Charles A. Siringo

by Fifteen Years on the Hurricane Deck of a Spanish Pony A Texas Cowboy or

  When I got onto my feet and the sand out of my eyes, I discovered the whole beach, east of me, thronged with men carrying guns, and marching right towards me. The head ones were not over a hundred yards off, beating drums and blowing their horns.

  It is needless to say I was scared and that I ran as fast as my legs could carry me, looking back every minute to see if they were after me. It was in this way that I ran or sprang right into the midst of Mrs. Zipprian’s drove of geese, before I knew it. There were several old ganders in the drove which used to chase me every chance they got. I generally took particular pains to go around them; but this time my mind was in a different channel from what it had ever been in before, hence my not looking out for them.

  As I flew past, two of the old ganders made a dive at me, but only one succeeded in catching on; he grabbed the tail of my shirt, which stuck straight out behind, in his mouth and hung on with blood in his eyes. My speed seemed to increase instead of slacken, every time the old gander would bounce up and come down, his claws would rake the skin from the calves of my legs. His death-like grip finally broke loose and I felt considerable lighter. My mind also, felt somewhat relieved.

  Mother was out in the yard washing, she had picked up chips enough to boil the water; the tub was sitting upon a box and she was rubbing away with all her might, her back towards me. As I was looking over my shoulder I ran against her, knocking her, tub and all over in a pile, myself with them.

  Mother got up first with her right hand in my shirt collar, I plead manfully, and tried to tell her about the scores of men, but she was too mad to listen, she dragged me to where the big black strap should have hung, I knew she couldn’t find it, therefore hoped to get off with a few slaps, but alas, no, she spied the mush stick and the way she gave it to me with that was a caution!

  The crowd I saw proved to be Dr. Pierceson’s company of rebels, who had been sent over from Matagorda to drill and be ready to fight the bluecoats when they came. It was then the summer of 1862. They located their camp on the beach, about a mile from our house, and I used to march with them all day long sometimes. The captain, Dr. Pierceson, gave me an umbrella stick which I used for a gun.

  That coming fall about five thousand Yankees landed at Deckrows Point on the Peninsula and marched by our ranch on their way to the rebel camp which was stationed forty miles above, at the mouth of Caney Creek.

  They camped one night close to our house and filled me up with hard-tack, which was quite a treat to a fellow living on mush and milk.

  They had a five or six day fight with the rebels, neither of them coming off victorious. We could hear the guns plainly from the “Settlement.” Many dead men were washed ashore on the beach. My sister and I stumbled onto one poor fellow one day, shot through the heart. His clothes were gone and his wrist was marked “J. T.” in India ink.

  After the battle the Yankees marched back to Deckrows Point where they remained to the end of the war; the rebels still held their ground at the mouth of Caney. Every now and then a squad from each side would meet at the “Settlement” and have a skirmish. I remember once after one of those skirmishes a crowd of Yankees rounded Mr. Williams up on the prairie—Billy and I being with him—and throwing their pistols in his face told him if they ever found him so far from home again they would kill him.

  Their threats didn’t scare Mr. Williams the least bit, for he afterwards slipped into their camp after dark and stole eleven head of their best horses and gave them to the rebels. But on his way back from the rebel camp, where he went to take the horses they caught him and took him aboard of a Yankee man-of-war to hang him. They had the rope around his neck ready to swing him when the General turned him loose, on account of his old age and bravery, telling him never to be caught from home again.

  Fighting was going on nearly every day in sight of us; sometimes the Yankee gun boats would get into the Bay among the rebel boats, and at other times they would fight across the narrow strip of land, shooting right over the houses at one another. Many of the cannon balls dropped on the prairie; one of them at one time struck within a few feet of Mr. Williams, almost burying him in the sand as it plowed along on the ground. Poor fellow, he was afterwards killed by one, he carried one home and taking all the powder out of it, as he supposed, set it out in the yard with the hole up, and then told Billy to get him a coal of fire in the tongs. He thought it would just flash a little.

