by Lou Cameron
I had a small flask of brandy in my bag and I went to get it. Rockwell waved it away. “Liquor won’t wash all that blood away. It’s going to stain us for all time. It’s strange that a group of men can do that to a whole nation of people.”
His eyes met mine for a moment; he had been looking away as he talked, something he never did. “You find it hard to get used to hearing words like nation,’ don’t you?”
I nodded. “A Mormon nation, yes.”
“But that’s what we are—a nation, not just a slice of something bigger. Anyway, I can’t change how I feel at my age. You’ll never know how free I felt when Brigham decided to cut loose forever, to put us beyond the reach of the States. I was thirty-four then, no longer so young, so it was like being given a new life, a second chance to make something out of myself. I knew there would be no more starts for me if I didn’t make the best of the one I had. That’s why our life here has meant so much to me. In our way, we may be the last free people left on this earth, and yet they can’t let us be. They want to strangle us with their nit-picking laws, tax us, regulate the life out of us until we’re just like the rest of the bleating sheep that think they’re free. I’ll be damned if I want to live in a world like that. Am I wrong, William?”
“I don’t know,” was all I could say.
Just then there was wild shouting in the street outside and not too far away a cannon boomed. It was answered by another one.
Chapter Eight
The first thing we heard when we started down the stairs was someone yelling, “The Americans are coming, a whole army of them!” Then everything became a babble, with men grinning, men looking anxious. The man behind the desk was making more noise than anybody, and his eyes bulged when he saw Rockwell. He kept on waving his hands until Rockwell reached across the counter and shook him hard and his mouth kept working after his voice stopped.
“Calm yourself, Mr. Findlay,” Rockwell growled, impatient with all the panic. “What’s this about the Americans?”
Findlay had to take a deep breath before he was able to speak. “It just came over the wire, Port. The Americans are getting ready to march on us from California. I knew you were upstairs but got excited and forgot. They’re coming. That’s all I know.”
“Who brought this news?” Rockwell said. “Point him out to me.”
Findlay tried to break Rockwell’s hold on him. “He’s gone out again, Port. Yelled it in the door, then ran off. He’s down the street by this time.”
Rockwell turned Findlay loose and we went out to find people running in all directions as if the American army, if there was one, would march all the way from California in the next five minutes. Men were pouring out of McSorley’s, some with beer mugs in their hands. A lone soldier lay in the middle of the street covering his face against kicks thrown at him by a group of men, and they might have killed him if Rockwell hadn’t drawn his Colt and fired two shots in the air, then waded in and sent the attackers flying in all directions. He helped the soldier to his feet and pushed him away from there, saying, “Get on back to camp, son.”
“We’d best get over to the telegraph office to get the straight story of this. It could be some fool’s idea of a joke.”
The excitement continued while we made our way through the crowds to the office of the Pacific Telegraph Company, a new building of raw wood that was only half painted. People were gathered there, too, all talking and gesturing, and when they saw Rockwell they began to shout questions, as if he knew anything more than they did.
“Go about your business,” he roared. “You’ll know soon enough.”
Inside, he cleared the room and locked the door; behind the counter the two clerks were in a dither. “Where’s Mr. Danvers?” Rockwell asked one of them. Against the far wall three telegraphers were tending to their clicking machines, impervious to the uproar in the street.
“Mr. Danvers took the message to General Wells,” the clerk said, mopping at his face. “It’s true, Mr. Rockwell. Message came in only fifteen minutes ago. Soon as Mr. Danvers got it he ran for General Wells’ house.”
“Let me see a copy,” Rockwell ordered. “Be quick about it.”
“It’s confidential, Mr. Rockwell,” the clerk said stupidly. “You’ll have to ask Mr. Danvers.”
Rockwell took hold of the clerk and shook him as he had shook the man at the hotel. You’ve heard of someone being shaken until his teeth rattled; this man’s did, and when Rockwell let him go he nearly fell to the floor.
