin very happy for it gave them a chance to trade with the Indians. They traded mounds of extra glass beads, coffee, beaver traps, blankets, tobacco and pigs of lead for beautifully tanned pelts from elk, deer, beaver, river otter, martin, fox and now freshly processed buffalo hides that they added to their small mountain of hides and pelts, stored away for the next rendezvous.
Singing Bird, more than anyone else in the valley, was happy. The men in her company were dealing fairly with her people, and the people in turn had been telling her of their good feelings towards the trappers. And the spring beaver-trapping season was still to come. And Ben Bow has my heart. Ben and Singing Bird began sharing her tepee, on a regular basis. She had moved on from the loss of Buffalo Calf, and being with Ben Bow made her smile more and more.
Trappers are strange men, she often thought. Ben Bow is like a little child when he is around me.
As the winter progressed, she watched Ben Bow continue to teach the Hunter brothers the various lessons of survival and prosperity in the high country. She came to think of Ben Bow and the two Hunters as her family. “Thank you, Great Spirit,” she often sang, “for bringing me Jeremiah Hunter and Leo Hunter, boys for a Lakota Sioux who has no children of her own.” Jeremiah and Leo could often be heard singing their praises as well: “Lord, we thank you for the blessings of life, and for the freedom you have granted us, and for the friends of Jacob and Martin. We thank you, oh Lord, for our new father and mother, Ben and Singing Bird, who have taken us into their hearts,” Jeremiah would pray, and Leo would add, “In Jesus’s name, Amen.”
Life was good. If only it would stay this way forever, everyone thought.
Chapter Eighteen
Blackfoot
Jacob knew the good life would not last forever.
The spring beaver-trapping season of 1832 was just around the comer. The trappers stayed very busy getting ready and it seemed that the needed preparations were never done. They filled their days with shoeing horses, repairing bridles, rebuilding packsaddles, creating new halters, making bullets, putting edges on knives, wood hauling, repairing guns, making new clothing, mending old clothing and continued trading with the Indians. The days were getting longer and the winter snows were becoming a thing of the past with the advent of each warming day. Even the grasses in the meadows were poking through the semi-frozen ground and the horses were getting rolling fat on the new feed. It was also a time for young colts to be born, bringing happiness whenever an owner’s horse herd was increased with the new additions.
Wham! With that noise, Martin and Jacob awoke with a start and went for their rifles. The door of their cabin was flung open with a tremendous crash, as Singing Bird and the two boys flew inside. Boom-boom-boom...boom-boom-boom sounded the thundering of rifles in their meadow.
“Blackfoot! Blackfoot!” screamed a frantic Singing Bird.
It didn’t take long before everyone was awake, dressed as good as they were going to get, and armed to the teeth. The alarm was no small thing; simply the word “Blackfoot” brought fears of the fierce tribe from the north. Wherever Blackfoot went, a wake of tragedy, burnings, and the dead of all sexes and ages always seemed to follow.
Jacob raced to the open door and peered out at the Lakota camp some hundred yards distant. It was nothing but a swirl of tomahawk-swinging, fusil-shooting, knife- and spear-wielding Indians intermixed with the screams of running women and children. Fifty barking and howling Indian dogs added to the chaos.
To join that swirl of humanity with only five men will hardly provide any positive measure in the outcome. Jacob made a fast decision.
“Singing Bird, you stay here in the cabin behind locked doors. If the Blackfoot kill us and then break through the door, you have the fowling piece and your two pistols. You know what to do in that instance. The rest of you come with me,” yelled Jacob.
Out the cabin they stormed, running around behind and out of sight of the fighting Indians in the meadow below. It was obvious to Jacob that the Blackfoot had not seen the trappers’ camp or they would have swarmed all over them as well. They apparently only had “eyes” for the many tepees in the meadow, for the bounty they potentially offered and their large horse herd whose value on the frontier was beyond measure. Seeing that, they had attacked the Lakota camp right at daylight.
