Michener, James A. (135 page)

In a tremendously concentrated half-day General Grierson satisfied himself on many points, which he stated in the report he wrote that night:

At the Battle of Three Cairns units of the 10th Cavalry deported themselves according to the highest traditions of the service. 2nd Lt. Elmer Toomey directed his men properly and died gallantly at their head. 1st Sgt. John Jaxifer assumed command as expected, and defended an exposed position with valor. I can give no credence to charges made by the Cavin & Clark drivers that Sgt. Jaxifer was in any way deficient. This battle will shine brightly among the laurels gained by this Regiment.

The death of 2nd Lt. Jim Logan, one of our most accomplished horsemen from Ireland, and the scandal attaching thereto, is the kind of tragedy which can overtake any unit of any kind, civilian or military. I treasured Logan as a brave man and I mourn his death.

In all respects 1 find these units of the 10th Cavalry in good condition, battle-ready and well led. Their desertion rate is 1 in 300. Desertion rate of the white troops at the fort, 48 in 100 over a period of four and a half years. I especially commend these enlisted men who serve so

faithfully and with such enthusiasm, and I applaud Capt Reed's l< ship, finding nothing to censure

On the next clay General Gnerson reviewed his troops and then asked Sergeant Jaxifer to lead him out to where Jim Logai johnny Minor's wife had died, jaxifer told his men later 'General, when he see the spot, and the water, and the birds, he dismounts and stands by the spot weepin'. I stayed clear, but he motion me to dismount, and together we placed some stones "Two men," he said a couple times, mcanm' Logan and Minor He i mention Miss Nellie.'

That night the Reeds held a gala for the visitors, and one of the Mexicans whom the soldiers employed to work the horse: peared with a violin, one of the laundresses beat a tambourine, and there was dancing, and the best food possible purchased from the post sutler, and much conversation about the old days. Even Wet zel relaxed, telling of his unit's exploits at various battles, and it was 'General This,' and 'Colonel That' as if the old ranks still pertained, as if the old salary scale were still being paid instead of the miserly pay accorded these heroic veterans: once a lieutenant colonel, now a first lieutenant, $1,500 a year, once a general, mm a captain, $1,800 a year.

Grierson was at his best, even joking with dour Hermann Wet /el: 'Your boys over in Prussia are going to conquer all Europe one of these days,' to which Wetzel replied: They will certainly eon quer France.'

That night Reed could not sleep, and when his wife heard his restless turning she asked why, and he said. 'My mother was an educated woman, you know, and she made us memorize poetry She taught us that the finest single line comes at the end of Milton's sonnet to his dead wife.'

'I don't know that,' Louise said

'The first thirteen lines tell of how the blind poet dreams that she has come back from the grave to speak with him "Love, sweetness, goodness in her person shined," that was my mother, too. But then came the fourteenth line, and everything fell apart. Mother said its ten short words were arrows pointed at the heart, showing what blindness meant: "I waked, she fled, and day brought back my night."

They lay in the darkness for some tunc, and then the general sighed deeply, making the anguish of his thought echo through the room: 'Tonight 1 was a general once more. Tomorrow the bugles will sound, dawn will break, and 1 shall be a captain again and forever.'

The second investigating team was completely different. Lieutenant General Philip Sheridan, a marvelously concentrated Irishman with a bullet head and drooping walrus mustaches—a sort of roundish, ineffectual-looking man until one discovered that every bulge was muscle—rode into the fort with three of his pet colonels, men, he said, of infinite promise. Most powerful was Ranald Mackenzie, a man so intense, said his troops, that 'his eyes could cut rocks'; he was destined to leapfrog his contemporaries and stand at the threshold of commander in chief, until his mind snapped, destroyed by syphilis and by the burdens he had placed upon it.

There was Nelson Miles, not a West Point man but something much better: the nephew-by-marriage of both General William Tecumseh Sherman, head of the Army, and Senator John Sherman, the powerful political leader from Ohio; he was an unproved quantity at the threshold of his career, but with his uncles' help he would gain constant promotion, a vain, arrogant, impossible man with only one credit to his name: he was a phenomenally-brave officer when leading men into battle.

