Sioux Dawn, The Fetterman Massacre, 1866 (48 page)

For a moment Kinney stood silenced. He finally stammered, “Think hard on this, Carrington. I've friends in power … why, my life savings are invested in that post——”

“To hell with your sutler's goods, Kinney,” Carrington interrupted quietly. He flung an arm to the west. “I'm thinking of those good men—butchered, left to the weather … and God knows what else.”

“You pompous sonofabitch!” Kinney shrieked. “If you send a rescue party out, all of us will fall prey to those red bastards.”

“I agree, Colonel!” Powell leaped up again. “We don't have enough men to do both safely. Take some to go after what's left of Fetterman's men—we can't leave enough to defend the fort. But if enough men remain behind to defend the fort while the rescue party is out—the Sioux can easily overwhelm those who've gone to bring the bodies back. We can't win!”

“Gentlemen.” Carrington motioned the men to their seats. “I want you each to listen carefully to me. Through the long hours of the night I've tried as never before to think like an Indian.”

“Cockleheaded fool!” Kinney spouted.

“I have the floor, Judge. If you choose to interrupt, I'll see you're excused from this council.” He waited for silence. “I could not but feel that if I'd been a red man, I would've fought as bitterly—if not as cruelly—for my rights and my home as the red man fought since last July. Especially as he fought yesterday.”

“What does that have to do with rescuing the dead?” Wands inquired.

“Coming to that, Lieutenant. Knowing a little more now than I ever have about the Indian mind, I won't let the Indians entertain the conviction that our dead cannot and will not be rescued.”

He circled the desk then leaned against it. “If we cannot rescue our dead, as the Indians always do at any risk, how can we send details out for any purpose? Realize, by not going to rescue our dead, that single fact will give the Sioux an idea of weakness here, Judge. And, Captain Powell—that idea just might stimulate them to risk an assault on the fort at any hour. On any day.”

He lumbered around the desk, gazed at his coffee-stained maps, then declared, “Therefore, gentlemen, the matter is decided. I'll lead the rescue myself—taking eighty men, soldiers and civilians. I alone will decide who'll go with me. Ten Eyck, you'll lead me to the battlefield. Surgeon Ould, you and Lieutenant Matson will accompany me. Captain Powell will be in charge of the fort in our absence. We leave in an hour, gentlemen. Dismissed.”

“Colonel?”

“Yes, Mr. Donegan.”

“I'd like to ride along with you.”

“So'd I, Colonel.” Bridger rose on creaky knees.

“You're in no shape for it, Jim.” He shook his head. “But I need you along. See that Jack Stead hangs close to Powell. The captain might have … need of Jack's horse sense while we're out.” He patted the old scout on the shoulder, then turned to the tall Irishman.

“But as for you, Mr. Donegan,” Carrington smiled weakly, “seems the army's a lot to repay you … after locking you up the better part of a month. Brown's dead. There's no need you risking your life going with——”

“My ass's been hung over many a fire before, Colonel,” Donegan replied. “Figure I better go 'long on one more wee ride up the Lodge Trail with you this morning.”

Bridger watched Carrington's eyes moisten. “You're more than welcome to ride at my side, any time, Seamus Donegan.”

*   *   *

In the Carrington parlor adjoining Henry's office, Margaret and Frances Grummond overheard every word spoken during the council. His meeting over, the colonel turned from the Irishman, crossed the floor and knocked on the pine door before entering.

“Henry!” his wife gasped, surprised. She rose from the window where she had been watching the frantic activities on the parade as men carried boxes and barrels to the powder magazine.

Frances had been reclining on a settee nearby. Both scrambled to their feet as Carrington closed the door behind him.

“Sorry to startle you, ladies. I knocked as a courtesy——”

“Of course, Henry,” Margaret replied, crossing the room and taking one of his hands in hers.

“Hush for once, Margaret. And listen to me. I've decided to lead the rescue myself.”

She nodded, her eyes misting. “I … heard, Henry. I'm so … so very proud of you.”

Margaret watched him swallow a knot in his throat before he turned to Frances. “Mrs. Grummond, I shall go in person. On my word as an officer and a gentleman, I promise to return the remains of your husband to you.”

