Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1870-07-22
Cats and Sketehes.
THE TRAGEDY AT AT MOHAWK STATION.
A Tale OF Life and Death In Arizona.

We called it our noon camp, though it
was really not after ten O'Clock in the
morning. Ours was the only ambulance
in the outfit although there were some
three or four officers beside the Captain.
The Captain had been ordered to report
at headquarters in San Francisco before
going East, and was travelling through
Arizona as fast as Uncle Sans mules
could carry him, in order to catch the
steamer that was to leave the Pacific
coast at the end of the month. 1t is just
a year, and the Pacific Railroad was not
vet completed, which accounts for the
Captains haste to reach the steamer.
When we made noon camp at the Gov
ernment forage station called Stanwick's
Ranch, we had already performed an or
dinary days march, but we were to ac-
complsh twenty-five miles more before
pitching our tent 0iterally) at Mohawk
Station for the night. These stations are
not settlements but only stopping places,
where Government teamsterS draw forage
for their mules, and where water is to be
had--the station keepers sometimes see
ing no one the whole year round except
the Government and merchant trains
passing along en- route to Tucson or other
military posts. Lunch had been des-
patched, and was lounging, with q book
in my hand on the seat of the ambulance
one of those uncomfortable affairs call
ed "dead-carts,n with two seats running
the entire length of the vehicle--when
the captain put his head in to say that
there was an American woman at the sta
ton. White representatives of my sex
are "few and far between" in Arizona,
and / had made up my mind to 60 into
the house and speak to this one, even be-
fore the captain had added;
at is a woman from Mohawk Station"
The captain assisted me out of the am
bulance, and welwalked toward the house
together. The front room of the flat
adobe building was bar-room, store, Office,
parlor; and here we found the woman of
the Mohawk Station. entered the back
room at the polite invitation of the station
keeper, with whom the captain fell into
conversation in the store or bar-room.
| The woman was young-not over %
and had been on her way from Texas to
California with her husband and an OK
team, when Mr.. Hendricks, the man who
kept the forage station at Mohawk, found
them camped near the house one day, and
induced them to stop with him. The
woman took charge of the household, and
the man worked at cutting firewood on
the Gila, and hauling it up to the house
with the station-keeper's two horses, or
at any other job which Mr.. Hendricks
might require of him. She had been a
healthy, hearty woman when they left
Texas, but laboring through the hot,
sandy deserts, suffering often for water
and sometimes for food, had considerably
"shaken her." and she was glad and will
ing to stop here, where both she and her
husband could earn money, and they
wanted for neither water nor food-such
as it is in Arizona. 1t was hard to believe
that ever she had been q robust fearless
woman, as she sat there covering and
shivering, and looking up at me with eyes
that seemed ready to start from their sock
cts with terror.
MAY l venture in?" l asked, uncer-
tain whether to venture closer to the
shrinking form.
Eyes, yes" she said, breathing hard
and speaking very slowly. Come in
it'll do me good. You're the first woman
I've seen since-since."
Tell me all about it," I said, sitting
down on the edge of the bed, as familiar
ly as though had been her intimate friend
for years; ''or will it agitate you and
make you sick ?"
mo" she made answer; 81 am dying
now, and | have often wished | could see
some woman, and tell her the whole story
before l die. 1t almost chokes me some
times because because | can't speak about
it, | haven't seen any one but my
husband and the station-keeper these last
three weeks-there is so little travel now
| you see, one Saturday afternoon, there
were two Mexicans came up this way from
Sonora and stopped at Mohawk Station to
camp for the night 1t was cold, rainy,
clustering day, and the men tried to build
their fires against the wall of the house.
1t was the only way they could shelter
themselves from the wind and rain, as Mr..
Hendricks would not allow them to come
| into the house. Pretty soon Mr.. Hendricks
drove them off, though they pleaded hard
to stay; and Col B., who had arrived in
the meantime, on his way to Tucson, told
Mr. Hendricks that, if he knew anything
about Mexicans, these two would come
back to take revenge. Perhaps Mr.. Hen
dricks himself was afraid of it, as he
picketed his two horses out between the
| coloners tent and the house, for fear the
Mexicans might come and drive them Oft.
But they did not return till Sunday after
noon, when, after considerable wrangling,
Mr.. Hendricks engaged them both to work
for him. The colonel had pulled up stakes
and had gone on his way TO Tucson Sun
day morning, so that we were alone with
the Mexicans during the night. But they
behaved themselves like sober, steady
men; and the next morning they and my
husband went down to the river, some
three miles away, to cut wood, which they
were to haul up with the team later in tile
dav. Have you been at Mohawk Station,
and do you know how the house is bllilt?'
she asked, interrupting herself.
"We camped there on our way out"
said y and l remember that an open cor.
ridor Iuns through the whole length Of the
house, and some two or three rooms open
into each other on either side"
Very well; you remember the kitchen
is the last room on the left of the corridor
while the storeroom and bar is the frs
room to the right Back of this is the little
room in which Mr.. Hendricks bed stood
just under the window; and opposite to
this room, next to the kitchen, is the
dining-room."
at was still early in the day, and wa.