The Life and Adventures of James P Beckwourth

by James P Beckwourth

  “I should certainly take my warriors,” I replied, “and go and avenge your loss.”

  “That is just what I was going to do for your relatives, friends, and nation. Now punish me if I have done wrong.”

  I had nothing to say in answer, and my head again fell — the spell was not yet broken. The Crow Belt, an old and crafty brave, whispered to a young warrior, who rose in silence, and immediately left the fort.

  Mrs. Tulleck shortly presented herself, and commenced tantalizing the Crows.

  “What are your warriors waiting for, who have been thirsting so many suns to kill the whites? You have been brave for a long while; where is all your bravery now? The gates are set wide open, and only three have joined the few whites whom you thirsted to kill; why don’t you begin? What are you afraid of?”

  She continued in this aggravating strain, the warriors hearing it all, although they did not appear to notice her. The woman’s voice was agreeably relieved by tones uttered outside the gate, which at that moment fell upon my ear, and which I readily recognized as the voice of Pine Leaf. She was haranguing her warriors in an animated manner, and delivering what, in civilized life, would be called her valedictory address.

  “Warriors!” she said, “I am now about to make a great sacrifice for my people. For many winters I have been on the war-path with you; I shall tread that path no more; you have now to fight the enemy without me. When I laid down my needle and my beads, and took up the battle-axe and the lance, my arm was weak; but few winters had passed over my head. My brother had been killed by the enemy, and was gone to the hunting-ground of the Great Spirit. I saw him in my dreams. He would beckon for his sister to come to him. It was my heart’s desire to go to him, but I wished first to become a warrior, that I might avenge his death upon his foes before I went away.

  “I said I would kill one hundred foes before I married any living man. I have more than kept my word, as our great chief and medicine men can tell you. As my arm increased in strength, the enemy learned to fear me. I have accomplished the task I set before me; henceforward I leave the war-paths of my people; I have fought my last battle, and hurled my last lance; I am a warrior no more.

  “To-day the Medicine Calf has returned. He has returned angry at the follies of his people, and they fear that he will again leave them. They believe that he loves me, and that my devotion to him will attach him to the nation. I therefore bestow myself upon him; perhaps he will be contented with me, and will leave us no more. Warriors, farewell!”

  She then entered the fort, and said, “Sparrowhawks, one who has followed you for many winters is about to leave your war-path forever. When have you seen Bar-chee-am-pe shrink from the charge? You have seen her lance red with the blood of the enemy more than ten times ten. You know what her vow was, and you know she has kept her word. Many of you have tried to make her break her word, which you knew she had passed to the Great Spirit when she lost her brother. But you found that, though a woman, she had the heart of a warrior.

  “Do not turn your heads, but listen. You have seen that a woman can keep her word. During the many winters that I have followed you faithfully in the war-path, you have refused to let me into the war-path secret, although you tell it to striplings on their second excursion. It was unfair that I could not know it; that I must be sent away with the women and children, when the secret was made known to those one battle braves. If you had seen fit to tell it to me, it would have been secret until my death. But let it go; I care no farther for it.

  “I am about to sacrifice what I have always chosen to preserve — my liberty. The back of my steed has been my lodge and my home. On his back, armed with my lance and battle-axe, I knew no fear. The medicine chief, when fighting by my side, has displayed a noble courage and a lofty spirit, and he won from my heart, what no other warrior has ever won, the promise to marry him when my vow was fulfilled. He has done much for our people; he has fought their enemies, and spilled his blood for them. When I shall become his wife, I shall be fond and faithful to him. My heart feels pure before the Great Spirit and the sun. When I shall be no more on the war-path, obey the voice of the Medicine Calf, and you will grow stronger and stronger; we shall continue a great and a happy people, and he will leave us no more. I have done.”

  She then approached me, every eye being intently fixed upon her. She placed her hand under my chin, and lifted my head forcibly up. “Look at me,” she said; “I know that your heart is crying for the follies of the people. But let it cry no more. I know you have ridden day and night to keep us from evil. You have made us strong, and your desire is to preserve us strong. Now stay at home with us; you will not be obliged to go to war more than twice in twelve moons. And now, my friend, I am yours after you have so long been seeking me. I believe you love me, for you have often told me you did, and I believe you have not a forked tongue. Our lodge shall be a happy one; and when you depart to the happy hunting-ground, I will be already there to welcome you. This day I become your wife — Bar-chee-am-pe is a warrior no more.”

  This relieved me of my melancholy. I shook the braves by the hand all round, and narrated much of my recent adventures to them. When I came to my danger in the A-rick-a-ra country, they were almost boiling with wrath, and asked my permission to go and exterminate them.

  Pine Leaf left the fort with my sisters to go and dress for the short marriage ceremony. She had so long worn the war costume that female apparel seemed hardly to become her; she returned so transformed in appearance that the beholder could scarcely recognize her for the same person.

