Strongheart: The Lost Journals of May Dodd and Molly McGill Page 7

  6 July 1876

  We have been over a week now on the trail, and in that time our path has crossed that of other bands of Cheyenne, Arapaho, and Lakota. After the grand victory at Greasy Grass, there seems to be a palpable sense of trepidation and uncertainty in this dispersal. All report the presence of companies of soldiers in nearly every direction, as well as many sightings of the Indian scouts employed by the Army. It is they who offer the greatest threat to our safety, for, with the ever increasing number of bands surrendering at the agencies and Army forts, the number of scouts grows exponentially. We have already had bitter experiences at the hands of Crow, Shoshone, and Pawnee scouts, during the battle of Rosebud Creek, where Pretty Nose and I were captured and held captive by the cretin Jules Seminole and his band of degenerates. These tribes, longtime enemies of the Cheyenne and Arapaho, were the first to surrender to the government and accept the employ of the U.S. Army. More recently, they are being joined by Lakota, Arapaho, and even Cheyenne warriors, who have turned themselves in at one or another of the agencies, and are now willing to scout against their own people, in some cases, even their own families.

  “Wolves for the blue soldiers,” Pretty Nose calls the scouts, and she explains that they are especially dangerous because, unlike the soldiers, “the wolves know our ways, they know where we like to camp and make our winter villages. They know how we travel and how we fight.”

  I am riding between Phemie and Pretty Nose, Martha tagging along behind us on her spirited little donkey, Dapple, with Astrid, Maria, and Carolyn side by side just behind her. It is a warm summer day, but the recent heat wave has broken, and with the light breeze, the air is softer with a preview of fall, the sky a clear deep blue. We are riding through a rolling prairie in what the Indians call sweetgrass country, where Meggie must have secured her small sample for her medicine bag. There has been good rainfall so far this summer, the grass and wildflowers as high as the horses’ bellies, undulating in the breeze like gentle swells on the sea. As we move through it, our noses fill with their sweet perfume. Some distance away a small herd of buffalo feed tranquilly upon this late summer bounty, the calves growing fat for the long, hard winter ahead. As we are already sufficiently well stocked with food, our hunters do not disturb them. It is on a day and in a place such as this that it is possible to forget for a moment our troubles, to imagine this country as a paradise, where men and women live in harmony with the earth and with each other. Isn’t that, after all, what we seek?

  We ride in silence for a time, as we often do, feeling, I believe, similar sentiments of this tenuous, if imaginary peace.

  “But how is it then that the wolves agree to help the soldiers hunt down their own people?” I ask Pretty Nose, bringing us perhaps too abruptly back to reality.

  “The men know that it is their last chance to be warriors,” she explains. “They have been trained for that since the day they were born. There is nothing for them to do at the agency, no way to prove themselves, no way to count coup and gain honors on the battlefield. Most have even had their guns taken away from them, and on the land the government puts us on, there is hardly any game to hunt. The agents steal the government rations and sell them to white settlers, so there is never enough food to feed their families. The Army pays them money to join, gives them rifles and ammunition. It makes them feel like men again, warriors in the stronger army, the army that everyone knows is going to win this war.”

  “But they are traitors,” I say. “If white men join the other side in a war, and get caught, they are shot or hanged for treason.”

  “Why would a white man wish to join our side?” she asks.

  “That is an excellent question,” I admit. “Except that we joined your side.”

  “Because you had to, you had no other choice, in the same way that the wolves have no other choice but to join your army.”

  “It is not our army any longer,” I point out. “We have fought with you against it, and we, too, would be executed for our actions.”

  “Yes, because you, too, are traitors.”

  I laugh. “Of course, you are right. It is odd, because we have spent so much time while we’ve been here simply trying to survive, that I rather forgot we have become traitors to our own government, and would also be hanged if captured.”

  “Then again, Molly,” says Phemie, “in my case, at least, I was never a citizen of America in the first place. Quite the contrary, my people were kidnapped and brought here against their will. They were property, not human beings with any rights. To attain my freedom, I was forced to escape to Canada. I cannot be called a traitor because I have never been considered as or treated like a real American.”

  “That’s true, Phemie. And I can’t say that I feel like a real American any longer, either. In Sing Sing, they even took our names away. They gave us numbers. That is how they addressed us, and called us out at morning roll call. I was 781645, a number imprinted forever in my memory.”

  “But you see,” says Pretty Nose, “if this land is called America, which is not what we call it, then my people are the only true Americans. And since you, Molly, are now white Cheyenne, and you, Phemie, are Black white Cheyenne, you, too, can call yourselves real Americans, if you would like. Then you are not traitors. You are warriors fighting to protect your land against the foreign invaders.”

  Phemie and I laugh. “Yes, I like that,” Phemie says, “and it’s very clever and generous of you, Pretty Nose. However, I don’t think it will prevent us from being hanged if we are captured by the soldiers.”

  Christian Goodman now rides back from the front of our little procession of seventeen souls, children and the aged included, to join us. He has been riding and conversing with the Arapaho families. Christian is one of those who absorbs new languages as sand absorbs water, and already speaks nearly fluent Cheyenne. He says that Arapaho is of the same language family, and though the tribes speak different dialects, they understand each other. I have no doubt that he will soon be fluent in that language as well.

