Blood Memory

by Margaret Coel

  She stared at the name Fitzpatrick. She had used the same name to register at the hotel. A name from history, and yet she’d had the odd sense of connection. She pushed away the notion. Mary Fitzpatrick happened to be the woman with sandy-colored hair who drove a rental car and stayed at a hotel. That was all.

  She read through the treaty itself.

  The Treaty Council began on September 8, 1851. The tribal chiefs and the government commissioners assembled in the shade of a canopy erected by the Indian women. Before the talks began, the calumet was passed around. As each chief accepted the red stone pipe, decorated with beads and feathers and filled with a mixture of plants, tobacco, and the bark of red willow, he drew an invisible line with his hand from the bowl to his throat as a sign that everything he said would be sincere and truthful.

  The council lasted a week, and on September 15, the first treaty between the federal government and the Plains Indians was signed. The treaty acknowledged Indian ownership of the Great Plains. Tribes were guaranteed the legal rights to their traditional lands. Fitzpatrick and several traders huddled with the chiefs and wrote out the boundary descriptions for the land owned by each tribe. The government acknowledged that the sweep of land between the Platte River and the Arkansas River, from the Continental Divide eastward across the plains of Colorado, belonged to the Arapaho and Cheyenne.

  Catherine carefully wrote down the description and added her own notes: Eastern half of Colorado. Twenty-seven million acres. All the towns, ranches, settlements, stage coach stops, and army forts when Sand Creek occurred in 1864 were ILLEGAL. She slashed a black line under illegal, nearly cutting though the page. No governor or territorial legislature could change that fact. United States treaties took precedence over other legislation.

  But there was another way to take control of the land: the tribes had to be eliminated.

  She lifted the next volume off the stack. The title was embossed in gold: A Compilation of Our Times. 1858-1870. Edited by M. C. Johnson. Little motes of dust rose off the spine as she opened the cover. The pages were brittle. Carefully she went to the table of contents, and bless M. Johnson, whoever he was, he’d had the foresight to gather accounts from people who had lived in Colorado in the early 1860s. Some accounts were secondhand, others speculations. She dismissed them. The eyewitness accounts were what mattered. She noted the pages for the sections she intended to read and settled into the task, allowing herself to be transported into the strange country of the past.

  I was roundin’ up some strays when I seen the Indians lined up on the bluff, sittin’ on their ponies all painted, like they do. They had on feathered headdresses, and they was naked as jaybirds, except for them breechcloths they wear, and they had themselves all painted. Chests and faces smeared with red, blue, and yellow paint. They was a sight, I tell you, and I took off runnin’ back to the house where the wife and kids was. I got my rifle, and went out on the porch, ready for ’em. They come whooping and hollering down the bluff. Headed straight for my herd. Some of ’em rode for the corral. They was the ones that took my horses, all six of ’em. They had guns, and soon’s they got close enough, they started shooting at the house. They weren’t gonna take me alive, I knew that to be a fact. They wasn’t gonna get the kids and the wife. You know what they do to women? I don’t wanna talk about it. They take kids and turn ’em into Indians. I was ready to kill any of ’em that rode up to the house. Guess they knew that, ’cause after they fired off the first shots, they just went about getting the cattle and the horses. Next thing I know, they’re herding my cows back up the bluff. Couple them braves was taking the horses. I watched them go off with everything I’d been building up the last four years. Everything was gone, just like that.—Lucas Weatherbee, Rancher, South Platte.