“Colonel——”

“Say nothing,” Carrington silenced her.

In the next breath his cheeks flushed as Frances stood on her toes to kiss his cheek.

He turned to his wife. “To know I've done right is reward enough, Margaret.”

“God bless and keep you.” She embraced him, feeling for Henry more than she had felt for such a long, long time. “Come back, Henry. Come back to me.”

Without another word, Carrington turned, closed the door, and stepped into the arctic cold pounding life from the Big Horn country like a icy hammer on a frozen anvil.

*   *   *

Donegan watched Carrington climb atop a broken-down sorrel with a bad case of wind-galls. Not much left in the way of good horseflesh at Fort Phil Kearny, he brooded.

Yet it comforted a battle-scarred veteran like Seamus to know that every last man at the post had volunteered to march with Carrington, to rescue the bodies of comrades and friends. The colonel chose eighty of those most fit to march.

“Captain Powell?” Carrington called out. Powell stepped up. “You understand your orders?”

“I'm to fire the sunset gun as usual, running up a white lamp to the mast head on the flagstaff. If the Indians appear near the fort, I'm to fire three shots from the twelve-pounder, at minute intervals. Then hang a red lantern from the flagstaff instead of the white.”

“Very good, Captain. You remember as well the orders you are to keep secret from the rest of the men … women and children?”

Powell barely whispered this time. “If the hostiles attack in overwhelming numbers, I'm to put the women and children in the magazine with food and water. When all is lost, strike a match to the powder. Let no man, woman, or child be captured alive.”

Carrington nodded. Saluted. “God's speed, Captain.”

Powell swallowed. “Good luck, Colonel.”

The colonel waited until the last man in his rescue party had cleared the gate, then listened while sentries inside drove the bolt home.

Donegan rode with Carrington to the head of the columns. At both sides of the road marched a cordon of mounted cavalry. Most of the remaining infantrymen bounced along the frozen road in mule-drawn wagons. Bridger saw to it that pickets were stationed on the high ground along the ridges. A pair of soldiers left at every station, within sight of two other stations, so that a continuous line of communication would link the rescue column to the fort.

A day wine-clear and as still as a buzzard's shadow hung over high-meat. Growing colder by the hour. Silently, Carrington's column climbed the long, frozen ridge, now laying bare, silent. Everlasting.

Past sage and yucca. Through bunch-grass and wild-rose. Down into thickets of allthorn, following the crooked trail like some dark, bloodied scar beneath the brooding sky. To the very end of the naked ridge itself.

Ten Eyck and Donegan pointed to the boulder field below, then began their descent into hell once more. On their way down the snowy, trampled slope, they crossed that narrow rib of ground where most of the cavalry had died. Horses strewn over the bare ground in a space barely forty feet wide. The head of every one pointed toward the fort.

Donegan pointed to the boulders. There, he explained, they would find most of Fetterman's dead. Arrows sprung like sunflower stalks from the frozen ground, pointing every which way. Soldiers completely surrounded.

The dreary, stomach-churning work began. A man had to hold the head of every mule frightened at the smell of so much frozen blood as others stacked the remains and body parts into the wagons like cordwood. When the first freight wagon had been half loaded, the mules kicked and lunged, throwing their handlers aside, strewing the bodies across the frozen ground and darting off. Only six of all the bodies showed bullet wounds. The rest had been killed by arrow, with lance, club, knife, or axe.

“Close and dirty work. Hard way for any sojur to die.” Donegan stopped beside Carrington. “There're more, Colonel.”

“We've loaded every man here.” Carrington turned and climbed into the saddle. “The Eighteenth endured snow and ice before Shiloh. It marched through a brutal plains winter to its new post in Nebraska just last year. These men lived on parched corn before Kennesaw Mountain, and moldy pork here at the foot of the Big Horns.” He swiped a hand beneath his nose, knowing he should brood on it no longer. “Ten Eyck, I'll follow Mr. Donegan. Bring the wagons down the road.”

Over the next mile they located four more bodies. Then came across Lieutenant Grummond and Sgt. Augustus Lang. Carrington stared at Grummond's body for the longest time before he slid from his horse to kneel over the remains. The lieutenant's head had been nearly severed from the neck, and his naked body bristled with arrows. Placing something in the pocket of his greatcoat, Carrington rose and returned to his horse.