  Together we all speak in a strange combination of languages, depending on whom we’re addressing, moving between English, Cheyenne, Arapaho, and French, and, when all else fails, with the sign talk of our hands. Phemie, too, speaks Arapaho, for it was to one of their villages that her husband, Black Man, took her after she was gravely wounded during the Army attack on Little Wolf’s village. I am gradually learning both native tongues myself, and it helps me to listen to Pretty Nose and Phemie converse fluently in one or the other.

  “The Lord has given us a magnificent day for traveling, hasn’t he, ladies?” Christian says cheerfully. “One must believe that all is well in the world on a day such as this.”

  “Until it isn’t,” I suggest.

  “Ah, Molly, always a bit of the cynic, aren’t you?” he says. “While at the same time being a hopeful romantic at heart.”

  I laugh. “How do you know that, Christian?”

  “Well, because I’ve seen you and your husband, Hawk, together, for one thing.”

  “I’m glad you said ‘hopeful’ instead of ‘hopeless,’” I answer. “For my cynicism tells me that we may never see each other again, while my hopeful romanticism holds out at least for the slim possibility of a reunion.”

  “Exactly! As you can see, I am in a splendid mood today,” says he. “However, while gabbing away as I have been with our fellow travelers, I seem to have lost my bearings. I’m just wondering, where we are headed? Do you know, Molly?”

  “My understanding is that our ultimate destination is a safe haven with plentiful game, where we can make a long-term camp, unmolested.”

  “Aha,” says Christian, “speaking of hopeful romanticism!”

  “Exactly,” I say. “And are you being the cynic now, Chaplain?”

  “Not at all, my friend. You should know by now that my faith is unlimited.”

  “Apparently our destination will involve more days of travel.”

  “But of course. Doesn’t i
t always?”

  “Although no one seems to know how many.”

  “I follow blindly, Molly, secure in the knowledge that the Lord lights our path.”

  “You are a lucky man, Christian.”

  “There is a medicine woman traveling among us,” says Pretty Nose. “Ma’heona’e is her name. It means Holy Woman. She is half Cheyenne, half Arapaho. She was at Sand Creek when Chivington’s soldiers attacked and massacred the People. She escaped but as she fled she was blinded by the slash of a soldier’s saber. The scars on her face across her blinded eyes are terrible to behold. Since that day she has been on a vision quest to save the People from the rage of the whites, to find a safe place for us to live. She is very wise and says that she knows now where that place is. It is Ma’heona’e who is guiding us.”

  “We are being guided by a blind woman?” I ask. “And you, Christian, are following blindly … as apparently are the rest of us. This does not seem promising news to me.”

  “Yet don’t you find that it has the ring of a biblical story, Molly?” the chaplain asks.

  “All I have seen of the Bible since we have been here, Chaplain, has been the violent parts.”

  “Is Ma’heona’e by chance a Christian?” he asks Pretty Walker.

  “No,” says Pretty Walker. “She knows nothing of your God. She worships the Great Spirit.”

  Christian is not discouraged by this news. “Well, it is quite possible that the Great Spirit is our God,” he says, “and she just doesn’t know it yet. One need not see with the eyes to be led by the spirit.”

  Phemie chuckles in her deep, richly amused way. “Always looking on the bright side, aren’t you, Chaplain?” she says.

  15 July 1876

  Yesterday afternoon while traveling, we stopped to water our horses in a creek, when Lulu spotted a movement in the willows and heard whispers in what sounded to her like children’s voices. Due to the circumstances, we are all in a state of heightened vigilance, and we quickly put together a small, armed contingent consisting of me, Pretty Nose, Maria and her husband Hó’hónáhk’e, Rock, Lulu and her husband No’ee’e, Squirrel, and Christian. I carried, as always, the knife at my waist and a Colt .45 I inherited from Meggie, and that Phemie had kept for me; Pretty Nose carried a knife and a hatchet; Maria, also a Colt .45, and Rock, a knife and a stone club. If there was to be any kind of confrontation in the heavy cover of the willows, it would presumably be at close quarters. The chaplain, of course, was unarmed, as was our guide, and nonwarrior, Lulu. Phemie stayed back with the others to guard our people.

  We cautiously followed Lulu into the willows, and soon came upon a clearing in which we found two very rough shelters constructed of bent willow branches, the wilted green leaves still upon them. Pretty Nose called out first in Arapaho and then in Cheyenne, asking if there was anyone inside the huts and if so, to come out. In response, we heard only the frightened whimpers of children, but none appeared.

  “It could be a trap,” I suggested. “There may also be adults inside.”

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake,” said Christian, “I’m having a look.” He strode purposely forward, and as he bent down to peer through the opening, he was met by the shrill war cry of a boy who threw a small rock that bounced off the middle of the chaplain’s forehead, knocking him back on his butt. “Oww!” he hollered, rubbing his forehead as we three spectators couldn’t help but burst out in spontaneous laughter. We take any opportunity for such a thing these days.