Jacob knew the Lakota and Blackfoot were mortal enemies, so there could be only one lethal outcome to what was now playing out beyond them on the other side of the ridge. But the Blackfoot hated the white men as well. No matter how you look at it, this will be a fight to the death for all concerned!
Jacob scurried behind the cover of the ridge—away from the cabin but towards the sounds of battle. Jacob kept looking for one thing—the Blackfoot raiding party’s horses. They had to have ridden this far, being so many miles south of their usual territory. Horses had to be close at hand somewhere, since the attack was just over the ridge.
Jacob and the other trappers spread out and silently made their ways through the timber behind the ridge. I knew it! There they are! About forty horses were attended by three young Indian men.
Martin held up his hand. Jacob and the three others slid to a stop behind the cover of a dense stand of willows alongside a frozen creek. Martin handed his two Hawkens to Jacob and Ben, then took off silently through the trees with only his bow and arrows. Within moments, he soon disappeared into the darkened timber.
Zzip...thunk. Jacob watched as an arrow flew from Martin’s position into the back of the closest Indian horse-handler’s skull. The killing force of the arrow’s impact toppled the Indian youth face first into the snow. He was dead before he hit the snow.
The second Indian horse-handier turned at the surprising sound of the arrow hitting his partner, only to have the next arrow hit him dead center in the throat. He grabbed at the arrow in his neck, struggled a little and then pitched forward into the frozen earth next to his already dead companion. In the fall, the arrow was driven clear through his neck upon impact with the ground. The third Indian boy guarding the horses viewed the demise of his friends, took off running and disappeared into the forest.
Jacob’s team then ran forward and tied the Indians’ nervous horses to nearby trees to prevent their escape. Then they quickly followed the tracks of the raiding party in the snow, over the ridge. This effectively cut off the raiders’ escape route. The five trappers ran up and over the small ridge in a crouch and positioned themselves down the far side at the edge of the clearing just inside the tree line.
A few yards distant laid the Lakota camp and the scene of a fierce battle. Jacob considered the distance as his compatriots laid out their firearms alongside for hasty retrieval and use. They each chose a tree for cover and to help steady their deadly aim with the heavy Hawkens.
“On my cue,” said Jacob quietly. He aimed at a very large Blackfoot
warrior who was about to tomahawk a Lakota woman being held by the neck.
“Now!”
Boom...boom-boom-boom-boom went the Hawkens in rapid succession, and five Blackfoot warriors dropped instantly.
Just as instantly, the fighting paused as Blackfoot and Lakota alike looked around for the hidden shooters.
Boom-boom-boom-boom-boom went the reserve rifles in rapid succession and again five more Blackfoot warriors kissed Mother Earth for the last time.
Consternation reigned within the ranks of the attackers. The Blackfoot had attacked in barely superior numbers at the onset of the fight using surprise as leverage. Now, Jacob thought, in addition to the numbers they’ve already lost in fighting with the Lakota, ten more of their number lay dead, killed by unknown assailants from their rear!
The tide of the battle had swiftly turned. Now the Blackfoot raiding party is in double trouble. Their numbers have been dangerously depleted and we are between them and their horses!
* * *
Buffalo Heart, the leader of the Blackfoot war party, instantly realized their plight. Fighting the Lakota any further was sheer folly, so he yelled for his remaining warriors to break from the battle and follow him in a sprint for their horses. Within seconds, his warriors disengaged from the Lakota and were running right at the little group of shooters, howling like a band of banshees.
The first five Blackfoot—including Buffalo Heart—tumbled to the earth as heavy lead bullets tore gaping holes in their chests. The remaining Blackfoot kept at a dead run to hit the shooters head-on.
Stepping out from the timber as one, the trappers leveled their horse pistols at the nearest charging Indians. In an instant and in a blinding-cloud line of white black-powder smoke, the Blackfoot were upon them. Five pistols burned holes in the flesh of those unfortunates closest to the end of their muzzles. The big .69-caliber slugs fired at such close range flung those five Blackfoot into their fellow warriors who closely brought up the rear.