Rockwell knew he hadn’t done him any real harm; he smiled at me and said, “He thinks its confidential. What do you think, William?”
I didn’t feel like smiling. “I hope it isn’t true.”
Rockwell thrust the copy at me when it was handed to him; the clerk retreated, smoothing the rumpled lapels of his frock coat, as angry with Rockwell as he dared to be. Rockwell himself was like a man revitalized; he might have come back from a walk in a flower garden instead of a four-hundred-mile ride. He wanted war.
The telegraph message had been sent from San Francisco. The sender called himself Abraham, an angry enough name for the situation. There was no attempt at coding; Abraham was quite direct:
LARGE FORCE OF CALIFORNIA VOLUNTEERS TO MARCH ON SALT LAKE WITHIN THE WEEK. ESTIMATED STRENGTH: 1000. INFANTRY AND CAVALRY. STRONG ARTILLERY SUPPORT. COMMANDER IS GENERAL PATRICK E. CONNOR. EX SEMINOLE CAMPAIGN AND MEXICAN WAR. INFORMATION VERIFIED. ACKNOWLEDGE RECEIPT. FURTHER INFORMATION IF AVAILABLE.
After I read the message to Rockwell he folded it and put it in his pocket. “No doubt about it, William. Abraham is our most reliable man in California. If they’re sending Connor, they must mean business.”
“You know who he is?”
“By reputation. People here served under him in the Mexican War. He was born in Ireland and enlisted to fight against the Seminoles when he came to the States. When the Mexican War came along he got to be an officer. Then he went to California and got to be one of the richest men in the state. One of the forty-niners who got lucky. Now he owns mines, ranches, part of a railroad. They say he can ride all day on a fast horse without leaving his own land. Now he’s a brigadier general of volunteers, it looks like, but he isn’t one of those politicians or moneybags who are in the army just for the title. I told you they’d send somebody good this time.”
“How good?”
“Very good, very tough, from what I hear. They say he shot a whole bunch of his own people—South Texas Irishmen that went over to the Mexican side. San Patricios they were called. Saint Patrick’s. Most of the Irishmen he executed were Mexican citizens, but that made no difference to Connor. ‘White men got no business fighting Americans,’ he’s supposed to have said. I wasn’t there so I don’t know what he said—he shot them. Now maybe he’s of a mind to shoot Mormons so he can get to be general. He may not find it as easy as killing South Texas clodhoppers and Mexican soldiers without shoes.”
Outside, Rockwell held up his hand when the crowd started yelling questions; now he was very much the man in command and he raised his normally quiet voice to a shout. “Don’t get so het up, citizens,” he said to the hushed throng. “The American army hasn’t even started out yet and there are a lot of deserts and mountains to be crossed before they even get close. Men that belong to militia units report to their commanders immediately. Men that want to join go along with them. If you want to be brave, boys, now’s the time. Let the Gentiles alone or you’ll answer to me and if you know who I am, then you know how hard that’s going to be. I won’t tell you again to clear this street.”
Since that time my work has taken me to towns and cities under siege or about to be attacked; then it was all new to me: the fear, excitement, indecision, suspension of daily business. Of course, it was up to the Mormon leadership whether there was to be a siege or fighting of any kind; Rockwell wanted war but it was not his decision to make. Legally, the “Americans” (I had come to think of my fellow countrymen in quotation marks) were in the righ
t; however, law isn’t always justice.
“You want to stick with me?” Rockwell asked.
“Won’t I be suspect?” I said, answering a question with a question. “I’m one of those Americans.”
“If I say you’re all right, it won’t make any difference. Or any difference that I can’t make right. I have to go see General Wells now, but I’ll be talking to you.”
“Then you will fight Connor when he comes? He may be the man you were talking about, the most experienced soldier they can find in this part of the West.”
“Probably he is, William. I don’t know what Brigham will decide to do this time. I’m just wondering if Connor had something to do with the man who tried to murder me.”
“Will there be trouble for the American civilians here?” I asked him, thinking of the soldier who had been beaten.