  When I visited her lodge in the evening I found her dressed like a queen, with a lodge full of her own and my relatives to witness the nuptials. She was naturally a pensive, deep-thinking girl; her mind seemed absorbed in some other object than worldly matters. It might be that her continual remembrance of her brother’s early fall had tinged her mind with melancholy, or it might be constitutional to her; but for an Indian girl she had more of that winning grace, more of those feminine blandishments — in short, she approached nearer to our ideal of a woman than her savage birth and breed would seem to render possible.

  This was my last marriage in the Crow nation. Pine Leaf, the pride and admiration of her people, was no longer the dauntless and victorious warrior, the avenger of the fall of her brother. She retired from the field of her glory, and became the affectionate wife of the Medicine Calf.

  The difficulty being now entirely removed, we quitted our encampment, and went on a hunting excursion. We were away but a few days, and then returned to the fort. One morning it was discovered a large drove of horses was missing. A party was dispatched along the trail, which conducted them precisely the same route they took before. I raised a party, and again struck across the Mussel Shell, and, finding I was before the fugitives, I secreted my warriors as before. We had waited but a few moments, when I saw the enemy emerge from the pines, not more than a mile distant. Pine Leaf and my little wife were with me. My new bride, as she saw the enemy approach, lost all recollection of her new character; her eye assumed its former martial fire, and, had she had her former war equipments, beyond all doubt she would have joined in the dash upon the foe.

  The pursued, which was a party of Black Feet, were hard pressed by their pursuers in the rear, but very shortly they were harder pushed in the van. When within proper distance, I gave the word Hoo-ki-hi (charge), and every Black Foot instantly perished. So sudden was our attack, they had not time to fire a gun. I struck down one man, and, looking round for another to ride at, I found they were all dead. The pursuers did not arrive in time to participate in the fight. We took thirty-eight scalps, and recovered one thousand horses, with which we returned to the fort. This was my last battle in the Crow nation; the scalp I relieved the Black Foot of was the last I ever took for them. Before my sudden recall from St. Louis I had entered into negotiations which I now felt I would like to complete. I had informed the Crows, after my marriage with Pine Leaf, that I must return to the country
of the whites, as they had called me away before I had had time to finish my business. When the boats were ready to go down stream I stepped on board, and proceeded as far as Fort Union. Previous to departing, I informed the Crows that I should be back in four seasons, as I at that time supposed I should. I told them to credit no reports of my death, for they were all false; the whites would never kill me. Pine Leaf inquired if I would certainly come back. I assured her that, if life was preserved to me, I would. I had been married but five weeks when I left, and I have never seen her since.

  I was disappointed in my expectation of entering into a satisfactory engagement to the agent of the company, so I kept on to St. Louis. In good truth, I was tired of savage life under any aspect. I knew that, if I remained with them, it would be war and carnage to the end of the chapter, and my mind sickened at the repetition of such scenes. Savage life admits of no repose to the man who desires to retain the character of a great brave; there is no retiring upon your laurels. I could have become a pipe-man, but I did not like to descend to that; and, farther, I could not reconcile myself to a life of inactivity. Pine Leaf and my little wife would have excited their powers of pleasing to procure me happiness; but I felt I was not doing justice to myself to relapse irretrievably into barbarism.

  It certainly grieved me to leave a people who reposed so much trust in me, and with whom I had been associated so long; and, indeed, could I have made an engagement with the American Fur Company, as I had hoped to do, I should have redeemed my promise to the Crows, and possibly have finished my days with them. But, being mistaken in my calculations, I was led on to scenes wilder and still more various, yet dignified with the name of greater utility, because associated with the interests of civilization.

  CHAPTER XXIX.

  Return to St. Louis.—Interview with General Gaines.—The Muleteers’ Company.—Departure for Florida.—Wreck of the “Maid of New York.”—Arrival at Fort Brooke.-Tampa Bay.—Bearer of Dispatches to General Jessup.—Battle of O-ke-cho-be.—Anecdotes and Incidents.

  I HAD speedy passage to St. Louis, and arrived there after an absence of five months. I mentioned that I had left some business unsettled at the time of my sudden leave. This was none other than an affair matrimonial; but on my return I had some misunderstanding with my fair dulcinea, and the courtship dropped through.

  At this time the Florida war was unfinished. General Gaines was in St. Louis for the purpose of raising a company of men familiar with Indian habits. Mr. Sublet had spoken to him about me, and had recommended me as being particularly well acquainted with Indian life. The general sent a request that I would call upon him at his quarters. I went accordingly, and was introduced by Sublet.

  The general inquired of me how I would like to go to Florida to fight the Indians. I replied that I had seen so much of Indian warfare during the last sixteen years that I was about tired of it, and did not want to engage in it again, at least for the present. He remarked that there was a good opportunity there for renown. He wished, he said, to raise a company which would go down as muleteers; that their duties would be light, and so on through the stereotyped benefits peculiar to a soldier’s life.

  Sublet recommended me to engage. Florida, he said, was a delightful country, and I should find a wide difference between the cold region of the Rocky Mountains and the genial and salubrious South.

  The general then inquired if I could not raise a company of mountain-boys to go with me. I replied that I thought I could, or that, at any rate, I would make the effort.

