The Arizona champion., 1890-11-15
SUN FLASH SIGNALS.
Messages Transmitted From
 Peak to Peak.
GENERAL NILES APACHE CAMPAIGN.
Mathematical Exactness of the Hello.
 graph System.

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 graph System.
 At this stage of the campaign Gen. Miles decided to make use of the signal service, and to this end requested the chief signal officer to provide him with a detail of men from the corps to report to the commanding general of the depart ment of Arizona for military signal duty in the field Signal stations were located on the highest peaks along the line of communication. Each station was equip ped with from two to four operators, ac- cording to the amount of business which passed through it. In addition to these operators there were lookout men who swept the surrounding country and neighboring peaks with powerful field glasses. While on duty operators and lookout men were guarded by detach- nent of infantry, the numerical strength of which depended upon the location of the station, having reference to its liabil- ity to attack by hostiles.
 Messages were transmitted from peak to peak and down into the valleys by what is known as the heliographic system of signals. The heliograph, or sun writer, consists of an arrangement of mirrors mounted on a tripod, and so adjusted as to enable the operator to throw a flash of reflected sunlight on a distant point with mathematical exact ness. In making signals long and short sun flashes take the place of the ''dots and clashes of the magnetic sounder, the same call being used for both instru- ments. In a clear atmosphere signals made by this instrument can be easily read by the naked eye at a distance of eighty miles, and by an expert operator at the rate of fifteen words per minute.
 To and fro across the valleys and lower mountain ranges fitted the mes sages which told of the recent where abouts of the hostiles, and close upon the heels of those messages came others or oering the troops in pursuit
 presume it would be a difficult task to try to imagine the surprise that the Indians felt when they suddenly saw that they could not move without finding that almost immediately their trail would be cut by scouting cavalry. They saw the light of the heliograph flashing across the valleys, but they did not at first compre- bend its true significance. At last they began to associate those flashes with the fact that they were constantly being pressed and harassed, and within two weeks from the date of the establishment of the heliograph they fled southward across the Sonora border, there to remain until chased back again by Capt. Lawton to the place of surrender.
 For nearly two months following the flight of the hostiles into Mexico not a sound came back from the shadows of the Sierra Madres, into whose depths pur- sued and pursuers had disappeared. At last, on a scorching hot morning near the close of August, a Mexican courier gal loped into Bisbee-a mining town near the border-with the intelligence that Geronimo and band were in the mount aims about twelve miles from Fronteras, Mex, wishing to treat with the authori- ties of Sonora.
 There was a heliograph station at Bis bee, and the information furnished by the "Greaser" was flashed promptly tc Fort Bowie, seventy-five miles away. Within two hours from the time of the arrival of the Mexican courier at Bisbee five troops of cavalry were making forced marches on Fronteras. When Geronimo had escaped from the net that the United States troops sought to weave around him at Fronteras, and was flying eastward, pursued by all the cavalry in the field, whisper passed along the line that negotiations had been opened look ing to the surrender of the hostiles. Consequently all signal men were on the tiptoe of expectancy.
 One evening, about the 1st of August, the operators at a station in the Swiss helm mountains were nodding lazily under the shelter of their tent fly, when suddenly from the highest peak in the Chiricahua range came the flash of a heliograph, and the following message was received:
 ''Send a blackboard to meet me at Scott Whites ranch. I shall be in Bowe tonight and shall bring some h. dians with me-
 This is the modest manner in which Gen. Miles announced the surrender of Geronimo. That the employment of the heliograph was most important factor in bringing the campaign to speedy and successful issue is generally conceded.- Sergt. Whitney in Louisville Courier Journal.