Railroad tracks were swept away, telegraph poles leveled, and thoughPhiladelphia and other cities sent help and food at once, it wasimpossible to reach the helpless victims for forty-eight hours, and whenat last soldiers and navvies on rescue trains reached the scene, therewas nothing to be done but to feed the living and bury the dead.
Nearly 10,000 perished, and all who had escaped with their lives triedto succor the sufferers, save a few Hungarian Slavs and Italians, whoplundered the dead, but who were shot at once as a reward for theirgreediness.
It is not possible to picture the condition of the Valley after thewaters receded. In many places the whole town was swept as bare asthough a gigantic broom had passed over it, nothing but sand and gravelbeing left. Where a house chanced to be left standing, it was filledwith mud and slime to the third story, while trees, broken timbersand debris was piled up to the second story. Not a house was fit foroccupancy. Dead bodies were found in cellars, and in some dwellingshorses had been forced into the rooms by the rushing waters, and laythere putrefying. {334}They all fared alike. A few citizens were heldprisoners in their frame houses, and floated over two miles to a placeof safety, but these fortunate ones were the exception.
Medicines, clothing, money and food were liberally poured into theunfortunate region. Men and women from all over the country offeredtheir services to care for the living and the dead.
The dam whose bursting caused this awful loss of life was verycarelessly constructed, and had no stone work in its makeup. Indeed, itmight well be called a vast embankment of earth.
EARTHQUAKE AT CHARLESTON.
|Charleston, South Carolina, seems to have more than her share ofmisfortunes.
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This thought occurred to me when the papers all over the country on themorning of September 1st, 1886, {335}gave to the world an account ofthat dreaded convulsion known as an earthquake, which had taken placethe night previous, just as the hour for retiring had come. The firstintimation that the Signal Service Bureau at Washington city had of thiscatastrophe was only a surmise. They knew that something was wrong, forcommunication was not to be had. All the telegraph wires were suddenlycut off. Without a moment's warning the city had been shocked and rentto its very foundation. Hardly a building escaped injury and almost athird of the city was in half or total ruins. The whole Atlantic coastwas more or less affected, and for leagues from the shore the ocean wasthrown in a turmoil.
People fled from the tottering houses to the parks and public squares,where they erected tents and remained for weeks, afraid to return totheir own homes. It was soon discovered that these shocks were only thedying away of great convulsions and that further alarm was unnecessary,so they returned home.
With true American energy the debris was in a few months clearedaway, business was resumed and to-day were it not for a few cracks andfissures in buildings we would never know that anything had happenedthere to disturb their peace.
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INDIAN WARS.
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ATING {336}from the time of the discovery of our continent there havebeen disturbances between the whites and the Indians. The first Indianwar was between the colonists and the natives, and dates back to 1622.
At the beginning of the nineteenth century the Sioux Indians held allthe lands between the Mississippi and the Rocky Mountains, north of the40th parallel of latitude. These lands were grassy, rolling prairies,with a plentiful supply of timber growing along the rivers and creekswhich abounded. The government established reservations thirty-two yearsago for the purpose of keeping those Indians who are hostile, separatedfrom the peaceably disposed ones, who only went upon the hunt for gamefor food and sale. When buffalo and large game grew scarce, the UnitedStates furnished them with food and clothing, and placed the meanswithin their power, to support themselves.
The Indian question is full of interest, and comes forward constantly toperplex our government, which regards them as its wards. Articles bythe hundred have been written about the red man, his possibilities andcapabilities set forth; plans have been proposed to subdue, or rathercivilize him, and still the fact remains that the savage nature, save inexceptional instances, is as untamed as the first day he came upon thescene. {337}
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The {338}first mail to California from the East was carried by theoverland route, in stages, and lucky was the party that made thelonesome journey across the plains unmolested by the Indians, whoswarmed about them and sent showers of arrows into the coach which wascarrying its bag of mail and the trembling passengers. The stage wasalways guarded by United States soldiers, but in spite of this thehalf-naked savages would press closer and closer, hurling their sharparrows with unerring aim, as the stage went plunging along, the horseshalf-mad with fear, but straining every nerve to outrun the screamingfoe. The settlers of those early days were brave men and women, or theywould not have risked falling into the hands of the roving bands whowere always on the war-path on some pretext. Many a brave man has dieddefending the mail which the government intrusted to him.