  I was present, and not liking the looks of it, crept out behind the picket gate, a few yards away, and peeped between the pickets.

  The whole family was looking on to see the fun, Mattie, one of the little girls, was sitting with her arms around a dog’s neck, within a few feet of it.

  Billy, arriving with the coal, handed it to his father who reached over and let it drop down into the hole—where he had taken out the lead screw.

  It seemed to me that the coal hadn’t reached the hole when the thing exploded. For a few seconds everything was enveloped in smoke; when the smoke disappeared sufficiently for me to see, the whole sky seemed to be a blaze of fire, and finally Mr. Williams emerged out of the heavy cloud of smoke hopping on one leg.

  A piece of the bomb-shell had taken off part of one foot on the left leg and another piece had plowed through the calf of his right leg; part of one ear was also gone. He only lived a few days.

  A piece of the shell took off one of the dog’s legs without even touching Mattie, the little girl who had her arms around his neck.

  Several pieces went through the house, and one piece went through the picket gate right over my head. The next day Billy and I found a large piece sticking in the wall of an old vacant house a mile from where it exploded.

  During the war several ships were driven ashore on the beach by the Yankee gun boats. The folks at the “Settlement” would get all the plunder. One ship was loaded with dry goods and from that time on I wore breeches.

  About a year after the war broke out the rebels gathered up all the cattle on the Peninsula and drove them to the mainland, where they were turned loose with the thousands upon thousands of wild cattle already over there. Their idea in doing so was to keep the Yankees—whom they knew would hold the lower part of the Peninsula, they having the best gunboats—from getting fresh beef to eat. There was only one cow left in the whole “Settlement” and that was our old “Browny;” mother had begged manfully for them to leave her, for she knew we children would starve to death living on mush straight.

  When the war broke up everybody was happy. We cheered for joy when Mr. Joe Yeamans brought the good news from town.

  Shortly after this all of the men, and boys that were large enough, went over to the mainland to gather up the Peninsula cattle. On their arrival they found it a bigger job than they had figured on, for they were scattered over two or three hundred miles of country and as wild as deer.

  Billy and I thought it very hard that we could not go and be Cow Boys too; but we had lots of fun all by ourselves, for we had an old mule and two or three ponies to ride, so you see we practiced riding in anticipation of the near future, when we would be large enough to be Cow Boys.

  After being gone about three months the crowd came back, bringing with them several hundred head of cattle, which they had succeeded in gathering. Among them were about twenty head belonging to mother.

  The crowd went right back after more. This stimulated Billy and I to become a crowd of Cow Boys all by ourselves, therefore we put in most of our time lassoing and riding wild yearlings, etc. We hardly stayed at home long enough to get our meals. Mother had to get her own wood in those days, for sister had gone to school in Galveston. Of course I always had to come home at night, therefore mother would get satisfaction out of me with the black strap or mush stick, after I was snugly settled in bed, for my waywardness and trifling habits.

  In the spring of 1867, a cattle man by the name of Faldien brought his family over to the Peninsula for their health and rented part of our house to live in.

  After getting h
is wife and babies located in their new quarters, he started back home, in Matagorda, to make preparations for spring work, he having to rig up new outfits, etc. He persuaded mother to let me go with him, and learn to run cattle. When she consented I was the happiest boy in the “Settlement,” for my life long wish was about to be gratified.

  CHAPTER III.

  My First Lesson in Cow Punching.

  THE NEXT DAY after arriving in town, Mr. Faldien sent me out to his ranch, twenty miles, on Big Boggy. I rode out on the “grub” wagon with the colored cook. That night, after arriving at the ranch, there being several men already there, we went out wild boar hunting. We got back about midnight very tired and almost used up. Such a hunt was very different from the coon hunts Billy and I used to have at the “Settlement.” Our dogs were badly gashed up by the boars, and it was a wonder some of us hadn’t been served the same way.

  In a few days Mr. Faldien came out to the ranch, bringing with him several men. After spending a few days gathering up the cow-ponies, which hadn’t been used since the fall before, we started for Lake Austin—a place noted for wild cattle.