Near the bank of Peno Creek they found Jimmy Carrington's little calico pony, its head butchered.

“Injins ever scalp a pony, Jim?” Seamus inquired.

“Wouldn't put it past the sonsabitches, Irishman,” Bridger growled. “Way of showing how they hated the man what rode the animal.”

“Brown,” Carrington replied. “Fred Brown.”

“Injuns!”

Seamus jerked around with the first shout. More soldiers took up the alarm, pointing up the ridges.

“The bastards come to get us!”

“Run for it!”

Soldiers and civilians alike lunged for their horses and wagons. Forgetting the bodies. Ignoring the dead.

“The Sioux come back to finish us!”

Donegan gazed up the ridge where the soldiers pointed.

“Colonel!” Seamus grabbed Carrington. “Your soldiers think the pickets Jim left on the hills are Injins!”

Bridger nodded. “Best you get your boys under control now. Gonna have a full-scale ruckus here.”

Carrington dove into the center of the pandemonium, quieting the men enough to speak. He pointed out that they had seen their fellow soldiers. “Like being scared of your own shadow, men.” Then he wagged his mittened hand. “Any man among you too afraid to stay long enough to finish this work, let him leave now!”

He listened to angry grumbling before continuing. “Go on back to the fort best you can if you're afraid. But understand, those of you who go will leave your guns and ammunition behind. I'll not allow one armed man to leave until the last body's rescued.”

With the disturbance quelled, a hundred yards away Donegan brought Carrington to the desperate stand of Wheatley, Fisher, Garrett and the cavalry veterans.

“From the looks of it, they put up one devil of a defense here,” Carrington offered as he viewed the dead carcasses of horses and ponies alike.

“Look at them black patches on the ground,” Bridger pointed out. “A warrior knocked outta his saddle for every one. These boys made a fine account for themselves while they lasted. Injuns hated 'em something fierce. More'n a hundred arrows in every man's body here. Sioux didn't take kindly to the toll these fellas took.”

“Even young Private Burke,” Seamus added. “Company C.”

Carrington inched closer to another body, pointing. “Isn't that … the cavalry sergeant——”

“Eli Garrett, Colonel.”

“Appears he acquitted himself honorably,” Carrington said.

“Eli always was a good soldier,” Donegan answered. “Sometimes, he just forgot what being a good soldier means.”

By the time the wagons were loaded along the frozen Peno Creek, the low rumble of the sunset gun echoed over the ridge. A cold, desolate feeling like nothing he had felt before seeped to Donegan's marrow while the columns climbed the bare, scarred finger onto Lodge Trail Ridge.

“Praise God,” Carrington sighed, gazing south as twilight settled over the fort, “from whom all blessings flow.”

“Your white lantern hangs high on the flagpole, Colonel,” Bridger added.

“Yes,” Carrington sniffled. “Like a welcome star of blessing. A homing beacon, calling the wanderers home. Praise God—our people are safe.”

Chapter 39

“Your husband lays in the guardhouse, Mrs. Grummond. With his comrades,” Carrington explained, squeezing her hand. It was just past ten o'clock when his rescue party crawled back through the fort gates.

Beside her sat Margaret, clutching her other pale hand. “Can I——” Frances choked on the sob.

“No,” he whispered. “I think it best that——”

“I … understand, Colonel Carrington,” she whimpered, dabbing at the end of her nose with a damp kerchief.

“I'm deeply sorry,” he continued, stuffing a hand into his pocket. “I only wish I could express the sorrow I feel at this moment. For you … for your child, Mrs. Grummond.”

He held before her a small, sealed envelope. “I … brought something from your husband's last field of battle. I knew you'd want to have it—as a memento of George.”

“George?” she squeaked.

“Yes,” he answered. “God knows you've suffered the worst loss imaginable. No one can ever say you'll get over it, Mrs. Grummond. I'm not saying you should ever get over it. Just that, the best thing is to make a place for that hurt, that loss in your life … and walk on. Make a place for that pain, and let it give meaning to your life.”