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While we were resting there, quite a number of
officers and myself were talking to Colonel Mills, when we noticed, coming from
the direction in which we were going, a solitary horseman about three miles
distant. He was coming from the
ridge of the mountains. The colonel asked me if I had any scouts out in that
direction, and I told him I had not. We naturally supposed that it was an
Indian.
He kept drawing nearer and nearer to us, until we made out it was a white man,
and as he came on I recognized him to be
California Joe.
When he got within hailing distance, I sung out,
“Hello, Joe,” and he answered, “Hello, Bill.” I said: “Where in the world are
you going to, out in this country?” (We were then about five hundred miles from
any part of civilization.) He said he was just out for a morning ride. I
introduced him to the colonel and officers, who had all heard and read of him,
for he had been made famous in Custer's Life on the Plains. He was a tall man,
about six feet three inches in his moccasins, with reddish gray hair and
whiskers, very thin, nothing but bone, sinew, and muscle. He was riding an old cayuse pony, with an old saddle, a very old bridle, and a pair of elk-skin
hobbles attached to his saddle, to which also hung a piece of elk-meat. He
carried an old Hawkins rifle. He had an old shabby army hat on, and a ragged
blue army overcoat, a buckskin shirt, and a pair of dilapidated greasy buckskin
pants that reached only a little below his knees, having shrunk in the wet; he
also wore a pair of old army government boots with the soles worn off. That was
his make-up.
I remember the colonel asking him if he had been
very successful in life. He pointed to the old cayuse pony, his gun, and his
clothes, and replied, “This is seventy years' gathering.” Colonel Mills then
asked him if he would have anything to eat; he said he had plenty to eat, all he
wanted was tobacco. Tobacco was very scarce in the command, but they rounded him
up sufficient to do him that day. When invited to go with us, he said he was not
particular where he went, he would just as soon go one way as the other; he
remained with us several days, in fact, he stayed the entire trip.
He was of great assistance to me, as he knew the
country thoroughly. He was a fine mountain guide, but I could seldom find him
when I most needed him, as he was generally back with the column, telling
frontier stories and yarns to the soldiers for a chew of tobacco.
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One day I rode back from the advance guard to ask
the colonel how far he wanted to go before camping, and while I was riding along
talking to him, we noticed that the advance guard had stopped and were standing
in a circle, evidently looking at something very intently. They were so
interested that they did not come to their senses until the colonel and myself
rode in among them. Then they immediately moved forward, leaving the colonel and
myself to see what they had been investigating. It was a lone grave in the
desolate mountains, and whoever had been buried there evidently had friends,
because the spot was nicely covered with stones to prevent the wolves from
digging up the corpse.
We were looking at this grave when old Joe rode
up, and as he stopped he threw down his hat on the pile of rocks and said, “At
last.”
The colonel said, “Joe, do you know anything
about the history of this grave?”
Joe replied -- “Well I should think I did.”
The colonel then asked him to tell us about it.
Joe said: -- “In 1816” -- we didn't stop to think how far back
1816 was -- “I had been to Astoria at the mouth of the Columbia River with a
company of fur traders, and had been trapping in that country for two or three
years, and by that time the party had made up their minds they would start back
to the States, across the mountains. They were headed for the Missouri River,
and when they got there, they intended to build a boat and float down to St.
Louis. As they were coming across the Continental Divide of the Rocky Mountains,
had reached the eastern slope, and were coming down one of the tributaries of
the Stinking Water, some one of the party discovered what he thought to be gold
nuggets in the bed of the stream. The water was clear. Every man went down to
the water prospecting. The stream was so full of gold nuggets that they all
jumped off their horses, leaving them packed as they were, and commenced
throwing gold nuggets out on the banks.
“They abandoned everything they had with them,
provisions and all, excepting their rifles, and prepared to load the gold.
“Then they started for the Missouri River again,
and when they reached the spot where this grave was, a man was taken suddenly
ill, died in a very few minutes, and they buried him there.”
Old Joe gave a sly wink, as much as to say, “We
buried the money with the man.”
At this time quite a number of officers gathered
around where the advance of the command had halted, and there may have been
thirty or forty soldiers listening to this story; there were some who took it to
be one of Joe's lies that he usually told for tobacco.
The colonel ordered the bugler to sound
“forward.” The command moved on and within five or six miles went into camp. But
every man who had listened to Joe's story of this grave, feeling that there was
some hundred thousand dollars buried in it, gave it a look as they passed by.
We moved on and went into camp. Joe was messing
with me, and after we had supper he said, “Bill, would you like to see a little
fun to-night?” I said, “Yes, I am in for fun or anything else.” He said, “As
soon as it gets dark you follow me.” I said, “You bet I will follow you,”
thinking all the time that he was going back to dig this fellow up.
As soon as it was dark he started and motioned me
to follow him, but, instead of going back on the trail, he went in the direction
that we intended to go in the morning. Thinks I to myself, “That is good
medicine, we won't go directly back on the trail but follow another.”
I asked him if we did not want to take a pick and
shovel with us, and he said, “What for?” I said, “We will need it.” He said,
“No, we won't need it; you come on.”
When we got outside the camp he commenced to turn
around to the left, getting back on our trail. I said, “This is all right.” He
was now going back toward the grave. We went about a mile on the trail and he
said, “Sit down here.” I said, “Don't we want to go on?” He said, “What for?” I
said, “To dig that fellow up and get the money.” He said, “The money be damned;
I never saw the bloomin' grave before,” or something like that. I was
disappointed. He said, “Wait a few minutes until after ‘taps,’ and you will see
that camp empty itself.”
Presently here they came, scouts, soldiers, and
packers by the dozen, sneaking through the brush and hurrying back on the trail.
Old Joe laid down behind this boulder and just rolled with laughter to see them
going to dig up the grave.
The next morning the boys told me that they dug
up the grave and found some bones; they dug up a quarter of an acre of ground
and never got the color of a piece of gold; then they “tumbled.”
Added
February, 2007
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