  We saddled up soon’s Major Jacob Downing give the orders. We got word them Arapahos and Cheyennes were marauding on the South Platte. They was hittin’ ranches, stealing horses and cattle, and getting away with it. What rights they have to be doin’ that? They needed to be punished and feel the whip of the white man. We rode out first light of dawn. There was Cheyenne villages near the river, and the major was certain those marauding thieves was in those villages. We rode into the first village we come to. It was nothin’ but a bunch of buffalo-skin tipis, and they looked pretty ratty, like a good wind would’ve knocked ’em over. We shot them redskins, and good riddance, I say. We did our best to put an end to their murderous ways. Killed several old bucks that come walkin’ out with their hands in the air, the way they always do, like they was innocent and wasn’t harboring no thieves. Shot ’em down, like they deserved. There was some warriors in the village, and we got them, too, before they could get their weapons and do their dastardly deeds. It was self-defense for us troops, you ask anybody that was there. There was some squaws and younguns’ that got in the line of fire, but like the major says, you gotta expect that in war. Soon’s we left the village burning, we rode on to two other villages and did the same.—Private Luke Handy, Camp Weld.

  I was the first to come upon the mutilated bodies of the most unfortunate Nathan Hundgate and his family. There were a great many shells scattered over the grounds not far from the ranch house. I saw with my own eyes what had taken place. A band of marauding Indians had intended to drive off the stock. From the way that Mr. Hungate lay on the hard ground, not far from the house, it was obvious that he had heard the commotion and run out with his gun firing. We found Mrs. Hungate and the children a farther distance from the house. All the bodies had been mutilated in a horrible manner. I believe it was correct for Governor Evans to order the bodies brought into Denver and put on display so that Denver citizens could see with their own eyes what our command saw. I believe we are confronted with a terrible and ruthless enemy that will stop at nothing to drive settlers from this area.—Sergeant Marcus Hitchens, Camp Weld.

  I worked closely with Governor John Evans during the violent years of 1863 and 1864 that led to the battle at Sand Creek. Arapahos and Cheyennes had been raiding the outlying ranches for months. One of the leaders, an imposing-looking Arapaho by the name of Chief Left Hand, came to see the governor. It is a fact that this Indian brave spoke English better than some of the prospectors in the area. I wrote down the record of the meeting. The brave told the governor that his people were hungry. He said the whites had killed a great many buffalo and dispersed the herds so that their warriors had to ride great distances to find food for their villages. He said that 1863 was a year of hunger. His people wanted peace with the whites.

  The governor said, if you want peace, why do your warriors attack our ranches? The chief said they needed food. They weren’t looking to kill the ranchers. He said it was the ranchers that fired on the warriors. Later the troops came and destroyed three villages. He claimed that the warriors who raided the ranches weren’t from those villages. The people killed there were innocent.

  The governor said that he couldn’t expect the troops to distinguish guilty Indians from innocent, that they were all guilty if they accepted stolen cattle or harbored hostile warriors.

  Chief Left Hand assured the governor that he and the other so-called “peace chief,” Chief Black Kettle of the Cheyennes, were working hard to keep their young men under control, but that the provocations were mighty. They want only to be allowed to live in peace.

  If you care so much about peace, the governor told him, then why didn’t the chiefs come to the meeting on the plains as they had promised. He had waited for two weeks, but no Cheyenne or Arapaho came.

  The chief said that they had wanted to come, but the villages were in mourning over the deaths of many children from strange sicknesses and hunger. They had sent a messenger to tell the governor they could not meet with him.

  Governor Evans said he never received any such messenger. He advised the chief to go back to his people and stop the atrocities against whites.

  After the chief left, the governor poured us each a glass of sherry and we sat in his parlor discuss
ing the present worrisome situation. We were still talking after the sun had disappeared behind the mountains and the parlor walls turned a dull red with the dusk. I remember hearing horse carts passing outside on Fourteenth Street. The governor opened his soul to me. He said he carried a great burden to protect Colorado settlers, in light of the Sioux uprising almost two years ago in Minnesota. The Sioux went on a rampage and slaughtered seven hundred white settlers. The governor said he could not allow that to happen in Colorado. The settlers were getting nervous, he said. Bands of hostiles had cut off the Overland Trail and stopped all commerce for three weeks. Our settlements depended upon supplies coming from the east, and he reckoned we could hold out against an Indian blockade of the trail for only a short time.