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While our land was torn with dissension, the Indians cunningly planned ageneral uprising. This was in 1862. The Indians in Minnesota and Dakotamassacred the settlers everywhere, In Minnesota the Sioux attackedoutlying towns, committing {339}terrible atrocities. They pounced uponNew Ulm, a small but thriving village, and killed 100 of its people.
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They turned their attention to two other villages, but were drivenaway. {340}Colonel Sibley was sent after them, and met several bodies ofIndians, whom he defeated. They fear cannon greatly, and two were turnedupon them, much to their terror.
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The garrison at Fort Kearney was surprised by Indians December 21, 1866,and 100 soldiers were slaughtered.
The Indians have many peculiar customs. One of them is, their habitof daubing on the war paint and indulging in a war dance whenever theyresolve to attack the whites.
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Once seen they {342}can never be forgotten, for their lithe forms,hideously painted faces, and demoniac yells would startle the bravest.
September of 1867 the Indians on the North Platte called a council toconfer with General Sherman. They demanded that the building of severalroads should be stopped, and particularly the work on the SouthernPacific, as it interfered with their hunting. The General would notaccede to these demands, but promised that any loss they suffered shouldbe made good to them.
September 18, 1868, the 'Indians attacked our troops at RepublicanRiver, and Lieutenant Beecher and several other officers were murdered.In 1871 the Apaches killed over 200 white settlers, not in battle, butskulking in ambush, and shooting them wherever they met them.
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The whites met the Indians at Washita River, and defeated them, November27, 1868.
Thus the continual outbreaks of the Indians, have been a source oftrouble and anxiety to the government, which has sought to adjust theclaims of the red men in a fair and just manner. That the latter haveoften been cheated and robbed by unscrupulous agents and traders, noone can deny, but the fact still remains that the Indian nature ispeculiarly hard to subdue, and their natural instincts are cruel. {343}
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There are, fortunately, many bright examples among several tribes,{344}of the beauty of civilization, and its beneficial influence uponthem.
The Modoc massacre was a cruel return for intended kindness. Thistribe had for its chief Captain Jack, a very intelligent man of fineabilities. Their removal to another reservation was violently resistedby them, and they retreated to the Lava Beds, where trouble wasanticipated. At last a peace council was arranged for and althoughColonel Meacham, the peace commissioner, urged the whites not to attendit, they paid no attention to his warning, but went. The Indians hadconcealed weapons, and they rose in a body, and attempted to massacreevery white man present. General Canby and Dr. Thomas were killed, andColonel Meacham received a dozen wounds, but sur
vived them. Three monthsafterward the band surrendered, and Captain Jack and some of the otherleaders were executed at Fort Klamath, Oregon, October 3.
GEORGE A. CUSTER.
|A the close of the war of 1861 most of the boys in blue went back totheir homes--but not so with General Custer. He was one of the mostbrilliant soldiers of the war, and had the distinction of being theyoungest general in the army. His graduation from West Point took placejust about the first year of the conflict, and he was made lieutenant,but before the close of the last year he had attained the rank ofmajor-general, and assisted in some of the most remarkable victories.
He was not allowed time to visit his home in Michigan, but was orderedto lead a cavalry command through Texas, to teach the people there thatthe war was over, and to check the ravages of the "bushwhackers" whostill infested that beautiful State. On his return home he acceptedthe lieutenant-colonelcy of the Seventh United States Cavalry, and nineyears were passed in service at the frontier posts of Kansas and Dakota.
