On the north side of
the Platte River there was a distance of three hundred miles where there
were no roads or settlements. There was plenty of good grass on the north
side, owing to there being no travel, and for that reason Arthur Lewis
went down the north side and camped, June 3, 1867, across from the Spring
Hill ranch, twelve miles below Mr. Coburn's ranch. Mr. Coburn tells the
following story about their fight with Chief Eagle Claw:
One of
our cows had run away, and I went down to the Spring Hill ranch after it.
I stayed for dinner, then immediately afterwards started home. I had gone
about three miles when I rode over a ridge, and looking across the river,
I saw nine horsemen riding towards Lewis' wagon and oxen. I rode back to
the ranch and asked Mr Freal: "Are there any soldiers out from the fort?"
He said he did not know of any. I got my glasses and looked at the
horsemen and discovered that they were Indians, coming down from the
bluffs toward the wagons, and we realized at once there was going to be an
attack. Arthur Lewis had left the wagon and was somewhere around the
ranch. I found him and showed the Indians to him and asked if there was
any one with the wagons. He said, "Yes, I left a young fellow, George
Teal, over there."
Fight
with Eagle Claw
"Did you leave any guns or ammunition in the wagon?" I asked him.
"Yes, seven guns and plenty of ammunition."
There were eight men
and myself at the ranch, and I suggested that we take the boat and cross
over to Teal's assistance. The others all hesitated, and then began to
make excuses. They couldn't all leave the ranch, and some couldn't swim,
in case the boat should tip over, were some of their excuses.
By
this time I was getting vexed with them and said, "I believe you fellows
are all cowards and afraid to go. I know it is a risky business and all
that, but we can't stand here and watch the Indians get that man without
us taking a chance to help him. I am going; is anyone coming with me?"
Tom Fought, who used to work for me and was in several hard fights
with me, and Henry Freal spoke up, "Take the lead, Coburn; we will follow
you."
The river was high and running swift, so we towed the boat
up stream quit a distance, that we might be able to land on the opposite
bank with the wagon between us and the Indians. Tom rowed the boat, Henry
steered it, and I sat with my rifle ready in case it would be necessary to
use it.
In the meantime, Teal had seen the Indians approaching and
got in the covered wagon, tied the canvass sheets together at both ends,
loaded up his seven guns and waited for them. When they began to fire at
the wagons, Teal just peppered it back into them. The Indians, seeing that
they had a harder proposition than they expected, sent a runner back to
their camp for more warriors.
The current was so swift, it was
taking us below the wagon, and before long the Indians caught sight of us
and left the wagon and ran down the bank, waiting for us to get in rifle
range, then fire into us. When we were nearing the bank, I saw an Indian
with a rifle, that looked about nine feet long to me just then, and he was
leveling it in our direction, so I told the boys to drop flat in the boat,
and just as I started to drop, crack! went that rifle, and the bullet
grazed across my temple. I dropped into the river. I was stunned several
minutes and when I gradually came to myself, I was standing in water waist
deep and holding onto my rifle, which was also standing in the water. I
looked around and saw the boat drifting down stream, and as I was
collecting my thoughts as to how I got there, the accident came to my mind
and I said to myself, "Well, you have been shot, but where?" and while
looking for the bullet hole, I happened to look up and saw an Indian
hiding behind a rock, loading a gun. I thought, "Old fellow, I'll just
beat you to it." I took my gun out of the river, poured the water out of
it and had it ready, so just as I saw the Indian edge around the rock and
that nine-foot gun aimed at me, I fired. The Indian turned a somersault
and limped away. The boys in the boat looked around and I motioned them to
pull ashore. One of them landed and the other came back after me. We then
got under the bank and taking the boat with us, started toward the wagon.
As the Indians saw they could not get to us while we were under the bank,
they hurried back to the wagon, intending to get Teal and raid the wagon
before we got there. By this time fourteen more Indians had come down from
their camp, and a runner had been sent for still more, so their number was
increased to fifty-eight, while there were only four of us.
Teal
could not imagine what the commotion was outside, as he could not see out,
and never once thought that it was someone coming to his aid, since he
knew there was no white man for a hundred miles on that side of the river,
and he did not think anyone would dare to cross the river when it was so
high, and a mob of Indians waiting for them to land. When he heard the
Indians returning to the wagon he peeped out and saw us back of him near
the bank. He jumped from his hiding place and joined us. We had got there
just in time, for he had only three cartridges left, and in another five
minutes the Indians would have had him.
