Chapter 3

Tom Watson spent a lot of time near Mrs. Mary Whittle, the widow of the man who started the Indian trouble two days outside Grand Island. They were close to the same age and had become attracted to each other. Her two sons, Johnathon and Abner, got along well with Tom, so that barrier was not really there. The attraction was strong enough that Tom had started taking his meals with Mary and the boys, rather than with the other guards.

Since they both were in their late 20s, a few tongues did wag, but were shushed up when the older heads pointed out that Mary was going to need a husband when they got to California and, just maybe, Tom was a good candidate. At least, he was known to be the solid, conscientious sort who was not taken to strong drink.

It turned out that Tom had gotten tired of the wandering life of a wagon train guard and was looking for an excuse to settle down in one place. Mary was unusually intelligent and well aware of where her best interests lay, so she talked the matter over with her sons and got their approval before setting her cap for Tom. Tom didn't know it yet, but he was as good as married!

Tom's time off in the evenings was spent walking with and talking to Mary and they got to know each other quite well in a very short time. Their relationship had progressed far enough that Mary and Tom were actually talking of marriage and everybody in the train got the word that they were officially betrothed, as far as they were concerned. One of the men in the train was a lay Methodist preacher and they asked him to perform the ceremony.

A wedding on the wagon train! Excitement ran high among the women and the men got caught up in the emotion. Andrew agreed to be the best man and the rest of the members of the wedding party were selected. A day was chosen for the ceremony and it was held after supper with all the train there as witnesses. The happy couple retired to their wagon and the other guards rearranged their schedule to give Tom the whole night uninterrupted with his bride. The two boys spent the night with friends and the marriage got off to a glorious start! Of course, they didn't know it at the time, but Mary got pregnant that night.

Tom took to married life like a duck takes to water. He was captured by the opportunities offered by a permanent sex partner. The other adults snickered behind his back, forgetting what it was like when they first married. At first, the two boys were a bit embarrassed by the noises coming from under their wagon, but they got over it when they noticed their mother's happiness. Tom, Mary, and the two boys settled into a happy and loving routine which carried them through to California and beyond.

The boys quickly started treating Tom as a father and they came closer to him than they ever had been to their natural father. This was in large part because of Tom's superior intelligence, compared to their father. Tom would answer their questions and listen to their troubles as if he enjoyed helping, rather than treating the conversations as a core. The result was the formation of a happy family that was the envy of the rest of the train.

Mostly, the trek across Nebraska was a period of utter boredom interspersed with intervals of absolute terror. There wasn't much to do during the long periods of walking except to keep an eye out for buffalo chips. Most topics for conversation had long been exhausted by the time they got half way through Nebraska, so rumors and gossip were all they had to talk about, and even that got pretty dull when the topics began to recycle.

The emigrants began to look forward to fording streams, just for the break in the monotony. As somebody remarked, "It's a hell of a note when the high point of yer day is tryin' to keep yer feet dry!"

They never lacked for food. Seth brought down buffalo or antelope every day, so there was plenty of meat for the train. They were making a noticeable dent in the stock of flour and coffee, but they expected to fix that when they got to Scotts Bluff. Men were still polling flat-bottomed barges up the Platte River, bringing in supplies, but Jasper wondered how much longer that would last, now that the Indians were becoming such a problem.

The intervals of terror were usually caused by Indian attacks, but once they were threatened by a mass buffalo stampede. Seth gave enough warning that they had time to circle the wagons and form a firing line to shoot the buffalo that got too close. The were stalled for hours as thousands of buffalo rampaged past the fearful train. Jasper ordered a feast that night—they had plenty of dead buffalo to chose from for delicacies and the celebration was what they needed to relieve the stress of the experience.

The Indian attacks were usually still limited to the case of one to three braves riding past, yelling and whooping and firing the occasional arrow. These actually became welcome relief from the boredom when the people found out how little danger there was in such an incident. They often didn't even bother to shoot back, unless the Indians threatened the oxen. This annoyed the Indians, because they felt cheated when all their effort was greeted by indifference!

On the other hand a major attack by a large band of Indians was anything but a break in the boredom. The Sioux would usually stick to charges on their horses. This was fatal to anyone caught in the open, but usually not so bad if the train had time to circle the wagons.

On one occasion, the Sioux hit before the wagon circle was complete and were able to break in through the gap in the outer circle of wagons. The White men fought valiantly against the charging horses, but many a lance wound was received before the Indians were driven off. The train would have been wiped out, were it not for the shotguns. Most of the Indians received wounds from the buckshot and many of those would die because they didn't know the proper way to treat such wounds.

Fortunately, the women and children had made a successful run to the inner circle of wagons and could be protected there. As long as they stayed on their horses, there was no way the Indians could break through this barricade. The only way through the wall of wagons was to jump off the horse and crawl under a wagon. No self-respecting Sioux warrior was going to abandon his horse if he could avoid it, so the women and children were reasonably safe.

Nickolas Holden, one of Jasper's two assistants, led the defense of the inner circle and distinguished himself with his bravery. It was good that they had plenty of ammunition, because they were blasting away at attackers as fast as they could shoot for nearly 30 minutes. Nickolas seemed to be everywhere, encouraging the defenders, making sure there was an adequate supply of shells, and fighting where the action was the hottest. He managed to pick up several arrow wounds, but didn't even know it until the battle was over!

Several of the older girls fell in love with this skillful and courageous leader and had to be reminded that he was already married and had a family waiting for him in California. Many a young female heart was broken when reminded of this, but they managed to suffer in silence.

They were finally able to drive the Indians out of the incomplete circle and close the gap, but they were still in trouble. The remaining Indians kept up the battle by surrounding the train and peppering them with a rain of arrows. At no time was the rain of arrows to the point of being a storm, and that was a significant difference. If the Indians had owned enough arrows, they could have caused serious problems by shooting them in swarms which would have been impossible to avoid. As it was, the occasional arrow falling into the circled wagons was bad enough and the only safe place near the outer wall was under the wagons.

Several people wondered why the Indians didn't shoot fire-arrows at the wagons. This would have caused the maximum damage to the train and made them much more vulnerable to attack. Seth pointed out that the Indians weren't stupid and knew that burning the wagons would almost surely have started a plains grass fire which would have hurt them more than it did the Whites.

The Indians kept the wagon train bottled up for three days and Jasper was getting desperate to be on their way. He called a meeting of his people and asked for advice and suggestions. Seth had an idea, "We can attack their camp at night an' really play hell with them. They won't be expecting us an' won't have much of a guard out."

"OK, that sounds good, but how would we do it?"

Andrew said, "Suppose we take most of the men an' march down there like the infantry would. Ifen we form three ranks of 15 men in each, we can wipe them out by having the front rank fire an' fall to the rear ta reload while the next rank fires. Ifen we did that at a steady walk, nothing could stand in front of us an' they wouldn't have time ta shoot back."

"I like the sound of that! Let's practice tomorrow. There's enough room inside the outer wagon circle and they wouldn't know what we were doin'. Then we kin attack tomorrow night."

Further discussion resulted in the decision to fire in volley on command to get the maximum psychological effect. This was what they practiced and they thought they had the technique down solid by supper time.

The Indians were camped only about 200 yards away from the circled wagons. It looked like that was to keep the wagons from sneaking away. Andrew, who was in charge of the attack, assembled the men just after midnight and formed them into ranks as they had practiced. The marched as quietly as they could to the Indian camp and, luckily, were not spotted; the lookout had probably become bored by now and wasn't paying attention.