Fulton County tribune. (Wauseon, Ohio) 1883-1925, 1921-12-01


company. New York; is a chapter in which Rain
in-the-Face tells how he 300 miles on snow
shoes in n blizzard in three days-by far the most
remarkable run in all history.
Ugh what a discussion that chapter has raised
all over the West For the West will never get
through talking about Custer and the battle OF
Little Big Horn River, June %, 1876.
Now Of course, anyone who has ever Travelled
OH snowshOes and has been in South Dakota
blizzard has a positive opinion as to the truth OF
the Indians story Incidentally the worlds record
for a hundred mile run is 13 26 30 However, the
story Of Rain-inthe-Face serves double purpose:
1t makes interesting reading and it has brought
out some reliable facts concerning the legend that
the Sioux chief boasted that he would kill Custer
and eat his heart-and actually did carry out MS
boast
According to the story told to Colonel Shields
by the Sioux in December, 1873 or 1874, while
duartered with portion of his tribe at the Stand
ing Rock agency about 70 miles south OF Bis
1narck. Ran-in-the-Face got into alteration
with four white and killed two of them in
self-defense as he claimed. He captured, TAXI
en- to the agency, and thrown into JAIL "a tenn
porary, unfinished log structure without hoor.'
There were six eight inches of snow on the
ground that had blown in through the openings IN
the walls and the prisoners "Ony means OF Keep
ing from freezing to keep walking constantly
about the room" This cruelty to Indians was prac-
tced on the orders of General Custer then in COM
mand at Fort Lincoln near BiSparck. General
Custer ordered that 'if alive, Rain-in-the-Face
should be thrown into Jail and punished as severe
ly 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 shot" When this order
was read to the prisoner, "Rain-in-the-Face swore
vengeance on General Custer as the author of his
sufTerings. He swore that if he ever got out he
would kill Custer in hand-tO-hand fight, If pos
sible and if not, then at longer range; that he
would cut his heart out and carry it away as
trophy"
Some time before the Custer massacre Rain
fn-the-Face escaped from his prison with the as
Sistance of two friends, who handed him pair
Of snow-shOes and a blanket in which piece of
dried buffalo meat was rolled" The buffalo meat
fell out as he adjusted the blanket and so lie
started out into the desert, in the midst of
bowling blizzard at nightfaII,f with only one
blanket without a 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 and will tell it to
you in his words nearly 1 recall
Them" reports Colonel Shields:
Il asked him, through an interpreter, where
did you 90 when you escaped from the Jail at
Standing RockY He said:
" 4 went to the camp of my friends, at the base
Of Woody mountain, in Canada
" How far is thatT / asked
"Three hundred miles the crow flies.'
How long did it take you to make the runT
""Three days and nights
"Do you to tell me that man can run
a hundred miles in twenty-four hours, on snow
shoes, and another hundred in the next twenty
four, and another hundred in the nextT
eve said 4 did it,
How often did you sleep on the wayY
"I didn't sleep at all. 1 knew dared not sleep.
I dared not even sit down to rest, for if l had,
under the terrible fatigue and hunger and strain
from which suffered, l would have lost conscious
ness, Il stupor would have overtaken me, and |
would have frozen solid in half an hour. was
fleeing from the persecution, the wrongs, the out
RACES inflicted and my people by the white
men. 1 going to my friends and had deter