  During the summer I was taken sick and had to go home. I was laid up for two months with typhoid fever. Every one thought I would die.

  That fall, about October, mother married a man by the name of Carrier, who hailed from Yankeedom. He claimed that he owned a farm in Michigan, besides lots of other property.

  He was very anxious to get back to his farm, so persuaded mother to sell out lock, stock and barrel and go with him.

  She had hard work to find a buyer as money was very scarce, but finally she got Mr. George Burkheart, a merchant in Matagorda, to set his own price on things and take them.

  The house and one hundred and seventy-five acres of land only brought one hundred and seventy-five dollars. The sixty head of cattle that we had succeeded in getting back from the mainland went at one dollar a head and all others that still remained on the mainland—thrown in for good measure.

  At last everything for sale was disposed of and we got “Chris” Zipprian to take us to Indianola in his schooner. We bade farewell to the old homestead with tears in our eyes. I hated more than anything else to leave old “Browny” behind for she had been a friend in need as well as a friend indeed. Often when I would be hungry and afraid to go home for fear of mother and the mush stick, she would let me go up to her on the prairie calf fashion and get my milk. She was nearly as old as myself.

  At Indianola we took the Steamship “Crescent City” for New Orleans. The first night out we ran into a large Brig and came very near going under. The folks on the Brig were nearly starved to death, having been drifting about for thirty days without a rudder. We took them in tow, after getting our ship in trim again, and landed them safely in Galveston.

  There was a bar-room on our ship, and our new lord and master, Mr. Carrier, put in his spare time drinking whisky and gambling; I do not think he drew a sober breath from the time we left Indianola until we landed in New Orleans, by that time he had squandered every cent received for the homestead and cattle, so mother had to go down into her stocking and bring out the little pile of gold which she had saved up before the war for “hard times,” as she used to say. With this money she now bought our tickets to Saint Louis. We took passage, I think, on the “Grand Republic.” There was also a bar-room on this boat, and after wheedling mother out of the remainder of her funds, he drank whisky and gambled as before, so we landed in Saint Louis without a cent.

  Mother had to pawn her feather mattress and pillows for a month’s rent in an old dilapidated frame building on one of the back streets. It contained only four rooms, two up stairs and two down; the lower rooms were occupied by the stingy old landlord and family; we lived in one of the upper rooms, while a Mr. Socks, whose wife was an invalid, occupied the other.

  The next day after getting established in our new quarters, the “old man,” as I called him, struck out to find a job; he found one at a dollar a day shoveling coal.

  At first he brought home a dollar every night, then a half and finally a quarter. At last he got to coming home drunk without a nickel in his pocket. He finally came up missing; we didn’t know what had become of him. Mother was sick in bed at the time from worrying. I went out several times hunting work but no one would even give me a word of encouragement, with the exception of an old Jew who said he was sorry for me.

  A little circumstance happened, shortly after the “old man” pulled his trifling carcass for parts unknown, which made me a better boy and no doubt a better man than I should have been had it never happened.

  Everything was white without, for it had been snowing for the past two days. It was about five o’clock in the evening and the cold piercing north wind was whistling through the unceiled walls of our room. Mother was sound asleep, while sister and I sat shivering over an old, broken stove, which was almost cold, there being no fuel in the house.

  Sister began crying and wondered why the Lord let us suffer so? I answered that may be it was because we quit saying our prayers. Up to the time we left Texas mother used to make us kneel down by the bed-side and repeat the Lord’s prayer every night before retiring. Since then she had, from worrying, lost all interest in Heavenly affairs.

  “Let us say our prayers now, then, brother!” said sister drying the tears from her eyes.

  We both knelt down against the old, rusty stove and commenced. About the time we had finished the door opened and in stepped Mr. Socks with a bundle under his arm. “Here children, is a loaf of bread and some butter and I will bring you up a bucket of coal in a few moments, for I suppose from the looks of the stove you are cold,” said the good man, who had just returned from his day’s work.

