by Earl Murray
“After you left, I became angry at Mother many times,” Hawktail said, “especially after we were captured by the Utes. I told her we would still be with our own people if she hadn’t wanted you to leave.”
I asked him how they managed to escape, and he told me that the Ute warriors had left for war against the Pawnee and Kills It had then attacked the village at dawn and taken them back.
“Mother had no choice but to marry Kills It then,” Hawktail said, “since he was the one who had rescued us.”
“Do you have dreams about Kills It?” I asked.
“He scares me, so I don’t think about him.”
I suggested that we head back to camp so there would be no concerns about us. I knew it wouldn’t be long until I would be leaving for Oregon. That same feeling of dread came over me.
We untied our ponies and I said, “You know that it’s not possible for me to stay now, either.”
“I’ve known that from the time you came to the village,” he said, sadly. “But I’ll always love you as my father, and I’ll keep you forever in my heart.”
Gabriella’s Journal
20 MAY 1846
Yesterday we were prepared to leave, but our plans changed abruptly when Kills It returned to the village with his warriors and announced that a war party of Utes was two days behind.
He said that the war party was large enough to wipe out the entire band. No one became anxious immediately, as we were camped at a place of sacred waters. The tribes that frequent this area have an unspoken rule prohibiting warfare anywhere near the site.
“Before they arrive,” Kills It said, “I want to give a feast.”
He said that the feast would be in honor of his victory over Edward and his soldiers. He had caught up with them and had forced them to turn back towards the east. Then he and his warriors had taken fresh meat. He wanted to give the feast so everyone would know he was a truly good war leader.
He told Owen to ask me if I was sad that the one I would have married was now leaving America.
“She would never have married him,” Owen insisted.
Kills It laughed. “He’s a coward and not worthy to take any woman. And since you were with him, you’re the same.”
“I doubt your victory,” Owen said. “You just need to make your people think you’re a warrior.”
Kills It’s eyes turned hard and his jaw muscles turned rigid as iron. He walked away and soon Antelope came to our camp.
“It’s not good to stir everyone up,” he told Owen.
“Not everyone,” Owen said. “Just Kills It. He had it coming.”
“My people are divided as it is,” Antelope said. “You make it worse.”
“I won’t be insulted,” Owen said.
“I can understand that he would insult you,” Antelope said, “but you should disregard it.”
“There was a time when you would have taken my side,” Owen said.
“Times have changed,” Antelope said. “You know that.”
Owen looked out towards the mountains with hurt in his eyes. “Maybe we shouldn’t have taken your invitation to come with you to the village.”
“But you accepted it,” he said, “and now you will have to stay until the Utes have left the area.”
“No, I think we should go now,” Owen said.
“You might escape the Utes,” Antelope said, “but Kills It and his warriors will catch you quickly. He has everyone believing that you are the reason the Utes have come, and that if you leave now, it will be to help them fight us.”
“And everyone believes this?”
“A great many do,” Antelope said.
“It seems he has more power here than you,” Owen said.
Antelope turned rigid but held his tongue. “I told Kills It that to believe you would fight with the Utes was crazy. He said yes, that it was crazy, but he doesn’t want you here, and that’s a way to turn all the people against you. He says he knows you will have to stay until the Utes are gone and that to keep peace with him, you must attend his feast.”
We had no choice, and tonight Owen and I sat with Antelope and Kills It and a number of high-ranking warriors around a fire. For me to be seated with them was very unusual, as women rarely eat with the men, especially in times of important council.
The discussion dealt chiefly with the Ute problem. I couldn’t understand a word that was said, but Owen told me later that the men disagreed about whether or not there would be fighting. Most of them believed the Utes would respect the Manitou in the Boiling Springs and go about their way, perhaps hunting buffalo. The other men said that they had no business in Arapaho lands for any reason, and that they knew it. Fighting would surely happen.
The discussion ended when the feasting started and Kills It began an oration about how he had found Edward and his soldiers and forced them to go back towards the east. I knew Owen didn’t believe him, but I couldn’t understand why not.
“Because he’s talking about gaining glory,” Owen told me. “If he believes Edward to be no more than an old woman, then what honor would he gain in fighting him?”
Owen never said what he thought to the others. He accepted his bowl of meat, as I did, and we were asked to take the first bites, for the sake of conserving peace between Owen and Kills It.
The meat had been stewed with roots and tasted sweet. Owen asked what kind of meat it was and Kills It said he had shot a young bear with his bow.
“I’ve eaten bear before,” Owen said. “This isn’t bear.”
Kills It shrugged and suggested that it might be mountain lion. Owen threw the bowl on the ground and stood up.
“You’ve fed us human meat, haven’t you?”
I looked at Owen and realized he had determined something I didn’t yet know about or even understand. It confused and frightened me, as well as set my stomach to churning.
“Did you feed us Edward Garr?” Owen demanded.
“Sit down,” Antelope said. “There will be no fighting.”
