New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1899-06-25
SCOUTS WITHOUT A TRAIL.
MANY VETERANS OF THE TRAIL IN
POOR CIRCUMSTANCES
THE CIVILIZATION OF THE PLAINS IN WHICH
THEY PLAYED A GREAT PART. THREW
THEM OUT OF EMPLOYMENT.

About the most piifully cherries men in TN
West nowadays are those who have given I'M
greater part of their lives to scouting for tn
Army and occasionally for a cattle company o.
a band OF miners who have endured genera
ton OF savage har dships and have braved all tn
dangers Of the plains, and now. griZzled an'
gray, realize that their occupation IL gone TOT
ever There are scores of the old fellows in th'
Territories Several hundred Of the younger
scouts have become vaqueros sheep herders' ex
press messengers and guards, cattiemen, ran
road men, miners and prospectOrs. Electricity
and railroads principally have made scouting Cd
solete and since the Apaches in the Southwes
and the Sioux in the Northwest nave peer
beaten into peaceful relations with the Whlt'
settlers there has been no demand Tor the ser
vices OF the old-tme scout In every town o.
any size in this region one may see some OF th'
veteran scOutS-pOOr in purse, tattered IN per
son-loafng about the saloons telling visltor'
from the East of the glorieS or the trohtler DE
fore civilization and railroads spoiled it all. anc
half-heartedly building hopes Of the day wher
something unexpected may transplre ana scout
ing may be called into demand again
The earlier scouts. like Kit Carson and Jim
Bridger were originally trappers and hunters
born and reared in Missouri. Tennessee and Ken
lucky, who had fondness for adventure. TheS
had pushed their way across the border or clVi
ization of those days and had gone upon the
plains of Kansas, Nebraska and Texas Tor DIE
Same and excitement The Mexican War o.
1917 and the movement of troops through IeXh
and along me Rio Grande brought scouting lht'
the Army service. When the era or OK teams
and excited gold seekers headed toward Callfor
mia began in 1S49 there a great demand
for scouts at very profitable wages HUNDREDS
Of young men with smatterlng OF plains me
an experiences in firearms and little kno"l
edge of Indian ways became professional scouts
NJ emipration train would leave St. Joseph. Mo.
or Leavenworth Kan. on its journey OF four oi
five months TO the Plcitic Ocean without an &C
comparying scout or guide for at least part oil
the way AS the chain Of Army garrisons was
Id - DlalnS
ment employed more and more scouts for the
troops and scouting became sort OF science Oh
the plains in which there was competition IN eN-
nerience During the Apache and Sioux wars
in 1877 1873 and 1879 the Government had
about twelve hundred scouts on the Army pay
rolls Then the Indians. who had adopted white
mems WAYS became scouts. and the pursuit oil
the white men waned fast
HE MUST ENDURE PRIvATIoNs.
ALL an iron constitution He expected to re-
main in the saddle days and nights in success
sion, To sleep for weeks at a time wherever night
overlook him. His sole concern. so far as phys
zeal discomfort was concerned, was for his horse
or bronco. PriVatiOns that would quickly break
down men used to combining employment and in
door life we're nothing to scouts They have
gone for weeks without cooked food because
they were secretly trailing in an Indian country
and dared not make ? fire. Hunger ana thirst
were common privatiOns They have slept on
bleak and barren spots where bitter winds blew
and dust and sand filled the air. with their
horses picketed near. without even protecting
blanket over them, only to get up at dawn and
pursue the ride sixty or seventy miles further
1t is wonderful that these plainsmen could en-
dGrc this life longer than few years.
Courage is another requisite for good scout
Some OF this courage may be border bravado
but there have been such constant opportunities
to reveal the mettle Of a scout that none could
conceal his true self very long. There have
been published countless highly romantic stories
OF the bravery Of scouts in prairie fires in STAN
pedes Of buffalo, in facing a shower of bullets
and a storm Of feathered arrows and the ma
jOrity OF these rOmanceS are founded on fact.
one may hear about any garrison on the West
ern frontier to-day veraciOuS stories or deeds OF
bravery by long-haired. untutored scouts that
rival the widest fiction.
The scout must also have quick comprehen-
sion and good memory for details of a coun-
try. Scouts Winchel and Flanagan. who led a
troop of cavalry into an Apache ambush among
the Dragon Mountains in Southern Arizona in
1879. and who instantly ordered the sol
Giers to whrl about and seek safety behind
the lava powders. while they (the two scouts
dashed into the open and received the deadly
charge intended for the troops, showed as much
courage and quckness Of comprehension as
legendary heroes ever did. Out on the barren.
sun-baked and wind swept plains the scout must
know where water is to be had. even though he
might not have been that way in several years.
General Custer said that the four scouts who led
his troops in the Indian campaigns Of the later
sixties could smell water forty miles away, even
when the sun was witheringly hot and the SOL
ders and horses were almost overcome.
The art Of scouting is learned only by expert
ence and years of observation. There are no
textbooks To be studied. A vast number Of mi
mute facts in nature-things that experienced
natlrasts would not observe-are like an open
volume to veteran scouts. The twist Of a turned
leaf along trail will be noted as showing which
way the last persons in that locality went. and
the height and location IF the turned leaf show
whether the person afOOt or en- horseback
The turned pebbles denote by their color how long
they have been stirred from their beds OF earth