The herald. [microfilm reel] (Los Angeles [Calif.]) 1893-1900, 1896-10-04
AN ARIZONA TRAGEDY
A Vivid Story Of Life and Death Among
the Apaches
How Undesired Halfbreed Children Are
Quietly Disposed Of-Remnant
OF Horrible Barbarity.

Ariz.. riding on the top Of a freight car,
an accommodation which Is furnished
free to Indians by benevolent corpora
ton. His visit to town arose from the
fact of an over-production Of Indian
bows and arrows for the limited market
Of Yuma, and a desire to dispose Of the
surplus to curiO dealers of this city.
The reason why Jose did not make his
usual pilgrimage or commercial trip to
Los Angeles during the last Fiesta, when
his fellow workmen brought in their
wares, was that he was at that time the
guest of the territory, or as Jose ex-
pressed 1t, Gin the big guardhouse where
they shut up bad men,"
Not that Jose admitted himself in
that category, but thought himself rath-
er the innocent victim of tribal custom
among the Mojaves. The alternating cir
cumstance of his incarceration, to Jose,
was the suspension of the necessity for
him to assist his squaw during the heat
ed term in the manufacture of their
joint stock in trade. The primal cause
of Joses trouble was his brother law,
a Mexican named Maria Sortillon. Sor-
tillon, two years ago, was the mail car
rier between Yuma and Parker, where
are situated the agency and government
buildings of the Colorado river Indian
reservation, about eighty miles north
of Yuma and about ninety miles south
of the Needles. Jose's home, where he
dwelt with his mother and sister in a
single tepee, or straw hut, was at a
small settlement called Ehrenberg,
which since it's abandonment as trad
ing post has dwindled from a place of
some Importance to a location for q few
temporary Indian huts. This Indian set
Element was about midway between Yu-
ma and Parker and served as half
way resting place for Sortillon, the Mex
lean mail carrier. He was good fell
low among the Indians and popular with
them. Moreover, in his official capacity,
he inspired the Indian with a sort of
reverential awe, SO that when he began
to single out Jose's sister, Vera, as his
special protege, 1t was eminently salts
factory not only to Jose himself, but to
his aged mother Cemika as well.
Cemika vs. an ancient and wrinkled
creature Of as hideous an aspect as even
an Indian squaw could we'll support, and
in former days, when accompanying her
tribe upon the warpath had lifted many
scalps from the heads of murdered
ranchers and emigrants.
In her more youthful days she was
a member of the Apache nation, and as
| is we'll known to those informed in the
habits Of Apache warfare it is the
| squaws who are the most ferocious,
! bloodthirsty and cruel
|
! any tender sentiment on the part of
Vera toward Sortillon, for according to
| a custom generally accepted among the
| Mojaves, and especially demanded by
| Cemika, the mail carrier purchased his
| fair bride for a sack Of beans and can
| of coffee, and an implied promise to
devote a portion of his official salary
| to the future needs Of Jose and KS
mother. That Vera was properly a
bride, according to Mojave customs,
seems hardly to be susceptible of doubt,
although the relationship was after
ward dlspted by Sortillon. AT least
the Indians of the settlement still recall
the happy events of big "tiswin''
drunk attending the wedding ceremoni-
al, which is to be commended for it's
simplicity, consisting, as it does, of the
payment Of the purchase price and the
delivery of the bride. The quantity
and quality of the tiswin furnished on
such occasions Is the most trustworthy
evidence of the fitness of the BRIDE
groom. The Mohaves do not furnish
marriage certificates, so that when the
marriage was questioned. Wera's only
proof consisted in the tiswin- clouded
memories of her friends and relatives.
For time all went smoothly but 1t
| each succeeding mail trip Sortillon be-
came more and more disinclined to
spare money from the monte tables in
Yuma to provide the family larder with
canned goods, and when toward the end
of the year he was called upon to as
sumo the added cares Of parent, his
| not too energetic nature rebelled.
1t was in Christmas week that he
started upon his usual trip from Yuma
| north and toward the evening of the
second day out he arrived at the door
of his little tepee. A fire was burning
inside, and the odor of the inevitable
| frijole greeted him as he lifted the rag
\ n n t,a 5trpv - ~
hut. This bit of ornamentation, by the
way, gave to his little hut an aristocrat-
| ic appearance which singled 1t out from
| its neighbors, and with an old blanket
laid over some hay on the floor and one
stool constituted It's entire furnishing.
| The fire was built with dried willow
poles, long ends of which were stretch
ed almost across the hut, and as the
| ends burned off, 1t became the duty of
! old Cemika to-keep up the blaze by
| showing them into the heart of the fire.
| Two adobe bricks at right angles to
each other answered for a stove. upon
| which rested their one pan. A few
Goals which had been scraped to one
side supported the ruins of a coffee pot.
| AS Sartillon entered he noticed that
| Vera was lying on the straw in one
corner of the hut with her back to Ce-
mika, who was silently crouching by the
| fire. Jose was not to be seen, After
several unavailing attempts to arouse
| Vera, Sortillon turned toward Cemika
| and angrily demanded the cause of the
| girls listlessness. Cemika stolidly
grunted OUT
'Wera she get pappoose'-a piece of
intelligence which so enraged him that
he turned to Vera and heaped upon her
many reproaches. Far from attempt
ing to simulate any interest in the birth
| of his baby, it was afterward stated
| that he would not postpone a much
needed siesta to look upon the new
| born infant.
AS he settled to sleep the scowl upon
the old squaw's face seemed to deepen
and accentuate its every hideous line.
and the dull red glow in her sullen eve
darkeped as she thought Of the insult
offered tt her daughter. With the
| awakening of her hatred. her old Apache
ferocity and dormant love of cruelty
were aroused and hastily and stealthily
| quitting the tepee, she breasted the
! piercing December wind and ram to
meet Jose, who was returning from the
! Indian wood camp where he was help
| ing to build a raft upon which the In
| dams intended on the morrow to drift
with the current down the Colorado to
| Yuma.
| She managed to inform him of the be-
| havior Of Sortillon and also to impart to
| him no small degree Of the rage which
| filled her own breast. Together they
walked back to the tepee, Jose having
| first procured shovel from the wood
camp. On the way Semika was unnat-