Chapter 2

The Journey

We had fish and beans for breakfast. Our intent was to move closer to the trail and continue toward Tulsa.

We were just about to break camp after cleaning our dishes up and putting the fire out. I always tried to rub out the area we had been in so that it didn’t look like a campsite.

There was a commotion in the woods behind us, and a medium-sized buck deer stumbled from the woods with two arrows sticking from its side. This was someone else’s kill, but I wanted to stop the animal before it got into the river and floated down river. Tia helped me stop the deer and helped hold it down while I slit his throat.

We held it down until it stopped kicking. We stood and backed away from the deer and went toward our horses.

An Indian came from the woods and stood over the deer as he looked at us and then the deer. I stood with my palms out and then signed that he had a fine deer to take home to his family. The man nodded and was confused by our buckskins and moccasins. Tia had her breast beads on so that might have further confused the man.

Tia signed to him in her usual way and also by talking at the same time as she now did. He broadly smiled and answered back with sign and talking at the same time. He said his family and tribe were but a few miles south of where we were. He said he would share his kill with us for helping stop the animal from reaching the river. He invited us to go with him to his tribe and share in eating his kill. I wanted to move on toward Tulsa, but Tia pleadingly looked at me, wanting to go to the brave’s tribal village.

Going to an Indian village made me nervous, but Tia didn’t think that it would be bad. I let her convince me, so the brave and I hoisted the deer on a tree limb, and field dressed it right there.

Tia had been out looking around the area, and came to me and signed that there were more deer nearby and I should use my long gun to get one. I knew another deer would be welcomed, so I followed Tia with the brave right behind me. There were two bucks and a dozen does in a meadow that looked like a couple of acres in size. I’m not sure the bucks were aware of us, but we were close enough to get another. I used a tree branch to steady my Henry and leveled off at the nearest buck. My shot must have been perfect as the deer raised his head, bawled, and fell over.

There was enough game to feed a lot of people in the area.

The brave and I dragged the deer over to the trees and dressed him the same way as we had the other. We wouldn’t be able to have Benny carry two deer. I decided to put one on Benny, and one on my roan. We walked the few miles to the man’s village when everything was tied down.

I recognized this to be a traveling village that hadn’t been here long. The brave was welcomed back because he obviously was a person of stature in the community. Some older men with a lot of feathers and beads on their buckskins came to listen to the brave tell and sign about how he had shot the deer twice but it didn’t fall, and the white man had stopped the deer, slit his throat, then walked away so he could claim his kill. He then said that we had gone out and killed another deer when he invited us to come to the village so that there would be more meat for all to enjoy.

One of the older men came up to me, and in understandable English said, “I speak white man tongue. You give our brave good stories to tell at our fire. Where you go?”

I didn’t know how well the man understood, but said, “We’re going to Tulsa to maybe live near there. I want to have a farm to live on and to raise some animals to eat and sell.”

The man said, “There much land with no people. Buffalo there with no fences. They will stay for you to eat as much as you would want if you have good grass.”

I asked, “Why are you moving your village? You are traveling, but shouldn’t you be in your regular village?”

The man looked sad, and said, “The Dakota Sioux of the north raid hunting lands. We move south away from raids. We make village close to river and send for what left of the village up north. You stay with us. You good to help hunt. We go farther west, north, or back across the river if we want buffalo. We safe here from the white man and northern Indians.”

Tia had been taken away by the other women of the village to help butcher the two deer. Other men came back with more game as the day wore on. They didn’t have deer, but there were two fair-sized wild pigs. This was a larger group of people than I thought it was. They all suspiciously regarded me until they had spoken among themselves with the man I had helped this morning.

I spent some time cleaning my rifles and pistols. I made sure that the cylinders were fresh and the large bore rifles were ready to be fired. I really didn’t know how to clean most of the Henry since I didn’t know how to get it apart. I was going to take mine to a gunsmith and let him show me how to take it apart and reassemble it. I also needed some more oil, as I was just about out of the tiny tin of gun oil I had been able to buy. I needed to go to a livery stable or saddle maker since I needed leather oil for our saddles, bridles, and Benny’s pack harness. Our boots could also use a good scrubbing with oil.

I was able to tell the man who seemed to be some form of tribal leader that I wanted to get to the next town for some supplies. He understood, but asked if I could stop by to visit when we passed back through.

It’s funny how that hadn’t occurred to me, but I would be going back this way because I needed to see how my folks were doing. I also wanted to take a large quantity of those double eagles to my dad. He would never be without again if he handled the money right. The trouble was that I’d have to wait until the war was over before I could go home.

It was coming onto late fall of 1862, so I knew that Tia and I needed to be in some form of shelter for the winter. I didn’t want to have to leave our animals out either, so we needed somewhere we would stay warm and the animals could be out of the weather. We left the Indian village and traveled north and west until we ran into the main road that came from Fort Smith. We traveled off the main road for a day and came to the east side of either a lake or another river. We camped there and wondered which direction to get around or across the water.

We had passed to the south of a town, and I didn’t want to go there as I thought it was a wagon train town and would be harder to trade at. On the other hand, a wagon train town would have more merchandise and likely more skilled people, like gunsmiths, but on balance we decided to give it a pass for the time being.

We went south from the main road and ran into a group of buildings that were three houses, a fairly large barn, and another stock building. There were chickens free ranging around the building. This didn’t make sense because it didn’t look as if the land had been vacated all that long.