  “I told you it might be a trap, Christian,” I said, as we all approached. “That’s why I didn’t want to look in there first.”

  “From what little glimpse I got,” he said, still rubbing his forehead, “I think that you are all overarmed to deal with the situation.”

  Now Pretty Nose knelt by the opening to the first shelter and made sign-talk gestures, in case they might be from some other tribe. Two young boys finally crawled out, followed by a small girl. From the second hut, three girls and another boy appeared. One of the girls, who did not appear to be much older than thirteen years, carried an infant swaddled in a piece of dirty calico. The rest seemed to be roughly between the ages of four and eleven years old. They were all filthy, their clothes ragged, their eyes hollow, and they looked hungry.

  Two of the older boys glared at us defiantly, as did one of the older girls, already proud warriors despite their youth. The younger ones just looked scared. They reminded me of the immigrant children I had dealt with as a charity worker in New York … another lifetime ago … children without homes whose parents had turned them out because they could not afford to feed them, and who lived on the street or in abandoned buildings, fending for themselves as best they were able, and suspicious of all strangers. Using sign talk, I told these children that we would not hurt them, they were safe with us, and we were going to give them food, which I knew from experience were the things they most needed to hear.

  They followed us back to our horses. I did not think any would try to flee, as it was clear that the older among them had assumed the care of the younger, which was how the immigrant children had protected their tribe. In any case, there was nowhere for them to go, and it was obvious that they had little, if anything, to eat. They knew they had no choice but to put their trust in us.

  We gave them pieces of dried buffalo meat to chew while Pretty Nose questioned them. It was determined that they were from several different families in a mixed band like ours of Cheyenne and Arapaho. The oldest girl said her baby daughter was unwell and had stopped feeding. I asked her in sign talk to let me see the child, but she clutched it possessively to her breast.

  “Please,” I said in Cheyenne, “I may be able to help her.”

  At Pretty Nose’s urging, but reluctantly, and regarding me with deep uncertainty, the girl finally handed her baby to me. Not until I held the tiny child in my arms and felt the stiffness of her body did I realize that she was dead. I saw then the stain of dried blood and the bullet hole in the thin calico. With tears now running down her cheeks, the girl reached her arms out to me in a supplicating gesture. “Yes, sweetheart,” I whispered, nodding, “I understand,” and I handed her dead baby back to her.

  The story we pieced together from the children’s account was that since the confluence of tribes at the Little Bighorn, like us, their band had been traveling, trying to return to their traditional hunting grounds, or find new ones that were not overrun with Army troops. Three days ago, their people had spotted several mounted Shoshone warriors watching them on a ridge above the valley through which they were passing. The Shoshone disappeared quickly, and the leaders of the band, assuming that they were wolves, and fearing their return with soldiers, changed direction as an evasive tactic. Some of the band had horses and others, including all the children, were on foot. They moved as quickly as they could, the older children running alongside the horses, the youngest riding behind their parents. They traveled like this for several hours, until dusk came on.

  Hoping that they had succeeded in evading the soldiers, they pitched camp for the night along this same creek, and they made no fires that might give them away. The adults and oldest children took turns standing watch beyond the cover of willows where the others slept. This allowed the night guards a clear line of sight to survey the hillsides, lit by a three-quarter moon that cast enough light to see the silhouette of horsemen on the horizon, or the approach of enemies.

  The oldest boy admitted with downcast eyes that his was the last watch before dawn, and he had fallen asleep and did not see or hear the wolves and soldiers approaching on foot. Only the nervous nickering of their horses finally woke him, as it did the others in the camp. But by then it was too late.

  All Indian children are taught from the youngest age that at the first sign of a possible attack upon their village, they are to run and hide wherever it is possible to conceal themselves, and not to move again or give any sign of their presence until it is safe. This they did, the older shepherding the younger, and
all scattering. Six of them had escaped just before the soldiers and wolves stormed the camp, and from their hiding places, they listened to the shouts of the invaders, the gunfire, the yells of their older brothers, fathers, and grandfathers as they returned fire or engaged in hand-to-hand combat, the cries of their married sisters, mothers, and grandmothers, and the bawling of the babies, whose mothers had gathered them in their arms but had not fled in time. The young girl with the dead infant was running from the camp just as the attack began, and without her being aware of it until later, a bullet struck her baby daughter and must have killed her instantly.

  The chaotic noises from the attack went on for some time, until the guns finally fell silent, and the only voices heard calling to each other were those of the scouts and the soldiers speaking Shoshone and English, respectively. Dawn was coming on now and the children listened as the wolves rummaged through their camp for weapons and food, and anything else of value they could carry off. They took scalps, and they gathered the band’s horses picketed nearby.

  The children waited until well after the soldiers and wolves had finally departed before rising from their hiding places, regrouping, and walking back to the camp. There they found the bodies of their families. They keened and wept, and they wept again as they now told us about it.

  The Shoshone had carried everything away, had even stripped the clothes from some of the dead. They left no blankets, no food, no weapons … nothing. The older children decided they could not stay in that place; there was nothing to keep them there and they were afraid of the unsettled spirits of the dead rising at night from the corpses that no longer resembled their family members.