Owen took some deep breaths and sat back down. Kills It grinned broadly. I turned away when I saw a warrior carry the heads of J. T. Landers and Dr. Noel Marking to the fire and drop them. Two other warriors brought Norman Stiles forward. He had been gutted out like an animal and his body, mouth, and eyes stuffed with grass.
“We tried to make him look alive like he did the birds and animals he put stuffing into,” Kills It said. “But we couldn’t.”
I covered my mouth and nose and struggled not to vomit. The images of the three men, especially Mr. Landers, rose vividly in my mind and I couldn’t comprehend what had been done to them.
Owen turned to Antelope. “Why would you allow such a thing?”
“My people are angry about the death of Water That Stands,” he said. “Now they feel avenged.”
“But none of these men shot Water That Stands,” Owen insisted. “Edward Garr did.”
“That is true, but he gave Kills It the three men to save himself,” Antelope told Owen. “It was a trade that everyone thought fair, if the Britisher agreed to turn back from our lands.”
Owen saw me clenching my fists. I yelled out loud in rage, attracting everyone’s attention.
“What is she doing?” Antelope asked Owen.
“Expressing her anger at Edward Garr, a man who betrays everyone he meets. If you believe he left your lands, you’re all fools.”
Kills It leaned forward and spat at Owen. “You are the fool! Maybe we should cut you open and fill you with grass, also. Then your woman can have you hanging on her wall.”
There was laughter. Owen said, “You and I should decide between us who gets filled with grass. Or are you too cowardly to fight on your own?”
Antelope stopped the confrontation. “We are at the Manitou, a sacred place,” he said. “Whatever needs to be settled will happen after the Utes are gone and we have moved camp.”
BOILING SPRINGS RIVER
Gabriella’s Journal
24 MAY 1846<
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The Utes arrived two days ago and set up their camp less than a mile downriver. Antelope and his subchiefs went to meet with their leaders but were told there would be no negotiations for peace. Since that time the village has been under siege.
Antelope announced to the people that all but the children would go on half-rations. The village was getting low on food supplies and the time for gathering roots and hunting game had begun. But everyone knew that if a hunting party left to get meat, the Utes would eradicate them.
Kills It blamed Antelope for the bad fortune. “If you hadn’t invited these white people,” he said, “this would not have happened.”
Antelope told him that we had nothing to do with the Utes coming across from their lands to hunt buffalo, but most of the villagers agreed with Kills It. In winning the argument, Kills It had come a number of steps closer to becoming the main chief.
Against Antelope’s wishes, Kills It called a second meeting with the Ute war leaders. He told Antelope he didn’t want him to go along, as his thinking was tainted by his friendship with Owen, who could barely restrain himself from challenging Kills It to fight. But he realized that should he win the encounter, Kills It’s followers would likely make short work of him.
When Kills It returned from the meeting, we learned that he had planned for us to die anyway.
“The Utes will leave us alone if we offer them someone to kill,” he said. “I propose that the three whites be given over to them.”
Everyone but Antelope agreed. I grabbed Owen’s arm, but he said that we had no choice but to pack our belongings and follow Kills It to the Ute village. Bones Brandt seemed unusually calm.
“If I’m to die,” Bones said, “then it’s good that I go with my wife’s people.”
Before we left, I said to Kills It, “You may have sentenced us to die for your own sake, but remember that I once painted a picture of you. I have your spirit.”
His face paled. When he got his composure back, he said, “You cannot make me die. I will burn the image in a fire.”
“Your spirit will burn with it,” I said.
We were taken by a selected group of Ute warriors. Owen said they were the camp patrol and would see to it that we were watched closely until it was decided how we would die. Bones had learned a good deal of their language but could get none of the villagers to show any compassion. There would never be a time, one of them told him, when the Ute people would not seek vengeance against the Arapaho for past grievances, and it didn’t matter that he had once been married to a Ute woman.
We were marched through the village and insulted in every way. Children threw stones and struck us with sticks, while the women spat on us and tore at our clothes. We were taken to the river and tied to cottonwoods, where the women began piling campfire wood at our feet.
I went through many emotions and found myself turning numb, awaiting sure death. A group of warriors gambled with small, notched sticks, and after a winner was declared, he walked over to me and started to tear my dress off.
At the same time Bones kicked at a small boy who was sticking him in the leg with a knife. The warrior turned from me and walked over to him. He took the knife from the boy and plunged it deep into Bones’s thigh. The old buckskinner didn’t even flinch, but spat in the Ute’s face.
The warrior called for two ponies, and Bones’s eyes turned wild, but he said nothing. A number of warriors took him, struggling, from the tree and tied two long ropes, one to each of his ankles. The other end of each rope was tied to the saddle of a separate pony.
While this was happening, the same small boy walked up to Owen and fitted an arrow to his small bow. The camp women urged him to take careful aim.
The first shot stuck in Owen’s buckskin shirt. The boy’s mother stepped forward and ripped his shirt open. The next arrow penetrated the flesh and muscle of his upper chest and hung awkwardly while the women all laughed. I screamed at the women and called them cowards, but they ignored me.