Most impressive, to men and women alike, was Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer, nearly six feet tall, never weighing more than a hundred and seventy, and of such elegant bearing that he commanded attention wherever he went. Like the other two, he was thirty-four, but he was totally unlike them in other respects, they wore ordinary military uniforms, well pressed and tended; he wore custom-tailored trousers and jacket, spats over his General Quimper boots, and a remarkable Russian-type greatcoat cut from a heavy French cloth and with a monstrous cape adorned with Afghanistan caracul fur at the neck, along the front and at the cuffs. His face was cadaverously thin, with romantic hollows under his cheekbones, and he was obviously worried about the gradual retreat of his hair, for like many vain men he twisted and trained it to lie across his forehead and hide the loss. At the neck he wore his hair very long, and since it was naturally wavy, enhanced by his wife's constant attention with hot irons, it added considerably to his appeal. Like most officers of that period, he wore a mustache which he kept so carefully trimmed that it added dignity to a face already as compelling as that of any Roman emperor.

They were, as both Sherman and Sheridan agreed, three remarkable young colonels, and it was inevitable that one of them would gain supreme command. Mackenzie, perhaps the ablest of the three, would be disqualified because of creeping insanity; Custer

would perish because of his inexcusable arrogance al the Litr Horn; Miles, the political conniver, would prevail In th< as in all human endeavor, it can sometimes be the man u I survives who triumphs, whether his skills warrant it or not

Sheridan and his three aces needed little tune situation at Fort Garner: 'Second rate in even respect When \ wife misbehaves like Nellie Minor, she should be soldiered out within the day. When an important supply tram appr should be protected by more than an untested second lieutenant And when an Indian marauder like Matark ravages a count-he should be caught and hanged. Captain Reed is moderatelv acceptable, but the only officer present who seems to have an understanding of what a frontier fort should be is Captain Her maim Wetzel, who is hereby commended for his attention to detail.'

No formal rebuke was leveled against Captain Reed, but a kind of sorrow suffused the visit, as if the young colonels regretted that he was not a better man. Colonel Custer went out of his way to applaud Mrs. Reed's handling of the Johnny Minor affair, and he spellbound the other wives with his graciousness and warmth of understanding.

When Sheridan led his team away, the fort continued under the aura of the three colonels and there was much discussion as to which one would triumph in the battle for promotion Wetzel summarized opinions: 'Miles is political, but very strong in the field, a powerful combination. Custer can achieve anything if lie attends to details. Mackenzie's the one I'd like to lead me battle.' The women did not bother with the credentials of the other two colonels: 'Custer is magnificent.' And he was, for lie was considerate, charming, persistent, and suffused with that glamor which can only be called romantic. Even their husbands could not denigrate him when their wives applauded, for he was unquestionably the most dramatic leader ever to have visited Fort Garner, and his heavy felt spats and fur-trimmed greatcoat would long be remembered.

The fort received a shock when Lewis Renfro arrived with his alert wife, Daisy, for the traditional desk-hog was apt to be an obese, slovenly fellow with little military bearing. Renfro was quite the opposite, a thirty-six-year-old West Point man from a good family in Ohio, tall, erect, ten pounds underweight from daily horsemanship in the parks of Washington, and a man determined to give a good account of himself on the frontier He would take Minor's place as head of Company S, 10th Cavalry under the

command of Captain Reed, to whom he said unctuously: i want you to rely on me as one of the best officers you've ever had. When you give me an order, consider it executed.'

Fawningly eager to create a good impression, he sought out Captain Wetzel and assured him: 'I'll not permit any ridiculous cavalry-infantry unpleasantness while I command the Buffalo Soldiers. They'll be disciplined.' But that same day he implied quite the opposite to Jaxifer, to whom he told an outright lie concerning his experiences in the war: '1 served with Negro troops on three different occasions. None better. If the infantry give you any trouble, you'll find me on your side all the way.' But despite this trickery in fort politics, whenever an expedition against the Indians was organized he wanted to be in the lead, and from that position he gave a good account of himself.

'He knows how to fight,' Sergeant Jaxifer told his troopers. 'We got a good man this time.'

