Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1914-07-21


Notwithstanding twenty-five toug.
men held it and were Boosting they
would never give it up.
| Partly from the fact that their high
grade ore was so rich, and partly be
cause, doubtless, they were anticipa
ting trouble from the new purchaser
the bulk of their gang was kept down
below in the workings.
I lost no time getting busy. As
usual with me, my strategy was not
notably complicated. I have always
| found that when a man wants any
thing, about the only way worth mess.
| ing with is to just 20 and take it. by
, the straightest route and the most
direct method.
Letters agent wanted me to raise a
war party of thirty men, but told him
that would make bigger army than
was accustomed to command, and that
if he would leave the details to me,
would be ready to turn the Iron Silver
mine over to him by the time his un.
foreground boss could get his powder
bought and drills sharpened.
And l did the trick, with the aid of
three other men; but as each Of us
carried Winchester and wore two
six-shooters, and all four Of us were
poopularly known as such careful econ
omists in their use that little work re.
NAMED for the doctors after the finish
of any shooting match we were forced
to engage in-perhaps the odds against
us we're not as heavy as at first glance
they appeared.
Slipping up behind the shaft house
before the day shift was due to turn
out. I captured the outworks without
firing shot. and chased the crew
down the gulch. Then I sent note
down in the bucket to the underground
gang, ordering them out without any
delay or back talk.
Their reply was an invitation,
framed in anything but polite terms.
to come down and get them. and the
assurance that they would welcome a
chance to start us on the way to
deeper and hotter pit than that they
occupied.
While the answer was annoying, it
stf1l had for me immediate value. It's
reference to hotter pit suggested my
next move.
First, rushing one Of my men into
town to buy material to make my word
good, sent down a second note to the
underground gang to say that any re-
manning below after twenty minutes
would smoke out with sulfur.
Did It work? Like a charm. In
side ten minutes We got their hoist
signal and directly thereafter, bucket
load by bucketload received them, dis
armed them as fast as they appeared
and set them pounding the trail back
to town.
Bruce Hill and the Iron Silver mine
were ours; and my work was so far
appreciated that through the next year
or more Letters litigation lasted, /
remained captain of the Iron Mine
Guard.
Shortly after the Meeked massacre
by the Utes, old John Wallace and l
took chance on a trading expedition
Captain Jacks Utes, still rather
more than semihostile over On Platon
Creek
That we managed to return with
forty-nine horses and four hundred
buckskins, we owed exclusively to
promises we found ourselves forced to
make that we would come back short
ly with guns and ammunition.
In the lot of horses We got were sew.
eral that even the Indians could not
ride. But as by that time had be-
come something of a bronco buster
myself, I managed to master them in
a way that l believe would have made
my old mates, Peach and Cox, proud
Of me.
After spending the next few months
scouting for Captain Lawton around
Fort Garland, l was hired by Don
Men. Palmer, of Denver to go with
him to Mexico, as guard of his pay
roll and bullion pack trains.
In those years all of central and
northern Mexico was quite as unsafe
as in actual war times.
Porifro Diaz had the south fairly
well pacifed and under control. But
in the north lack Of communications
and facilities for moving troops for
some years left it impossible for him
to suppress the bandits that, under
able leaders. and often In large bodies,
were constantly attacking travel on the
stage roads, sacking ranches, and even
the larger towns and levying
prestamos (enforced "loans") on the
weather. merchants.
Ultimately, Don Porfirio destroyed
The last of these bandit organizations,
great and small, by most masterful
piece Of diplomacy, equal in its bril-
fancy 70 the greatest of his victories
IN the battlefield.
To each of the bandit leaders he
sent an invitation to come to the City
If Mexico for conference with him,
giving them his word Of honor that
hey should be free to return to their
fields of industry when they
pleased.
All came, nearly a dozen Of them,
IS I remember To them he gave
banquet in the national palace. The
ended, he addressed them,
more or less, as follows:
"Gentlemen-You know me. You
Know | am accustomed to make my
word good. I have brought you here
% tell you that now have the south
oacified. Now l am free to send half
ny army against you. if you leave 1t
necessary for me OF do so.
Il can, and will, wipe every last
me of you off the face of the earth
lnless you find merit in the alternative