The Wilmington daily Republican. (Wilmington, Del.) 1890-1902, 1893-08-01
EVADING INDIANS.
STONY OF THE "slsLEy SCOUT AND
ITs NARROW ESCAPE.


lTs NARROW ESCAPE.
An Exciting Chase Of the Disastrous Gus
ter Campaisn--A Recital of the Retreat
and Pursuit by the Hero Of the Anair.
Days without Food.
The 'Sibley scout" Is famous among In
dian fighters as being one Of the narrowest
escapes from savages now on record. The
hero Of that hazardous encounter with the
dreaded Sioux passed the winter in COM
pany with the writer and favored him with
a sketch of that memorable action Of a
handful of troopers away up in the Big Horn
mountains, far from the main command.
It was In 1875, at the time Of Clusters mas
sacre, when F. W. Sibley of General Crooks
column, then young Lieutenant, was or
dered out with 60 mounted men to look
about the country and see what was going
on. Frank Grouard, a half breed, and one
of the best scouts living, accompanied Sib-
ley. The young officer was fresh from
West Point and rather inexperienced in
frontier warfare, no cautious General Crook
ibade him heed the scouts advice should
emergency arise, and of the troopers start
ed almost at the very hour when Custer,
100 miles or so away, was being cut to pieces
by the cutthroats of Sitting Bull.
The scouting party was ignorant of this,
however, and travelled for two days With
out incident. As they nearea tie noun
Itains, Grouard, who always travelled ahead
lof the soldiers, suddenly signaled to halt
Indian signs were seen. From an eminence
vast area Of rolling coun-
try little specks could be seen Mere and
there. The glass proved that each speck
was a squad Of several Sioux In war cor
tune. The specks began to concentrate
They moved toward the trail made by the
troopers, but without discovering It for q
long time. The Indians were ignorant Of
the presence Of soldiers. After holding a
powwow one Of the savages rode toward
the telltale trail BY chance he discovered
lit and returned to his comrades, waving
his blanket and gesticulating.
It then seemed to the young cavalry of
flcer as II Indians sprang from the earth in
all directions to see what had been discov-
erred. There were swarms of them. But
happily they were miles away. Then be
gan the race for life. The mountains Of
fered the only refuge. Up and up scram-
bled the horses On, came the Indians.
They were seen occasionally along canyons
In the rear. The band BID divided and
was trying to head of thc's9 diers and sur
round them. Suddenly, MS the soldiers as
cended the side of a gulch and gained a
small plateau, party Of redskins sprang
at them, firing their rifles and yelling.
"The men scattered like sheep" says
Captain Sibley, "and confess that for the
moment my heart was In my mouth. My
horse fell down an embankment, which
!, added to my discomfort. ordered the men
Ito fire even if they did not aim at the en-
envy, for rifle made noise like cannon
amid those hills. Finally the men got to-
gether, and we reiterated up slope to bit
of wooded ground which protected us from
the Indians fire. This was about o'clock
in the morning. The Indians began to
gather about us rapidly. The situation was
growing more serious every minute. My
men were doing good work with their rifles.
ut pleased me to see one man shoot q
noted Sioux chief right through the heart.
That old sinner never twitched a muscle
after the lead hit him. We never knew how
many we killed because when an Indian il
shot his comrades keep him out of sight
Well, we held them off for four hours, and
they were four hours of redhot work, car
tell you. My scout then told me that the
one chance left to retreat, and this chanct
was fast lessening, because fresh Indians
were coming.
II did not like to abandon our horses
but 1t was that or die. So the retreat was
ordered. inspected each man personally
to see that his equipment was all right
but owing to my inexperience and the ex
lcitement of the moment 1 forgot the ra
Itions Only one man in the command tool
his rations. 1t was an hour or so befor,
the Indians discovered that we had fled
By that time we were up In the mountains
; lin places SO steep that one man had to hell
the other up. Horses could not follow us
rlSo for the time being the Sioux woult
not strike us. Grouard took a mountain
trail, which we followed on foot for s.
hours without a mouthful to eat.
/ "Such fearfully vigorous exercise withou
. food nearly killed us. Toward the end o
this perilous march we all became S,
weakened that we marched for 10 minute
and then would lie down and rest. Severa
lof the mort robust men became insane, an,
lone or two never regained their wits
(. When we reached Crooks camp, slept 70
hours without waking, and during tina
Itime the camp was sharply attacked by tn
Indians. Even the roar Of the musketr,
did not disturb my sleep i'll the least. No
a single man was lost on this trip"
Remarking on the peculiarities of plain
life, Captain Sibley said that it SCENE,
wonderful to him what remarkable in
lstincts a half breed scout possessed.
scout had led him across Il trackless vast
on dark night when the snow was falling
and the wind blowing There was not
Landmark to guide the scout The horse
were continually drifting to windward, a
lit were, in the effort to get their faces ava
from the cutting blast. Yet In the face o
all these difficulties the scout would lea,
the troopers after marching all night t
the exact spot for which they started, an,
he never failed.
A surprising popularity of Indians /
their carelessness about posting sentinel
when they go into camp, even when the
know that an enemy is near. Captain Sill
ley has seen a large Indian village com
pletely surrounded by soldiers in the earl
;, morning without an alarm being given
lin fact, the only movement in the India
camp as late as 0 o'clock In the mornin
was the appearance of an old squaw, VIII
came out of wigwam to change the pos
tion of tethered horse.-Cor. New Yorl
Tribune.