Twice-a-week plain dealer. (Cresco, Howard County, Iowa) 1895-1913, 1901-05-07
CHAPTER w.

Sl1AI L In I've
In the busy week that followed
Lieut.. Stuyvesant had his full share
of work and no time for social dis
traction. Appointed to the staff OF
out delay for Manila, the young Off
Ger found his hours from morn til
late at night almost too short for
the duties demanded of him.
The transports were almost ready
The troops had been designated fol-
the expedition. The supplies were
being hurried aboard. The general
had his men all the livelong day al
the rifie-ranges or backgrounds, for
most of the brigade were raw volun.
teers who had been rushed to the
point of rendezvous with scant equip
ment and with less instruction. The
camps were thronged with men in all
manner of motley as to dress and nc
little variety as to dialect. Few OF
the newly appointed officers in the
department of supply were versed in
their duties, and the young regulars
of the staff of the commanding gen
eral were working 10 hours out OF
the "a, coaching their comrades OF
the volunteers.
The streets were crowded with
citizens eager to welcome and ap
plaud the arriving troops. Hotels
were thronged. Restaurants were
doing thriving business, for the
army ration did not too soon com
mend itself in it's simplicity to the
stomachs of some thousands Of
young fellows who had known better
diet if not better days, many of their
number having left luxurious homes
and surroundings and easy salaries
to shoulder musket for three dol.
lars a week.
Private soldiers in blue flannel
shirts We're learning to stand atten.
ton and touch their caps to young
men in shoulder-straps whom they
had laughed at and called "tin sol
diers' year agone because they be
longed to the militia-a thing mos
of the gilded youth in many of ou1
western cities seemed to scorn as be
meath them.
In the wave of patriotic wrath and
fervor that swept the land when the
Maine was done to death in Havana
harbor, many and many youth who
had sneered at the state guardsmer
learned to wish that he too had
given time and honest effort to the
school of the soldier, for now, unless
he had sufficient pull to win for
him a staff position, his only hope
was in the ranks.
And SO, even in the recruit detach.
ments of the regulars, were found
scores of young men whose social
status at home was on plane much
higher than that of many of their of,
ficers. But the time had come when
the long and patient effort of the
once despised militiamen had won
deserved recognition. The commits.
sions in the newly raised regiments
were held almost exclusively by Off.
GERS who had won them through long
service with the National guard.
And in the midst of all the whirl
of work in which he found himself
Lieut.. Stuyvesant had been sum,
moned to the tent of Gen. Drayton
commanding the great encampment
on the sand-lots south of the Presidio
reservation, and hidden to tell what
he knew of one Walter F. Foster, re.
cruit til cavalry, member of the de.
tachment sent on via the Denver and
Rio Grande to Ogden, then trans.
ferred to the Southern Pacific train
No. en- route to San Francisco
its car and the car out of it's train
early on the morning of the oil
June, 1893, somewhere in the neigh.
borhood of a station with the un.
couth name of Beowawe in the heart
of the Humboldt desert, and which
Recruit Foster had totally disap
peared the following evening, having
been last seen by his comrades as the
train was ferried across Carquine7
Straits, 80 miles from Oakland Pier
and later by railway hands at Port
Costa on the back trip of the big boat
to the Benicia side.
There was little Stuyvesant could
tell. He hardly remembered the man
except as fine-featured young fel.
low who seemed shy, nervous and
unstrung, something Stuyvesant had
hitherto attributed to the startling
and painful experience of the fire
and who, furthermore, seemed desir.
Gus of lodging the lieutenant, which
circumstance Stuyvesant could not
fathom at all, and if anything rather
resented.
He explained to the general that
he was in no wise responsible for the
care of t detachment. He had only
casually met them at Ogden, and cir.
eumstunces later had thrown him
into closer relation.
But the veteran general was de-
kirous Of further information. He
aat at tho pine table In his plainly
furnished tent, looking thoughtfully
into the frank and handsome face of
the young officer, his fingers beating
a tattoo on the tabletop. The gen
erals eyes We're somber, even sad at
times. Beneath them lay lines of