Chapter 51
20-24 September 1876
The general had them up at four A.M., resaddled, and back on the road within a half hour, without breakfast or coffee.
Pointing to a ridge still at least twenty miles away to the south, Crook later halted the group as the sun was emerging in the east. “Would anyone care to hazard a guess what that is?” the general inquired.
“Those box-shaped buildings on the top of that high ground?” Finerty asked.
“Yes.”
“Could it be Camp Robinson?” asked Robert Strahorn.
“Exactly,” Crook replied. “Let’s push on, gentlemen!”
That last stretch of country before reaching Red Cloud’s reservation took the horsemen through some barren badlands. For the first time in weeks dust rose from the hammering hooves beneath them, covering them all with a fine layer of yellowed talc by the time that dirty detail rode in among the agency buildings. Near the sawmill a fatigue detail was hard at work and turned to watch the band of riders pass by.
One of the soldiers called out to the dust-caked horsemen, “Where the devil have you fellas been?”
“In Hades, of course!” sang out Thaddeus Stanton.
Suddenly a second infantryman slapped the first on the shoulder, exclaiming, “Jesus! They’re soldiers!”
“N-not just soldiers—officers!”
With a flurry of salutes to the mud-covered band of officers, the soldiers sheepishly turned back to their work in a great hurry.
It didn’t take long for more of an audience to gather on the road easing through the agency buildings. At least a thousand Sioux crowded to take a look at Three Stars himself—the soldier chief who had fought Crazy Horse several suns before the Hunkpatila war chief had defeated the Long Hair beside the Greasy Grass. These men with Three Stars must be some of the same soldiers who had attacked the village of American Horse.
As they moved slowly through the throng of dark-eyed visages, Finerty leaned in his saddle toward Donegan and said, “I wonder if any of these are the warriors we fought at Slim Buttes right before they hurried off to get here ahead of us.”
Seamus nodded. “I have no doubt, Johnny. You can feel it in the way they look at us. Makes my marrow go cold.”
By pushing Egan’s horses so hard, Crook had used them up and was forced to remain at Camp Robinson for the rest of the day and into the next until Randall and Sibley showed up late on the afternoon of the twenty-first. That Thursday evening after supper, Major Jordan and his officers gave Crook’s officers a crowded but grand reception held around the stoves in the sutler’s store. For many it was a delightful reunion of old warriors, and though they had only coffee and a dram of brandy to share, there was much to toast and celebrate.
Together again the entire party prepared to set out behind an anxious Crook early on the morning of the twenty-second. They were leaving behind one of the correspondents, Robert Strahorn of the Rocky Mountain
“How long’s it been, Bob?” Seamus asked as he dropped the stirrup down, finished tightening the cinch.
“Since last February when I came north to Cheyenne, Laramie, and on to Fetterman, hoping to investigate the rumors we’d heard that the army was taking the field for a winter campaign,” he replied as the rest of Crook’s party milled about, completing the last of their preparations before putting Camp Robinson behind them.
“I don’t think I’ll ever forget that day beside the Powder River,” Seamus said.
“I won’t ever forget charging in with Teddy Egan’s boys and John Bourke at my side!” Strahorn replied.
“You sure you won’t come on to Laramie with us?”
“No, I’m sure,” the reporter said. “I’ve been wanting to see the Centennial Exposition back in Philadelphia, maybe write a story or two about it for the paper. They’ve got a presidential campaign going on right now too. Good chance for a reporter, you know. Been thinking about both of those things more and more ever since last winter. All through the blasted summer too.”
“Just make sure you don’t ask for any horse-meat steaks while you’re back there!” Donegan cheered, holding out his hand.
Strahorn took the Irishman’s in his, and they squeezed more than shook. Then, more quietly than he had been speaking before, the newsman said, “You’ll take care of yourself, won’t you? I mean, now that I’m not going to be around, Seamus?”
“You watch yourself back
Strahorn smiled and clapped a hand on the tall man’s shoulder. “Likely I have picked up some damned crude manners, indeed—what with spending the last half a year with you, Irishman!”
Pushing their jaded horses and captured ponies as fast as they dared, the general and his men rode long into the evening before halting to graze the horses and grab a little sleep.
They were back in the saddle before sunrise on 23 September, reaching the camp of Ranald S. Mackenzie’s escort from the Fourth Cavalry that Saturday night. Having left most of his troops behind at Camp Robinson until Wesley Merritt could bring down the Fifth Cavalry to take over the task of disarming the Sioux at Red Cloud, the colonel was already on his way to Fort Laramie, called there to meet with Sheridan and Crook.
Together, the three of them would plan the prosecution of the Sioux War into that fall, even unto the winter if necessary, hoping to bring a resolution to the thorny “Indian problem.”
Some time after supper that evening, Donegan made his way to the leadership fire. In that ring of cheery light he recognized a few familiar faces, then carefully measured the back of a tall officer who was talking and laughing with Captain Randall.
Seamus stepped up and said, “General Mackenzie?”
The handsome soldier turned. “Yes?”
Holding out his hand, Donegan pressed on. “You probably don’t remember me, but—”
“Irishman!” Mackenzie bellowed, grabbing Donegan’s hand and pumping it vigorously with his own right hand that was missing some fingers. “By glory—I sure as hell do remember you!”
Proud and startled at the same time, Seamus said, “I wasn’t sure you would, General.”
The colonel put his hand to his cheek. “You don’t look quite the same as you did.”
Touching his own cheek, Seamus said, “Oh, this? With winter coming it won’t be long and I’ll have that full beard back what I wore that campaign down on the Staked Plain.”
“You might look a bit older—but we all do! I can’t believe you’d think for one minute I wouldn’t remember
Crook got to his feet and came to stand at the taller Mackenzie’s shoulder. “You mean this reprobate really was with you when you flushed Quanah Parker’s Comanche into that miserable winter?”
“When we butchered more than fourteen hundred of their ponies,” the colonel replied.
“Settlers down that way in the Panhandle talked about that for a long time after,” Donegan said as the four correspondents crowded up to listen in.
Mackenzie asked, “So what are you doing here? When did you show up?”
“This evening, with General Crook, sir.”
Mackenzie glanced at his superior. “Do you have Donegan serving you as a scout?”
With a nod the general answered, “From time to time he’s made himself quite valuable. Quite valuable—all the way back to the mess Reynolds made of things on the Powder River last March. Yes, this Irishman’s served me admirably.”
