Our heroine, dismounting, dragged her unconscious comrade to the bank of the creek, and, throwing water in his face, quickly restored him to his senses; but, before he could handle his gun, the Indians had come within a hundred paces, whooping fiercely to call back their companions, who just before abandoned the pursuit. They were luckily only armed with bows and arrows, and, circling about the fearless pair, they launched arrow after arrow, though without doing any execution. One of them fell before the rifle of Mrs. Coolidge. A second was brought to earth by the guide, who had by this time revived sufficiently to join in the fight. The third turned and galloped off towards his two companions, who were now hastening to the scene of conflict.

This gave our heroine and her associate in danger time to reload their rifles and to shield their horses behind the bank of the creek. Then, lying prostrate in the grass, they completely concealed themselves from sight. The three Indians, seeing them disappear behind the bank of the creek, and supposing that they had taken to flight again, rode unguardedly within range, and received shots which tumbled two of them from their saddles. The only remaining warrior gave up the contest and galloped away, leaving his comrades dead upon the field. One of the Indian mustangs supplied the place of the guide's horse, which was wind broken, and the two now pursued their journey at a moderate pace, reaching Fort Leavenworth without encountering any more dangers.

Mrs. Coolidge (under her pseudonym of James Brown), after delivering her dispatches, was promoted to the rank of sergeant, and was, at her own request, detached from the New Mexican division of the army and ordered to Matamoras, where she did garrison duty without any suspicion being awakened as to her sex. She afterwards entered active service, and accompanied the army on the march to the city of Mexico. She took part in the storming of Chepultepec, and never flinched in that severe affair, covering herself with honor, and proving what brave deeds a woman can do in the severest test to which a soldier can be put.

During the recent war between the North and the South woman's position on the frontier was similar to that which she occupied in the war of 1812. The greater part of the army of the United States, which, in time of peace, was stationed along the vast border line from the Red River of the North to the Rio Grande, had been withdrawn. The outposts, by means of which the blood-thirsty Sioux, the savage Comanches, the remorseless Apaches, and numerous other fierce and war like tribes had been kept in check, were either abandoned, or so poorly garrisoned that the settlements upon the border were left almost entirely unprotected from the treacherous savage, the lawless Mexican bandit, and the American outlaw and desperado.

What made their position still more unguarded and dangerous was the absence of their fathers, husbands, and brothers, as volunteers in the armies. The war fever raged in both the North and the South, and nowhere more hotly than among the pioneers from Minnesota to Texas. This brave and hardy class of men, accustomed as they were to the presence of danger, obeyed the call to arms with alacrity, and the women appear to have acquiesced in the enlistment of their natural protectors, trusting to God and their own arms to guard the household during the absence of the men of the family.

The women were thus left alone to face their human foes, and the thousand other perils which beset them. They were, to all intents and purposes, soldiers. They belonged to the home army, upon which the frontier would have mainly to rely for security. Ceaseless vigilance by night and day, and a steady courage in the presence of danger, had to be constantly exercised.

Sometimes the savage foe came in overwhelming numbers, and in such cases the only safety lay in flight, during which all woman's address and fortitude was called into requisition, either to devise means of successfully eluding her pursuers, or to endure the toils and hardships of a rapid march. Sometimes she stood with loaded gun in her household garrison, and faced the enemy, either repelling them, or dying at her post, or, what was worse than death, seeing her loved ones butchered before her eyes, and their being led into a cruel captivity.

On the Texas border, in 1862, one of these home-warriors, during the absence of her husband in the Southern army, was left alone not far from the Rio Grande, and ten miles from the house of any American settler. Three Mexican horse thieves came to the house and demanded the key of the stable, in which two valuable horses were kept, threatening, in case of refusal, to burn her house over her head. She stood at her open door, with loaded revolver, and told them that not only would she not surrender the property, but that the first one that dared to lay violent hands upon her should be shot down. Cowed by her intrepid manner, the bandits slunk away.

On another occasion she was attacked by two American outlaws, while riding on the river bank. One of them seized the bridle of the horse, and the other attempted to drag her from the saddle. Turning upon the latter, she shot him dead, and the other, from sheer amazement at her daring, lost his self-possession and begged for mercy. After compelling him to give up his arms, she allowed him to depart unmolested, as there was no tribunal of justice near by where he could be punished for his villainy. These exploits gained for the borderer's wife a wide reputation throughout the region, and either through fear of her courage, or through an admiring respect for such heroism, when displayed by a lone woman, she was never again troubled by marauders.

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