His wife lived with him through those scenes of interest. She {345}hadthe gift of transmitting to paper the vivid pictures of this wild anddaring life. She passed four months in an army wagon, and rode the longmarches which her brave husband was forced to make. He was a hero, shealso was a heroine, for the hardships and privations which she enduredso uncomplainingly, were worthy of so grand a spirit.
The Sioux (Soo) is the most powerful tribe of red men on our continent.They preyed upon all alike--with the defenceless settlements of ourMinnesota frontier, with the Pawnees, the Cheyennes, the Arapahoes, andthe Shoshones and, indeed, with all the other tribes, far and near.
They spared no one. At the end of the war of 1861 our army was calledon to protect the peaceable settlers of the far West, for the Siouxwere more hostile and bloodthirsty than ever. For ten years the cavalryregiments knew no rest. The Indians were on the war-path continually.They were always rash fighters, but when in 1874 they obtainedbreech-loaders and rifles, they became a foe more to be dreaded thanever. They burned our forts and massacred the small garrisons in a mostatrocious manner.
Our government used every method to subdue them, feeding, clothing andcoaxing them. Agencies and reservations were placed at good points, butthis care for their comfort had no effect. The old worn-out Indians,women and children lived on these reservations, partaking of thegovernment's bounty, while the young and vigorous warriors salliedout to murder and pilfer the whites wherever they could find them. Thesoldiers of the United States were not permitted to attack them on theirreservations, and so they kept out of their way, and escaped punishment.
An Indian in his wild state has no respect for another of his race whohas no scalps to show. There were, however, some who made treaties withthe whites, and kept them. But among the many who never made any promiseto behave was a powerful medicine chief known as "Sitting Bull."
In March, 1876, General George Crook was sent against this {346}renownedwarrior, who had entrenched himself in the hills with 6,000 "badIndians" around him. From the south General Terry was sent with a strongbody of cavalry and infantry, and General Gibbon with a small but braveband of frontier soldiers. They approached the stronghold of the chief.Major Reno left camp to reconnoiter, and was readily convinced how rashit would be to attack Sitting Bull, who was daily receiving accessionsto his numbers.
General Terry thought, however, it was time to start an expedition todiscover and dislodge the enemy, and he gave the command to the braveand fearless soldier, General Custer. He named the 26th of June as theday when he and Gibbon would be there to assist Custer, but the latter,impatient to open the conflict, had urged his horses and men to theirutmost so as to reach the scene. He started on the trail with theSeventh Cavalry, riding sixty miles in twenty-four hours. His aim wasto have a bout with the Indians and defeat them single-handed. Comingwithin sight of the village on the left bank of the Little Big HornRiver where Sitting Bull was encamped, he observed such tokensof excitement and hurrying away of ponies as to him had but oneexplanation--that the chief and his warriors were running away. Dashingforward with panting chest and the fire of courage flaming in his face,he placed himself at the head of his men, plunged hastily into thevalley, and the last that General Reno, who followed him closely, eversaw of the brave Custer and his three hundred, was the cloud of dusttheir trail had left behind.
The valiant Custer had gone to his death! Expecting Reno would make adash such as his own, he had gallantly ridden forward, to be met by aperfect storm of flame and lead. In an instant he saw how vain was hisattempt, and giving orders to mount he sought a way out, but the red menswarmed around his followers. Boys and even old squaws were firing athim and his band most viciously. {347}
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Vainly they tried to remount--they cut their horses loose, and on alittle mound, General Custer, with scarcely a dozen men, all who wereleft, made his last {348}rally. In a few moments all was over. Of thetwelve troops of the Seventh Cavalry, but one thing escaped alive--MylesKeogh's sorrel horse, Comanche, who came back into the lines a few dayslater, a most pitiable object. Thus perished General Custer, as braveand noble a soldier as ever lived!
The Utes gave a great amount of trouble in 1879, in Colorado, pouncingupon a wagon train and slaying Major Thornburgh and eleven of his men.They next murdered Agent Meeker, and carried many women into captivity.