  Another thing making the settlers nervous, he said, was the lack of title to the lands they were ranching and farming. The Treaty of Fort Laramie said that most of Colorado belonged to the Arapahos and Cheyennes. Settlers are unable to acquire a clear title to their lands. This is highly detrimental for the development of the territory, he said, which, in his view, offers great opportunity for the accumulation of wealth for its citizens. He called Colorado, with the vast deposits of gold, silver, and other metals, the nation’s treasure house. We must build a transcontinental railroad into Colorado to connect the mines with the rest of the country. He reiterated that a railroad could not be built without title to the land, and he said that he would not allow the advancement of civilization to be halted by primitive, uncivilized Indians.

  Catherine worked through the pages again, jotting down some of the quotes: The people killed there were innocent. The children were dying from strange sicknesses and hunger. The settlers were getting nervous . . . he would not allow the advancement of civilization to be halted by primitive, uncivilized Indians.

  Strange the way events had unfolded then, she thought, as if they had just happened, and yet moving like a shadow beneath the surface, faceless and inexorable, were forces that pushed the events into their appointed places. She scribbled more notes, writing quickly before the connections, as fragile as air, evaporated.

  Camp Weld Council, Denver, late September 1864. Governor John Evans, Colonel John M. Chivington, Arapaho and Cheyenne leaders. Governor and Colonel instruct tribal leaders to place their people under the protection of the troops at Fort Lyon until a peace agreement is reached. October and November, 1864. Chiefs Black Kettle and White Antelope, Cheyenne, and Chief Left Hand, Arapaho, move their villages to Sand Creek, forty miles north of Fort Lyon.

  The voices of the elders drummed in her head. They told us to go to Sand Creek. They said the people would be safe. She kept thumbing through the brittle pages, looking for what? Confirmation? Evidence that Evans and Chivington and the other white leaders had deliberately misled the tribes by sending them to Sand Creek? No longer would the troops have to hunt Arapahos and Cheyennes across the plains, they would know exactly where the Indians were.

  And here it was: Major Scott J. Anthony meets with Chief Black Kettle and Chief Left Hand at Fort Lyon. The chiefs inform the major that six hundred Cheyennes and Arapahos are now camped at Sand Creek. More bands are on the way. A large band of Arapahos under Chief Little Raven was expected soon. They had complied with the instructions, and they are eager to surrender their people to the safety of the fort. Anthony dispatches a report to the district commander at the Army headquarters in Kansas. “They appear to want peace, and want someone authorized to make a permanent settlement of all troubles with them to meet them and agree upon terms. They cannot understand why I will not make peace with them.”

  After the massacre, Lieutenant Silas Soule testifies before the congressional committee that had investigated Sand Creek. “Anthony was for killing all Indians, and was only acting friendly until he had a force large enough for the job.”

  Chivington makes a public speech in Denver: “My intention is to scalp all Indians, little and big . . . nits make lice.”

  And the chilling idea running through it all: Governor Evans and Colonel Chivington had corralled the Indians at Sand Creek.

  Catherine sat back and stared at the motes of dust suspended in a shaft of daylight. Odd how the voices from so long ago reverberated around her. The air was close and stuffy. Still she stayed at the table for a long while before she finally made her way back through the library to the outdoors.

  19

  Catherine awoke in a haze of daylight filtering through the curtains, coffee odors floating from somewhere. She blinked into the light a moment. The elevator dinged in the corridor, and there was a murmuring of voices outside her door. She felt groggy and thick-headed. Cellophane from the sandwich room service had delivered last night glistened on top of the desk next to the glass tinged red with Merlot. Light shone through the wine bottle that she had bought on the way back to the hotel. There was still half a glass in the bottom.