“Not unless they start it. Anyway, most of them make a good living here. Others came here because they got into trouble back in the States. Men like that won’t want so many federals around. With the soldiers will come the marshals and the warrants. It’s possible some will fight on our side if it comes to that.”
“Let’s hope it won’t,” I said, my longing for adventure warring with the peaceful side of my nature. “I’ll send the dispatches.”
Rockwell shrugged. “Let the Americans decide,” he said.
After he went to report to General Wells, known to many as Old Dan, I went back to the hotel and began to write another dispatch to send to New York. I had been there for some hours when a boy came with a telegraph message from Mr. Greeley; economical in all things, all he said was:
GOOD WORK. KEEP IT COMING, DON’T GET SHOT.
Sitting at the table by the open window I could feel the waves of excitement that swept through the city though the initial uproar had subsided. Connor and his army of volunteers were many hundreds of miles away; to reach Salt Lake they would have to cross the burning deserts of Nevada before they were in sight of the Utah border. Then would come the mountains, jagged and only half explored, and I wondered if Connor knew what lay ahead of him. I knew nothing of the man; his career in the army had been a minor one, but Rockwell seemed to respect his fighting abilities, and that told me more than a dozen books. The fact that Connor was not West Point, not regular army, might pose a greater threat to the Mormons than ten thousand men; if he chose to fight a guerilla war, it could be very bad indeed. Volunteers were the most feared troops of all, especially volunteers drawn from the wild, often lawless mining towns and camps of the West; men who would fight like savages and kill without mercy. Many would be veterans of the War with Mexico, work-hardened men long accustomed to the harshness of frontier life. And the man who led them had risen from penniless immigrant to millionaire landowner. Connor, I guessed, would be nothing at all like Johnson.
My dispatch was finished and I sat there making minor corrections when another caller came to my door. This time it was the Mormon girl Abby Brimmer, but instead of her working clothes she was wearing loose canvas trousers, a man’s shirt and an uncreased black hat. What surprised me even more, in this land of surprises, was the single-action 1860 Army Colt strapped about her slender waist. The belt had been cinched as tight as it would go; the entire outfit, clothes and heavy pistol, gave her the look of one of those lady bandits later to become notorious all over the West. Her chin jutted out at me, her eyes grew defiant when I stared too long at this unusual apparition.
“What are you gawking at, William?” she asked with some heat.
“You look so different without your working clothes,” I answered truthfully. “Have you joined the militia?”
“I’m already in the militia. I was too young for the last war. Now I’m not.”
“Are there many women in the militia?”
She was very pretty in spite of her rakish get-up, or perhaps because of it. Her light yellow hair was pushed back under her hat and her eyes were a startling blue in her sun-browned face. My best guess was that she couldn’t have been more than eighteen or nineteen.
“No, not many women,” she told me. “They won’t let the married ones join. Most women are married. I’m not.”
I refrained from smiling because it would have annoyed her. “So I’ve been told,” I said.
Her blue eyes widened and a touch of color came to her cheeks. “You asked about me?”
“Port Rockwell told me. No harm in that, is there?”
Shaking her head, she turned toward the door. “I’m supposed to take you to Old . . . General Wells’ house. Port told me to fetch you. He’s there now. So come along if you don’t want to miss anything.”
On the way out she glared into the dining room, where other girls were waiting on tables. They looked back at her and some of them giggled; most of the diners were shocked.
Hiking up her gunbelt, Abby said, “The blazes with all that. Who wants to be a waitress?”
“Perhaps it’s better than being in a war,” I suggested politely, already aware of the temper she had. I thought it was a fairly sensible thing to say; all it did was annoy her.
Pushing out through the door with the swagger of a young cowboy, she said, “I didn’t have to be a waitress. I had a good schooling. They think I should be teaching little kids, but I don’t like that either.”
“What would you like to do?”