  Was ever a prayer so quickly heard? We enjoyed the bread and butter, for we hadn’t tasted food since the morning before.

  The next day was a nice sunny one, and I struck out up town to try and get a job shoveling snow from the sidewalks.

  The first place I tackled was a large stone front on Pine street. The kind lady of the establishment said she would give me twenty-five cents if I would do a good job cleaning the sidewalk in front of the house.

  After an hour’s hard work I finished, and, after paying me, the lady told me to call next day and she would give me a job shoveling coal down in the cellar, as I had done an extra good job on the sidewalk. This was encouraging and I put in the whole day shoveling snow, but never found any more twenty-five cent jobs; most I received for one whole hour’s work was ten cents, and then the old fat fellow kicked like a bay steer, about the d—d snow being such an expense.

  From that time on I made a few dimes each day sawing wood or shoveling coal and therefore got along splendid.

  I forgot to mention my first evening in Saint Louis. I was going home from the bakery when I noticed a large crowd gathered in front of a corner grocery; I went up to see what they were doing. Two of the boys had just gotten through fighting when I got there; the store-keeper and four or five other men were standing in the door looking on at the crowd of boys who were trying to cap another fight.

  As I walked up, hands shoved clear to the bottom of my pockets, the store-keeper called out, pointing at me, “there’s a country Jake that I’ll bet can lick any two boys of his size in the crowd.”

  Of course all eyes were then turned onto me, which, no doubt, made me look sheepish. One of the men asked me where I was from; when I told him, the store-keeper exclaimed, “by gum, if he is from Texas I’ll bet two to one that he can clean out any two boys of his size in the crowd.”

  One of the other men took him up and they made a sham bet of ten dollars, just to get me to fight. The two boys were then picked out; one was just about my size and the other considerably smaller. They never asked me if I would take a hand in the fight until everything was ready. Of course I hated to crawl out, for fear they might think I was a coward.

  Everything being ready the store-keeper called out, “dive in boys!”


  We had it up and down for quite a while, finally I got the largest one down, and was putting it to him in good shape, when the other one picked up a piece of brick-bat and began pounding me on the back of the head with it. I looked up to see what he was doing and he struck me over one eye with the bat. I jumped up and the little fellow took to his heels, but I soon overtook him and blackened both of his eyes up in good shape, before the other boy, who was coming at full tilt could get there to help him. I then chased the other boy back to the crowd. That ended the fight and I received two ginger-snaps, from the big hearted store-keeper, for my trouble. I wore the nick-name of “Tex” from that time on, during my stay in that neighborhood; and also wore a black eye, where the little fellow struck me with the bat, for several days afterwards.

  About the middle of January mother received a letter from the “old man,” with ten dollars enclosed, and begging her to come right on without delay as he had a good job and was doing well, etc. He was at Lebanon, Ill., twenty-five miles from the city. The sight of ten dollars and the inducements he held out made us hope that we would meet with better luck there, so we packed up our few traps and started on the Ohio and Mississippi railroad.

  On arriving in Lebanon about nine o’clock at night we found the “old man” there waiting for us.

  The next morning we all struck out on foot, through the deep snow, for Moore’s ranch where the “old man” had a job chopping cord wood. A tramp of seven miles brought us to the little old log cabin which was to be our future home. A few rods from our cabin stood a white frame house in which lived Mr. Moore and family.

  Everything went on lovely for the first week, notwithstanding that the cold winds whistled through the cracks in our little cabin, and we had nothing to eat but corn bread, black coffee and old salt pork that Moore could not find a market for.

  The first Saturday after getting established in our new home the “old man” went to town and got on a glorious drunk, squandered every nickel he could rake and scrape: from that time on his visits to town were more frequent than his trips to the woods, to work. At last I was compelled to go to work for Moore at eight dollars a month, to help keep the wolf from our door, and don’t you forget it, I earned eight dollars a month, working out in the cold without gloves and only half clothed.