The Apache Indians fell upon the settlers of Silver City, New Mexico,October 19, 1879, killing twenty-one men and women, and seventeenchildren. The men were shot and scalped, and the women tortured. Troopswere sent to protect the remainder, but it was some time before theycould be reached.
The year 1890 witnessed one of the most serious outbreaks of the redmen of the Dakota reservations. The Ghost Dance was indulged in, andthe feeling of dread and fear spread all over the Western country.This dance was instigated by Sitting Bull, who had returned to thereservation eleven years previous. It has always been a superstitionamong all the Indians that the Messiah would come to them some day,bring all their dead to life, and drive the whites out of the land.Sitting Bull encouraged the Sioux in Dakota to believe this.
At once the War Department was given full control of the Indians by theInterior Department. At the different agencies it was found that theIndians were stealing cattle and horses and running them off into theBad Lands, where they designed starting a camp. It was well known thatif Sitting Bull reached that stronghold he would be safe, so the Indianpolice at the Pine Ridge Agency were told to arrest him, which they did,and started back to the Agency, knowing a body of cavalry and infantrywere following in their wake to assist them. But Sitting Bull's friendsrushed to his assistance and a fierce hand-to-hand encounter took place.They all fought like fiends, and lost several of their numbers. Butthe police held the old chief captive, {349}and two of them shothim--Bullhead and Red Tomahawk. A son of the chief, Crow Foot, was slainalso.
BATTLE OF WOUNDED KNEE CREEK,
|In the annals of American history there cannot be found a battle sofierce, bloody and decisive as the fight at Wounded Knee Creek betweenthe Seventh Cavalry and Big Foots band of Sioux. It was a stand-upfight of the most desperate kind, in which nearly the entire band wasannihilated, and although the soldiers outnumbered their opponentsnearly three to one, the victory was won by two troops, about onehundred strong.
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The night before the Indians had agreed to submit, and the troops wereup bright and early in readiness to move by eight o'clock. At thathour the cavalry and dismounted troops were gathered about the Indianvillage, the Hotchkiss guns overlooking the camp not fifty yards away.The Indians were ordered to come forward, away from their tents, andwhen the band, under the leadership of Big Foot, walked out of theirlodges and formed a semicircle in front of the soldiers' tents, therewas nothing to indicate that they would not submit. Colonel Forsyth, anIndian fighter of tried worth, never gave a thought to the chance ofa fight. When it was made plain to the band that their arms must be{350}given up, the murmur of dis
content was unanimous.
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When the soldiers proceeded to disarm them and search their tentsthe medicine man jumped up, uttered a loud incantation and fired at atrooper standing guard over the captured guns. That was the signal forfight, and in a second every buck in the party rose to his feet, castaside the blanket which covered his winchester, and, taking aim, fireddirectly at the troop in front. It was a terrible onslaught, and sosudden that all were stunned but, quickly recovering, they opened fireon the enemy. The position of troops B and K would not allow theirfellow-cavalry-men to fire, lest they shoot through the Indians and killtheir own men. This the terrible duel raged for thirty minutes. Someoneordered "Spare the women," but the squaws fought like demons and couldnot be distinguished from the men. The entire band was practicallyslaughtered, and those who escaped to the ravine were followed by thecavalry and shot down wherever found. The chief medicine man, whoseincantations had caused the band to act with such murderous treachery,fell with a dozen bullets in his body. It is claimed that of the Indiansthere were but two survivors, one of which was a baby girl about threemonths old, who has since been adopted by a wealthy lady in Washington.
After {351}the defeat of the Indians at Wounded Knee Creek, they wereready to close the conflict and make the best terms possible withGeneral Miles. On the 22d of January there was a grand military reviewin honor of the victory over the redskins. Ten thousand Sioux had agood opportunity to see the strength and discipline of the United StatesArmy, the end of the ghost-dance rebellion being marked by a review ofall the soldiers who had taken part in crushing the Indians. Thus passedinto history probably not only the most remarkable of our Indian wars,but the last one there will ever be.