This was a sensible estimation, because when an energetic foray led by Renfro ran into outriders of the main Comanche force, a bitter running battle ensued, forty Indians on mounts of superior speed against nineteen cavalrymen with superior firepower. Neither side could claim a victory, but Renfro pursued the Indians with such vigor that any Comanche whose horse faltered even slightly was overtaken and shot. Renfro was always in the lead, probably the best single horseman on the field that day, and when the chase was over, the black soldiers were satisfied that they had gained a proficient leader.

In a second fray, when Reed was in command, Renfro accepted his subordinate position graciously and moved his contingent instantly when Reed signaled. He was a good officer, and Reed told Wetzel: 'Had he stayed out here with us instead of hiding in Washington, he could have been one of Sherman's Young Colonels,' and the German agreed that Renfro was first class. 'I think his name must be German,' Wetzel said. 'He carries himself so well.'

But Lewis Renfro had no intention of laboring on the frontier to establish his reputation as the fourth of the Young Colonels. He would perform impeccably with the troops, but he would also pull every string to get back to his desk job in Washington. By-passing established channels, he and his wife bombarded everyone in real command with clever petitions, and were assured: 'As soon as anything interesting happens, back you'll come.' What the incident might be the Renfros could not guess, but their hammering at the doors of preferment became so well known that Mrs. Reed felt she had to caution Daisy against her excesses, and in the room

where so many had been quietly reprimanded, Daisy now took hei place, but she proved to be quite different from her pred

'Do you not see that your actions may be prejudicing your husband's chances?' Louise Reed asked.

i am improving them. Lewis was born to serve in Washin and I shall do my best to see that he does so.'

'But he is so capable at the front. He could be one of the meal leaders.'

'He's already one of the great leaders, Mrs. Reed. He fights in Washington with a skill that not even Sherman and Sheridan could exhibit.'

But the real fighting is out here, against the Indians.'

'Half of it is,' Daisy replied. 'And I do believe that the more important half, in peacetime, is back with us, fighting the battles in Congress.'

'But look at this fort, Mrs. Renfro. Does not the building of an establishment like this mean anything to you? When my husband came here . . . not a post erected, not a wall in place. He built a mud fort, and when the dead-house is finished, it will all be stone. A permanent testimony to the brave men who occupied it.'

Mrs. Renfro had to laugh: 'One act of Congress and this fort vanishes. Back to the mesquite. It's in Congress where the peacetime army fights its battles, and Lewis is going back to work with Congress, where he can do some good.'

Mrs. Reed had to be blunt: 'Mrs. Renfro, you certainly must be aware that your husband's report will be written by my husband. Why are you so daring in disregarding my counsel 7 '

'I do not disregard it, and I'm sure Lewis doesn't disregard your husband's. What can possibly be reported except that Lewis was foremost in battle, striking in his courage and immediately responsive to orders?'

'Yes, yes.'

'We both try to be like that. Haven't you seen that if you even hint at an instruction, I comply?'

'But I am now more than hinting that you should stop these letters.'

Now it was Daisy's turn to be obdurate: 'That's quite a different matter, dealing with the welfare of the entire army, not with a single fort. Lewis can aid immensely in getting our army the funds it needs, the support it requires. Of course I shall continue to help him get the post he deserves.'

The interview ended poorly, with battle lines drawn and animosities flaring, but the impasse did not continue long, because the kind of incident which the Renfro adherents in Washington

needed to bring their man back home occurred, with an incandescent explosion that not even the most stalwart Renfro supporter could have anticipated.

During the hottest part of the summer of 1874, Renfro, Jaxifer and all the effectives of Company S, forty-seven in number, set forth on the supposed trail of Chief Matark, whose braves had spent that summer ravaging the ranches along the frontier. The Texas government had warned settlers not to venture too far west, and the United States government had explained that protection even from forts like Richardson and Garner could not ensure safety, but the insatiable hunger for land which would always characterize Texans lured the adventurers farther and farther west, just as the four Larkin brothers had dared the empty plains, claiming their six thousand acres and holding them nicely until the Comanche struck, so now other daring men and women staked out their claims beyond the forts, and during this summer alone, sixty white men, women and children had been slain, usually in a manner so brutal and horrifying as to shock even those Texans who had become accustomed to the barbarisms.