I went into what looked like the biggest of the three houses and found a kitchen area with a large table. On the table was a handwritten note that read,

“You are welcome if you want to stay here. Our family has suffered too many losses to remain. We have moved to the nearby town and will be there. One of us will come to visit the property and wait in town until the Indian problems are settled. The well is deep with good water. Ask for the Grotowskis if you come to town. Most know us.”

We walked around the property and came upon a group of crosses. There were eight crosses with names scratched into the wood.

It was a shame to have been run off their ranch or farm. Tia and I rode around the property to see that there were fields that had been worked. There was a field of corn that was time to pick. There was a wheat field that was well past harvest time and probably dropping the heads.

I told Tia to pick out a house to live in for the winter when we were back at the houses. We decided on the house closest to the barn where we were going to put the animals. We could harvest the wheat first and use the stones in the barn to grind it for flour. We’d pick the corn for the animals and grind some of that for corn flour for us.

We needed to round the chickens up or figure out where they roost so that we could gather eggs. I thought I would like a breakfast with eggs.

Tia signed to me that she would look at the houses while I put the animals into the barn and small corral. There was an area where the former residents stored their tack, so I put our saddles there along with Benny’s pack frame. They enjoyed being out in the small corral and pranced around kicking up their hooves. I brought my brush and curry comb out, and was immediately being nosed by Benny for some treatment. I ended up combing and brushing out all three animals. I gave them some of the grain I had and made sure that the corral fence was in good shape to keep the animals in. They could get into the covered barn area, so they would be safe and comfortable.

Tia came to me and signed that all three houses had some cooking stuff. We didn’t have a sign for skillets and pots. She was trying to say the fire area was iron in one house and she didn’t know how that was used.

We went to that house and I could see that these people had been well off. There was a large wood stove that still had a large skillet on it and there was a large pot on the back burner.

The ash bin wasn’t full, so I raked the ashes there out into the ash bucket and went to look for stove wood.

The wood yard was full of logs ready to be split and cut for the fireplace and wood stoves. There was probably enough wood for the winter, but I would look for more dead trees to cut up.

I thought that Tia and I would go into the nearby town to find the Grotowskis to make sure it was okay for us to stay the winter. I wanted a chicken dinner meanwhile, but didn’t have enough grease to fry it right. That could be overcome by baking it in the oven.

I made a fire in the big stove and put some coffee on. I went outside to catch a chicken and found a young rooster that I thought would be good eating. I plucked and cleaned that bird and washed it good. I used some of my small tin of cooking oil and spread it over the chicken before putting it into the oven.

Tia told me of a small addition to the barn that had little boxes that the chickens were sitting in. There were small chickens running everywhere when we went out to the barn. There must have been enough food available for them as the nesting boxes all had hens sitting on eggs. I would have to look for a candle to see what eggs I can get for breakfast.

We were walking back to the house we were going to stay in when ‘Whump’ and an arrow buried itself into the side of the house. I pushed Tia in the door and shut it. I looked out to see if I could see where the arrow came from.

There were four Indian braves standing at the tree line with arrows nocked ready to shoot. I had brought the pack stuff in, so the rifles were here. I got one of the Henrys out and made sure it was full of cartridges. I leaned it up against the doorway and opened the door. I hollered and tried to sign to them. They were laughing at me. Tia hollered in her language hoping they understood. They were hollering back with what I’ll bet were derogatory comments. One of the four raised his bow and let fly. I pushed Tia back into the house and picked up the Henry. I found him in my sights and hit him square in the chest. The big bullet made him fly backward.

That incensed the other three, and they began firing arrow after arrow at the open doorway. I shot another man, but that didn’t deter the other two, so I shot a third brave. The last one kept coming and threw his bow down and drew a very large knife. I shot this man too, and felt sorry for him as he should have learned from the first three going down.

Tia signed that these men weren’t Cherokee. She didn’t know where they were from or what nation they belonged to, but we needed to take these men and put them and their weapons into the river.

I used Benny to drape two Indians at a time over his back and take them to the river. There was some current here so I put each of them on a log that was on the bank and pushed them into the river. I retrieved the last two and did the same with them. I had put all their bows and knives on the logs too so that these men would hopefully be far down the river before they were missed.

I was back home and washed up by the time the chicken was baked. The two of us ate heartily. I opened a can of the peaches I had bought. Tia loved the fruit and the sweet juice.

There was a worry as those Indians could have someone nearby who would miss them. I didn’t want to go to bed without a way of knowing someone was around. I decided to stay dressed and sleep by an open window.

I catnapped all night and was fairly rested by morning. I decided to backtrack the four who had attacked us to see where they came from.

There were some candles in the kitchen, so I used one of those after cleaning out beneath four chickens. They weren’t happy with me, but I would put the eggs with chicks in them back. I needed a pen and ink or some way to mark the egg.

I looked around the house until I found a small bottle of ink and a writing quill. There was also a piece of paper in the same place.

Tia watched as I held each egg up and pointed at the ones that were going to hatch, those that weren’t, and those that were edible. I used the quill and ink to mark the eggs that would hatch so we could easily find the good eggs.

I fried the eggs and some of the pork we had. Tia loved the eggs and signed that she would check all the chickens today. I told her what I was going to do, and she didn’t care for the idea. I showed her the other Henry rifle by the door, and she still had her pistol in a holster she could wear. I promised to be careful and went out to where the four men had been.

It took me a while to find the path they had traveled. I figured that they would probably run through the woods single file or would have put their horses in a brush enclosure. I found the horses and they didn’t look any worse for wear. I decided to follow their tracks for a while to see if they had a camp with more braves.