Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1874-08-22
For the Essex County Herald.
A Rover's Story,

7
from earliest boyhool / had to work
to help support them ;being one ofthe
oldest | always had a great longing
for liberty and harbored the thought
that some day L would roam at will.
These thoughts became master and
at the age of seventeen, Nov, 1866,
| enlisted in the army for three years,
with the express understanding that !
should be sent to the plains to fight
the Indians. They took me to Gov
ernor's Island, New York harbor, and
with others had to guard deserters
till | became sick of it, and told the
Colonel if he didn't send me West l
would desert. 1t was pretty sorry
for some of those aggravating cases
of desertion, to have to wear chain
locked to the ankle and fastened TO a
cast-iron ball weighing 80 pounds,
term to commence at date Of enlist
ment, so they lost all the time they
had served, and at the end would be
discharged without pay.
In August, 1867, about 800 of us
were shipped on the steamer Nebras-
ka for Panama. 1t was fearfully hot (;
several of the boys died with yellow
fever. On an Island in San Francis
co harbor we were organized into the
14th Regiment of the regular army. l
with others, was sent to Fort Huma,
Arizona, land here and at other forts l
spent the remainder of my time here
there was a romantic reality of all my
boyhood dreams. Many were the
scenes of savage brutality that | saw,
and the many incidents would fill a
volume. One l will relate. News
came to the Fort that an emigrant
train had been captured, and the
whole Of them scalpeG thirty of us
we're at once sent in pursuit. The
scene of murdered emigrants was
fearful, all of value was taken, and
then some of the poor victims chained
to the rest and slowly burned to death ;
some were scalped, and a few cap.
tured. We took their trail, and on
the afternoon of the 9th day came up
with them, strongly encamped in a
narrow ravine. We skulkcd behind
rocks and trees, and opened fire and
kept it up necessarily till late in the
night, so as to represent our strength
larger than theirs. They ceased
firing first we all kept our places in
the morning not Indian to be seen ;
we followed cautiously, and found
eleven dead Indians. We had two
killed and one wounded; we were
aware that there we're hundreds of
them, but following trial we soon
came upon their camps or village Of
about 800 women and children. How
soon and fearlully we went through
them; some of them run, but all was
soon silent as the death stiffness OF
the great wilderness itself.
After I was discharged | went tc
Los Angeles, California, and engaged
to drive twelve mule team 900 miles
to Prescott, Arizona, over the great
Alkali Desert. There were three oil
us drivers, Sc mules and the owner
on the "Bell' horse to lead ; were
loaded with dry goods took our pro-
visions and forage for the mules, sc
there was one thousand pounds tC
each animal. The dry dust from that
vast alkali plain at times was almost
unbe arabic and much of the way had tc
carry the water we used. Many times
we came near being gobbled up by the
Internal Appaches. l drove twice
over this route, then into the Onan's
River mines, then back to Los An
gelos, driving a job wagon.
One day as l was loading barrels OF
liquor, there was a great rush in the
streets, everybody was excited, and
here occurred something more wicked
than had seen yet, the Chinese
Massacre. In one of those old square
Spanish houses, lived about 800
Chinese. They got to fighting about
something, a policeman by the name
OF Hutton went in to quell the dis.
turbance when they fell upon HIM and
literally cut him to pieces. This SC
enraged the citizens who were watch
ing for an excuse 10 clean them
out, that they commenced to hang
them at once to lamp posts, piaz-
zas, or wherever they could find Q
pace. AS was loading my liquor
three chaps led along Chinaman
looking for place to hang him
There was crane that swung Out
from the building, that used in load,
ing-they threw the rope over the
crane and drew him up, but his toes
would touch the ground, and one o
them climbed on to my load, jumped
ON to his shoulders and broke his