  The trapping business was unusually dull at that time, and there were plenty of unoccupied men in the city ready to engage in any enterprise. I went among my acquaintance, and soon collected a company of sixty-four men. I went and reported my success to the general. He wished to see the men. I brought them all forward, and had their names enrolled. I was appointed captain of the company, with three lieutenants elected from the men.

  On the ninth day of my stay in St. Louis, we went on board a steamer going down stream, and were quickly, on our way to the Seminole country. We had a delightful journey to New Orleans, where we were detained five days in waiting for a vessel to transport us to the fields of “renown.” While waiting in New Orleans I fell in with several old acquaintances, who gave me an elegant parting dinner. I then sported the commission of captain in the service of Uncle Sam. Our vessel, the Maid of New York, Captain Carr, being at length ready for sea, my soldiers, with their horses, were taken on board, and we set sail for Tampa Bay. I now, for the first time in my life, saw salt water, and the sickness it produced in me led me to curse General Gaines, and the trappings of war to boot. Our vessel stranded on a reef, and there she remained snug enough, all efforts to dislodge her proving fruitless. There was one small island in sight to leeward; in every other direction there was nothing visible but the heaving ocean. Wreckers, who seemed to rise from the sea-foam, flocked instantly around us, and were received by our captain with a ready volley of nautical compliment. The vessel had settled deeply into a bed of sand and rock; the water was rapidly gaining in her hold, and my commission, together with my gallant companions in arms, seemed, at that moment, to have a slim chance of ever serving our respected uncle in the “fields of renown.” I ascended the rigging to take a survey of the country. Many a time an elevated prospect had delivered me from difficulties, if dissimilar, yet not less imminent, than those that now menaced me. Still I felt that, could those ratlines I was now ascending be transformed into the back of my Indian war-steed, this ocean be replaced with a prairie, and that distant speck which they called an island be transmuted into a buffalo, I would give my chance of a major-generalship in purchase of the change; for the sensations of hunger I began to feel were uncomfortably acute, and I saw no immediate prospect of alleviating the pain. Suddenly I saw a long line of black smoke, which I thought must be from a prairie fire. I reported my discovery to the captain, and he hoisted our colors at half-mast, to signal for assistance. A small steamer came in sight, and made toward us, and finally ranged up under our stern. She took off all my men except myself and twelve others. I wrote to the commandant at Tampa Bay to inform him of our situation, and asking him for immediate assistance. After twelve days’ stay on the reef, two small brigs came out to us, and received on board ourselves, with our horses and forage, conveying us to Tampa Bay, where they cast anchor. Major Bryant sent for me to his quarters, and I forthwith presented myself before him.

  This officer gave me a very cordial welcome, congratulating the service on having an experienced mountaineer, and saying several other very complimentary things. At length he said, “Captain Beckwourth, I wish to open a communication between this port and the head-quarters of Colonel Jessup, distant about one hundred miles. I have received no dispatches from there, although nine couriers have been dispatched by Colonel Taylor.”

  I replied, “Sir, I have no knowledge of the country; I know nothing of its roads or trails, the situation of its posts, nor do I so much as know the position of Colonel Jessup’s command. To attempt to convey dispatches while so little prepared to keep out of harm’s way, I very much fear, would be to again disappoint the service in the delivery of its messages, and to afford the Seminoles an additional scalp to those they have already taken.”

  He pooh-poohed my objections. “A man,” said Major Bryant, “who has fought the Indians in the Rocky Mountains the number of years that you have, will find no difficulty here in Florida.”

  “Well,” I assented, “furnish me with the bearings of the country, and direct me to the colonel’s camp, and I will do my best to reach there.”

  Accordingly, the major furnished me with all the necessary instructions, and I started alone on my errand.

  It was my acquired habit never to travel along any beaten path or open trail, but rather to give such road a wide berth, and take the chances of the open country. I observed my invariable custom on this occasion, merely keeping in view the bearings of the position I was steering for. I started from Ma
jor Bryant’s post about sunrise, and reached the colonel’s head-quarters at nightfall the following day. I passed through the camp without seeing it; but the sound of a bugle falling on my ear, I tacked about, and finally alighted upon it.

  As I rode up I was hailed by a sentinel,

  “Who come dere?”

  “An express.”

  “Vat you vant in dish camp?”

  “I wish to see Colonel Jessup. Call the officer of the guard.”

  “Vat for you come from dat way vere ish de Schimynoles?”

  “Call your officer of the guard,” said I, impatiently. The officer of the guard at length appeared.

  “What are you here again for?” he inquired of me. “I wish to see the commanding officer,” I replied. “Yes, you are always wishing to see the commanding officer,” he said; “but he will not be troubled with you much longer; he will soon commence hanging you all.”

  “I demand to be shown to the commanding officer, sir,” I reiterated.

  “Who are you, then?”

  “I am a bearer of dispatches.”

  “Give them to me.”

  “I was not instructed to give them to you. I shall not do it, sir.”

  “I believe you came from the Seminoles; you came from that direction.”