Bones lay on the ground, resolved to his fate. His leg bled profusely and I believe he was losing consciousness. The two warriors made certain the ropes were tied securely to their saddles and prepared to kick the ponies into a run in opposite directions. The intended result was that Bones’s legs would split and tear off.
Before they could execute their intentions, a small group of riders appeared and the warriors froze. An older white man with long hair, dressed in beaded and quilled buckskins, stepped down from his horse and asked one of the village men what they were doing.
Owen stared at the white man, turning pale. After a moment he yelled, “Father, is that you?”
The man walked over and stared at Owen for a long time.
“Where’s your mother?” he asked finally.
“She’s been dead for some time,” Owen said.
“Why did you come out into this country?”
“Just passing through is all.”
“To Mexico?”
“Oregon.”
“You’re off the main trail. No son of mine would make that kind of mistake.”
“And no father of mine would live among a people who were once friendly and now barbarous to the extreme.”
“You don’t know what’s happened to these people,” he said.
“Killing everyone you can isn’t going to solve any problems,” Owen said. “You should know that by now.”
“If you stay out here long enough,” Owen’s father said, “you’ll learn that you really don’t know anything. You just live one day to the next and see the changes and learn there’s not a thing you can do about them.”
After carefully removing the arrow from Owen’s chest, he ordered that I be untied and that Bones be cut loose from the ponies. I almost fainted with relief.
It seemed odd to me at the time that the Utes would obey a white man, but Bones told me later that Owen’s father, known as Strong Hand, had earned numerous war honors in fighting Ute enemies. He had even killed white trappers and traders who refused to do business fairly or who wouldn’t leave Ute lands when warned.
“He’s turned Injun in his own right,” Bones said. “He don’t want nobody moving out here and changing all this.”
Owen did not hug his father, nor did his father attempt to hug him. Instead, they stared at one another. There was pain on both faces, but neither could make the move to do anything but shake hands.
We spent the night in the Ute camp as the guest of Strong Hand, who owned a lot of property and had the right to demand we be treated well. In the course of less than an hour we went from facing torture and death to dining on choice cuts of fresh buffalo and elk.
Owen said his chest wound was more troublesome than threatening. Bones’s knife wound was treated by an older woman gifted in herbal medicine. She did as well as she could, but the cut was deep and painful.
The Utes were a shorter and stockier people than the Arapaho, but other than the physical, I could see no difference in their ways of life. Their lodges were painted in similar designs and their men wore the same kinds of medicine charms to help them in battle. But they had always been enemies.
Owen said little all evening. He told me that we would begin our journey to Fort Laramie as soon as possible. He didn’t know what would happen next, but believed the Utes would still require a measure of satisfaction against the Arapaho, unless some trading and peace negotiations could take place.
I don’t believe he spoke more than a few words to his father, barely a thank-you for saving our lives. I can’t help but think that their years apart might have produced a chasm neither of them can bridge.
Quincannon’s Journal
25 MAY 1846
I listened to war drums throughout the night, and with the dawn, took my place with the other warriors while an old medicine man said prayers and danced under a grizzly bear robe. My father told me that I would be looked to as a leader against the Arapaho forces, and that I shouldn’t fail to show strength and courage.
Stripped to moccasins and a breechcloth, I stood still while my father painted me in war designs of lightning and elks’ feet. My face was all black and red and three eagle feathers hung from the trigger guard of my Hawken, and three more from the handle of a battleax.
My pony was painted in similar designs, and when the medicine man came past each of us shaking a gourd rattle, we mounted to face the Arapaho.
Not long ago I was with Antelope, discussing our friendship and old times. Now I was facing his young men. He hadn’t stepped forward to stop Kills It from handing us over, so I don’t feel I will ever owe my old friend anything ever again.
I can’t really blame him. His future as main leader is at stake. My feeling is that he’s already lost his position and he just doesn’t know it yet.
Antelope wasn’t going to fight, of that I was certain. He’s of an older age and stays in the camp to help sing war songs with the medicine man. The Utes were already doing the same thing and my father was among the singers. His son, Black Horse, five years my junior, received the same paint as I did from our father. He watched me for a long time, no doubt wondering how I would fight.
Ella was also watching and worried not just for me but for Hawktail. I told her a number of times that he was too young for battle.
“He must prove himself stealing horses first,” I said. “He hasn’t even done that yet.”
Though I felt sure of my belief, I did worry that he might be pressed into going his first time. I didn’t really believe it would happen, but I couldn’t be sure of anything.
We lined up facing one another and the chanting began. Some of the warriors carried handheld drums and others beat on their shields with their bows. Kills It rode back and forth on his pony, whooping loudly, showing his bravery to his followers.
Finally a warrior from among the Utes rode out to meet another from the Arapaho. They charged each other straight on, their ponies running full speed.
The Arapaho carried a lance and raised his shield as the Ute shot an arrow at him. The arrow deflected upward and the Arapaho warrior rammed his lance into the Ute’s leg.