  She’d worked late writing the interview with Governor Lyle, the Dave Brubeck Quartet playing on the little radio on the bedside table. Another scoop, and the realization gave her a distinct sense of pleasure. She was the first to report that the governor had asked Senator Adkins to schedule a briefing with the Senate Indian Affairs Committee. When she had finished the article on the interview, she’d written a side story on Sand Creek. Quoting the first-person accounts, the fear and tension that had rippled through the white settlements, the hunger and desperation of the Indians, the decision on the part of Governor Evans and Colonel Chivington to settle the matter once and for all.

  She managed to lift herself out of bed and stumble into the shower. After a good ten minutes of steaming water pounding her skin, her head began to clear. Still the thought of breakfast sent her stomach into spasms. She pulled on the slacks from yesterday, found a clean blouse in the backpack, ran a brush through the sandy hair. Then she called Philip. Still no change. Maury was holding his own. She rode the elevator to the lobby and waited for the valet to bring the gray Taurus. She stared at it a moment, reminding herself that it was the car driven by the sandy-haired woman who had stared back at her in the mirror a few minutes ago.

  Catherine parked again in the Civic Center garage next to the Denver Art Museum. She crossed the plaza in front of the museum and headed north across the park to the black-glass skyscraper where the secretary of state’s office was located. The office had once been in the capitol, she knew, but a number of offices had outgrown the capitol even before 1906 when construction on the building was completed. Construction had taken twenty-two years, and in that time Colorado’s population had doubled and tripled. Denver had gone from a loose collection of log cabins and dirt roads with cattle grazing on the prairie that was now Civic Center to a metropolitan city with trolleys running up and down paved streets, electric lights shining in brick homes, and fresh water pumped in from the mountains. All of which—Lawrence had liked to boast—had been brought about by the founding fathers—the Evanses and the Russells and the Sterns. A handful of founding families known as the “Sacred 36.”

  Colorado would have grown up without them, which was the nature of things, she used to remind Lawrence. Sometimes he’d smile and shake his head. Sometimes he’d pour them each a glass of wine and say, “Let’s drink to their accomplishments.” One time, she remembered, he had stomped off, slammed the door, and shouted through the closed door, his voice muffled and shaky, “You’ll never understand!”

  Now Catherine made her way through the cool atrium of the skyscraper and found the bank of elevators that went to the first ten floors. She got out on the second floor and let herself through the doors on the left: the business center. The entry was small—a counter in front of two vacant desks and, behind the desks, people moving about a warren of offices with glass walls. A man and two women huddled together in front of the counter, waiting.

  Catherine glanced into the computer room on the right. Tables lining the walls, and a half dozen people hunched over monitors. At the far end was Dennis Newcomb. His gray ponytail trailed half
way down the back of a red shirt. She had the sinking feeling that he was ahead of her, already on to the names of people behind Arcott Enterprises and Denver Land Company. They’re willing to sell the five hundred acres, Arcott had said.

  Catherine kept her face turned away as she went into the room and sat in front of the computer down from Newcomb. It would be like him to glance around and spot her. “Newshound” was coined for reporters like him, she thought. He could sniff changes in the atmosphere. She didn’t want to get into a conversation while he probed for what she might know that he hadn’t yet found out.

  She had just pulled up the home page for the Colorado secretary of state’s office when Ramona Sanchez led the couple from the counter to a computer a couple of stations away. Catherine had known Ramona since she’d gone back to the Journal. “Go see Ramona,” Marjorie would say, and she had to admit there were times when she was working on tight deadlines that she had said to Violet: “Get that from Ramona, will you?” Ramona had worked in the office through the tenure of several secretaries of state. A little overweight and more competent than some of the state secretaries, she knew where to find the most obscure information on Colorado businesses, an expertise that had allowed Catherine to follow trails of fraud that had led to furious e-mails and phone calls to Marjorie. They had also led to indictments.

  Catherine typed Arcott Enterprises in the search box and waited for a document to materialize on the screen. Company address was Arcott’s office in the Equitable Building. Registered agent, Peter Arcott. On the next page was the name of the individual causing the document to be delivered for filing: Peter Arcott. There was no third page, no lists of officers and directors, no other names.