Cheraw chronicle. [volume] (Cheraw, S.C.) 1896-2005, 1921-11-24

company New York; is chapter In wnlcn haih-
in.the-Face tells how he rem 300 miles on snow
shoes in blizzard in three days-by far the most
remarkable run in all history
TI0b what discussion that chapter mas ralseu
all over the West! For the, West will never ger
through talking about Custer and the oaIeie u
Little Big Horn River, June 20. 1876
Now. Of course, anyone who has ever traVeie"
nh snowshoes and has been in South Dako'a
blizzard has a positive opinion as to the truth Oh
the Indians story Incidentally the WORLDS recoru
For q hundred mile run is 13 :26 80. However, tne
story Of Rain-in-the-Face serves douoie purpo'e.
II makes interesting reading ana II mas orousn.
ont some reliable facts concerning the leeenu 'io'
the Sioux chief boasted that he wouln XIII Ous.ei
end eat his heart-and actually did carry out Ills
boast. , eX,.,a
According TO the story told to Colonel Shields
nv the Sioux In December, 1873 or 1874 while
onar+ared with portion of his tribe at the Stand
inc Rock agency, about rs miles south OF BIS
merck Rain-in-the-Face got into an altercauon
With fonr white men and killed two OF them IN
salfdefepse, as he claimed. He was captured tax
on TO the agency and thrown into JAIL a TEN.
porary unfinished log structure without nooi
rhora uere six or eight inches Of snow on the
ground that had blown in through the openings III
the walls and the prisoners "only means OF Keep
ing from freezing was to keep walking cohstan'iy
about the room." This cruelty to Indians was prac
tIcad on the orders OF General Custer then In COM
mand at Fort Lincoln, near Bismarck. Geheral
Custer ordered that 'if alive, Raln-in-the-Face
sbould be thrown into Jail and punished as severe
" as possible, pending the time when the court
martial could be convened and the culprit dis
posed of In legal way. And this meant OF course
that he would be hung or shot" When TINS order
was read to the prisoner, "Rain-in-theFace swore
vengeance on General Custer as the author OF MS
sufrerings. He swore that If he ever got out ne
would kill Custer in hand-to-hand fight II pos
sible and If not, then at longer range; that ne
would cut his heart out and carry it away as
trophy"
Some time before the Custer massacre, Rain
in-the-Face escaped from his prison with the as
sistance of two friends who handed him pair
of snow-shoes and blanket In which piece or
dried buffalo meat rolled" The buffalo meat
fell out as he adjusted the blanket, and so he
started out Into the desert in the midst of
bowling blizzard, at nightfall with only one
blanket without mouthful of food, without
weapon of any kind when the temperature was
probably forty degrees below zero and the wind
was blowing thirty miles an hour" "He told me
the story Of his great run and will tell 1t to
YOU In his own words as nearly as can recall
them" reports Colonel Shields:
"I asked him. through an interpreter, Where
did you go when you escaped from the jail at
Standing Rockr He said:
"T went to the camp of my friends, at the base
Of Woody mountain, in Canada
"How far is thatT l asked.
"'Three hundred miles the COW flies.
"How long did it take you to make the rum
"Three days and nights
ado you mean to tell me that q man can run
q hundred miles In twentyfour hours, on snow
Shoes and another hundred In the next twenty
four and another hundred In the nextr
"He said, did It.
allow often did you sleep on the wayT
"T didn't sleep at all. knew dared not sleep.
I dared not even sit down to rest, for If had,
under the terrible fatigue and hunger and strain
from which l suffered would have lost conscious
ness stupor would have overtaken me, and l
would have frozen solid in half an hour. was
fleeing from the persecution, the wrongs, the out
RACES inflicted on me and my people by the white
men, was going to my friends and had deter