Tales of the Trail: Short Stories of Western Life

I was sitting in my office at Fort Harker on a warm evening in the latter part of September, 1868, musing over a pipeful of "Lone Jack," upon the possible extent of the impending Indian war, which had already been planned by Gen. Sheridan, in the seclusion of my own quarters, only the night before. It was rapidly growing dark; the somber line of the twilight curve had almost met the western horizon, and only the faintest tinge of purple beneath marked the intermedium between the gloaming and the rayless sky. Nothing disturbed my revery as I wandered in my imagination over the bleak expanse of the Arkansas, Cimarron and Canadian rivers, so soon to be the scene of active operations, except the monotonous clicking of the relay in the window of the next room, where the Government night operator was on duty, who was also meditating in the darkness. The terrible massacres on Spillman creek, only a few weeks before, still furnished food for vengeful thoughts that would not down, as images of the murdered women and little ones rose in horrible visions upon the thick night before me. The dismal howl of a hungry wolf borne upon the still air from the timbered recesses of the Smoky added to the weird aspect that my surroundings were rapidly assuming, and there seemed some portentous and indescribable thing bearing down upon the place. Suddenly the operator—while the clicking of the instruments became more nervous and varied from their monotone of the whole evening—exclaimed, "My God! Major, what's this?" "What is what?" said I, jumping from my chair and rushing to his side. Quickly lighting his little lamp and seizing his pencil, he wrote upon a blank as I looked over his shoulder and read—while the clicking grew more convulsive still—these words: "Gen. Forsythe surrounded by Indians on the Republican. Lieut. Beecher, the doctor, and many of the scouts killed; nearly the entire command, including the general, wounded. Stillwell, one of the scouts, ran the gauntlet of the savages, and brings report. Col. Carpenter, Tenth Cavalry, and his command, leave immediately to relieve them." This was a fragment of the whole dispatch going over the wires from Fort Hays to Fort Leavenworth and Washington. We had taken enough of it to know that a terrible disaster had befallen the gallant Forsythe, of Sheridan's staff, and his plucky band of scouts, who were all civilians and Kansans. The headquarters of Gen. Sheridan, who was at the date of this narrative in command of the Department of the Missouri, were temporarily established at Fort Harker. He was consummating his arrangements for a winter campaign against the hostile tribes, and the idea suggested itself that a body of carefully selected men, composed of the best material to be found on the frontier, under the leadership of an experienced officer, could effect excellent results.