Eugene Ware - The Indian War of 1864

The Julesburg fight was considered by the Indians as an exceedingly bitter and unexpected resistance on the part of the white men. The Indians were repulsed and injured so that they did not try to take or capture the stage station and the stores and supplies a mile down the river. In fact, it was believed that the Indians were endeavoring to cross the river above our post, and go up Lodgepole, and off into the northern country; that their object was to capture and kill what they could and get through the lines north, and hence the resistance which they met from the soldiers turned them from their purpose, and although they were quite numerous, it started them back again into the great wilderness of country which lay south between the two rivers.

Of the events of the fight many strange stories were told. The Indians were all well armed, and in one sense better armed than our soldiers. They had firearms, and they also had bows, and quivers full of arrows. A bow-and-arrow is a much more dangerous and effective weapon than a revolver in the hands of an Indian. While a revolver could shoot six times quickly, as then made, it could not be loaded on horseback on a run with somebody pursuing, but the Indian could shoot six arrows that were as good as six shots from a revolver at close range, and then he could shoot twenty-four more in rapid succession. And so, when a soldier had shot out all his cartridges, he was a prey to an Indian with a bow-and-arrow who followed him. In addition to this, the Indians carried lances, which they used to good purpose. Our boys had sabers; an Indian could not hit a soldier with a lance if the soldier had a saber, nor could a soldier saber an Indian if the Indian had a lance.

All during this fight an Indian upon a hill nearest the post handled his red troops by signal, using at times a looking glass, and at other times a buffalo-robe. He swung his men around in very good style. Our soldiers were deployed during part of the fight, and the Indians had a drill not very much unlike it. During the fight James Cannon had a cartridge in his carbine, which would not explode; after snapping it once or twice, while the soldiers and Indians were cavorting around among each other, Cannon took his carbine by the muzzle, and, using it as a club, started in, and finally got to chasing an Indian. As the Indian was about to get away from him, Cannon threw his carbine at the Indian and struck him in the back with it. Cannon said the Indian "howled like a tomcat," but of course Cannon couldn't hear anything or make any observations at that time. He got out of the melлe without injury. Several of the boys were slightly wounded, in addition to those killed. Several of the horses were wounded, and some died of their injuries.

One of our boys was shot with a frying-pan handle. It struck him in the rear part of the hip. The frying-pans of that day as used on the plains were little, light steel utensils, with slender, heavy hoop-steel handles with a ring in the end. The Indian had a large arrow, and about nine inches of this frying-pan handle sharpened on both sides, and pointed, was fixed into it. This arrow went in several inches, and through the pelvic bone. Although the soldier got out of the fight alive, he could not pull the arrow out. He succeeded in getting back to the post. Then one of the soldiers got the company blacksmith's pinchers, and, laying the wounded man down on his face, he stood on top of him, got hold of the arrow-bead with the pinchers, and finally succeeded in working and wrenching it out. The poor fellow was in great pain, but subsequently recovered all right. We had no anesthetics in the army in those days.

All of the stage-drivers and civilians around Julesburg flocked into the fort, and made up their minds to hold it against all odds that should come. All the available men of my company, about fifty in number, turned up at Cottonwood Springs, ready to march with General Mitchell, on the evening of January 14, 1865, about a week after the battle.

On the 15th of January, 1865, the command was drawn up in line, and consisted of 640 cavalrymen. This was in addition to about 100 mule-wagons lightly loaded with rations, corn, tents, and supplies. There was also a herd of about fifty extra horses that were fastened together close at the bit, and driven by fours. There were also four twelve-pound mountain howitzers, and two light three-inch Parrott guns. Captain O'Brien was made chief of artillery under General Mitchell. Colonel Livingston was the next in rank to General Mitchell, and to him was confided the looking after, and taking charge of, the line of march. On the evening of the 15th of January we went up the river to within three miles of Jack Morrow's, and spent a cold, unpleasant January night on the flat plains, without any fires, but we had tents which furnished us a good deal of shelter.

At Jack Morrow's ranch General Mitchell drew up and handed to me a paper which read as follows:

HEADQUARTERS, EXPEDITIONARY FORCES IN THE FIELD,

January 15, 1865. SPECIAL FIELD ORDER NO. 1.

"PAR. 1. Lieutenant E. F. Ware, A.D.C., is assigned to duty as Acting Assistant Adjutant-General during the Expedition now in the field, and will be obeyed and respected accordingly.

"PAR. 2. Captain O'Brien, Co. 'F,' 7th Iowa Cavalry, is hereby assigned to the command of the artillery in the field. All detachments in charge of artillery ordered to the field will report to him immediately for orders, with such officers as have been detailed for the artillery service.

"PAR. 3. Colonel R. R. Livingston will have the immediate command of the troops in the field, and all orders issued from these headquarters, for record, will be transmitted through his headquarters to regiments and detachments.

"PAR. 4. Lieutenant Thompson, First Nebraska Vet. Vol. Cavalry, will act during the expedition as Acting Assistant Quartermaster and Acting Commissary of Subsistence, and will be obeyed and respected accordingly.

ROBERT B. MITCHELL, Brig.-General, Comdg. District and Expedition."

That evening I told General Mitchell about my visitation and premonitions, and how the frog-man got down on me, and told me thrice that I would "never see Omaha." We had quite a talk in regard to it at headquarters. I had made a memorandum of the circumstance in my itinerary, as I wanted to put it down and have proof in black and white, so that, in case anything should happen to me, the premonition would stand in writing as of the proper date and show something definite as to what had occurred. But in the discussion that evening with General Mitchell, in which Captain O'Brien took part, the doctrine of premonition was pretty thoroughly riddled. Said Captain O'Brien, who had about him no savor of cowardice, or superstition: "These premonitions and prophecies are all bogus. Now," he said, "if any spirit, seen or unseen, any ghost or any angel, knows anything, why in thunder don't he tell it and tell it straight? Why does he give it to you in such a dark and veiled manner? If he knows you are going to be killed or die on such a day or hour, why doesn't he say so, tell it plainly, and leave the thing open to positive proof? No," said Captain O'Brien, "that isn't the way it is done. These things are always put into some sort of equivocal, double-dealing shape. Now, in your case, the message is, 'You won't see Omaha.' That doesn't mean that you are going to be killed, nor that your death is going to take place. You may never see Omaha, you may never see the North Pole, and may yet live a hundred years. Supposing, for instance, we should march on down to Fort Leavenworth, and didn't have to go to Omaha. Now that would be an every-day, unromantic fact, and entirely unimportant. And it would be just the same as if you were never going to see Davenport, Iowa. There are lots of places you are not going to see again. Now to pay attention to any such things as these is cowardice."