“I think I’m going to like being in this war. I can shoot a gun and ride a horse, so I won’t have to be a nurse. I don’t have to. Old Dan Wells is related to me on my mother’s side.”
“Ah, yes,” I said.
That got her mad too. “There’s no need for that tone, William. Just because Old Dan is kin to me doesn’t mean I want any special favors. You think I’m too young, don’t you?”
“Well, it’s not that, not exactly,” I said awkwardly, wondering if I should tell her how it felt to be shot. When a bullet hits you, the shock isn’t always completely physical; at first there is bewilderment, then a sense of outrage, and you think it can’t be happening to you. It makes no difference even if bullets are flying all around you; the feeling of outrage remains for a long time.
But I told her none of this, knowing that it would do no good: youth will be served, if only with a bullet. Glancing sideways at her, I hoped she wouldn’t be killed or crippled, and if she fell into the hands of Connor’s half-wild volunteers, it might truly be a fate worse than death. It might not be just one rapist, but thirty.
“I think they’re going to let you watch the war,” she said. “If they do, maybe you can write something about the women in it.”
“Yes, the women,” I said.
“Of course, I didn’t mean that you should write about me,” she said quickly. “I’m just a private soldier.”
“Of course,” I answered with a poker face.
“Well . . . we have to go.” Abby Brimmer hitched up her gunbelt again. People stared after us as we walked, and I wondered what Mr. Greeley would have said if he could have seen me.
General Dan Wells’ house was an imposing red brick structure of three stories, which suggested that its owner was much more than a part-time commander of militia. Armed Mormons stood on the wide porch; none was in uniform. Flowers grew along the side of the porch and the bright green grass that ran down to the street was wet with water sprinkling from two rows of perforated iron pipes. Even with the armed men on the porch, it did not look much like a camp of war.
One of the Mormons, apparently the one in charge, touched his hat when he saw Abby. “Is this the American?” he asked, regarding me with unfriendly eyes.
“Port Rockwell sent me to fetch him,” Abby said. “It’s all right, Mr. Tull.”
The Mormon nodded and stepped aside. “If Port says so, Abby.”
I wondered if Brigham Young might be inside; he was not. The house was cool and dark after the sunny glare of the street, and as we went down a tiled hallway I heard the murmur of voices that suddenly became loud argument. Outside the closed door of the dining
room two more Mormon militiamen stood with rifles cradled in their arms. Once again, Abby gave my name and Rockwell opened the door after the sentry knocked three times.
“Greetings, William,” he said a little formally. “Come in, both of you.”
General Dan Wells sat at the head of the dining room table with maps and papers spread in front of him. Despite his nickname, he wasn’t so very old, perhaps sixty, and if it hadn’t been for his mane of white hair he might have been taken for fifteen years younger. He was in his shirtsleeves, the light was behind him; down the table where the light wasn’t so strong were two other men, one huge and mustachioed and dressed all in black, the other short and nondescript.
“This is Dan Wells, our general,” Rockwell said. “Dan, this is William Forbes, a friend of mine from New York. These other men are Bill Hickman and Travis Widger, both militia commanders like me.”
General Wells leaned across the table to shake my hand; Hickman and Widger didn’t move. So this was the notorious William A. Hickman, I thought. Here was a savage if ever I saw one. His dark face—dark as an Indians—was handsome, strong, incredibly cruel; and his black eyes looked at me not with hostility, but as though I didn’t exist, or if I did exist it was only to be killed. Widger’s look, more natural, was simply one of deep suspicion.
General Wells pointed me to a chair, but said to Abby, “You don’t have be here for this, girl.”
Abby made a face that didn’t suit her warlike clothes. “What’s the harm, Dan? I won’t say a word.”
Dan Wells passed his hand over his eyes and sighed. “Oh God! Stay or go as you please. Just be quiet. Now, Mr. Forbes, I know all about the help you gave Port here. That was a good day’s work, sir. I’ve also read the dispatches you left at the telegraph office. Yes. Yes. I know they’re supposed to be confidential.”