We kept up a pitched fight
for quite a while, when it died down a little and we had time to look
around, we noticed one Indian with the long rifle, making his way to the
bank. He was out of rifle reach, so all we could do was to keep watch on
him. I surmised that his intention was to get under the bank, crawl up and
let our boat downstream and leave us without any means of getting back to
the ranch, then while the others held our attention in front, he would
pick us off one at a time. While we were watching the Indian and talking
about his intentions the other Indians had fallen back to council.
Suddenly they charged down on us, yelling and shooting. For ten or fifteen
minutes they took our entire attention and when we had a chance to look
for the Indian whom we had seen making his way to the river, he had
disappeared. About two hundred yards below us was a sharp bend in the
bank. I thought he might be hiding back of that until the others could
make another charge, then he could get up back of us. I said, "Boys, watch
in the grass below here for him and keep an eye on the others; I am going
to get under the bank, take my chances and meet that Indian at the turn
and see if I can't head him off."
I managed to drop over the bank
unseen, and crawled to the turn. I then stopped to load my gun, and
crouched down, ready to spring, but he did not come, and as I did not want
to waste any time, I leaped around the turn, thinking that I would take
him at a disadvantage and get the drop on him. But he wasn't there. I
cautiously peeped up over the bank and saw a black head raised up out of a
buffalo wallow (a place where the buffalo have pawed out a hole to catch
rain water in) a short distance away. Before I could shoot, it dropped out
of sight. Again it raised up and took a glance toward the wagon, as though
measuring the distance, then dropped down in the grass. I leveled my rifle
over the bank and waited. Suddenly he sprang out of the wallow with his
gun to his shoulder, aimed at one of the boys back of the wagon, who was
unaware of his danger and busy watching the Indians in front. By the time
the Indian was on his feet, I fired and he fell. To be sure that he was
dead, I leaped up the bank with knife in my hand, and started for him. At
the same time Tom came running from the wagon and said, "That is my
Indian." We looked for the bullets and mine struck him square and went
clear through, while Tom's hit him on the left wrist just where it was
bent in holding the barrel of the rifle, and as the Indian was turned
sideways toward Tom, the bullet went on into the left side of his chest
and lodged against the skin on the right shoulder. The boys had followed
my advice, and Tom watched in the grass, while George and Henry stood off
those in front.
The Indian we killed was Eagle Claw, and when the
others saw that their chief was dead, refused to fight any more and went
to their camp. The Indian camp was about a half mile from the wagon and I
watched them through my glasses, and saw they had three dead and eight
wounded. Fearing they might come down in the night and attack again, we
decided to make them leave entirely.
George Teal and Henry Freal
remained at the wagon, so if the Indians should surround us they could
break the ring. Tom Fought and I went toward the camp and on the way we
picked up two buffalo heads and took them with us. When we got within
rifle range, we laid down in a wallow and placed the heads in front of us
and opened fire into the camp. The Indians would not return the shots, but
threw their dead and wounded across the ponies and left camp just as it
was. We got all the buffalo robes, blankets and trinkets that the boat
would hold. We took a large eagle claw, that was on a string of beads,
from around the chief's neck, two five cent pieces that were fastened in
his ears with brass rings and a large brass ring out of his nose. He had a
bag on a string around his neck that they called a medicine bag, and
believed that it would protect him from all harm. We opened the bag just
to see what was in it, and found it full of a baby's hair. We loaded the
boat and crossed back to the Spring Hill ranch just at sunset.
The
stage route passed the ranch and on this day the stage was going by as we
were fighting, and stopped for four hours watching us. The passengers not
being used to such sights, were awfully excited. Among them was a son of
Jefferson C. Davis, and he wrote back to his father a description of the
fight and termed the frontiersmen as barbarians and called the Indians
those poor abused people. There was good excuse for him, for at that time
he was what we called a tenderfoot, and if he stayed out west very long he
would soon learn. But his lesson came sooner than we had expected. The
morning following our fight, as the stage was going on to Moore's place,
it was attacked by the Indians and one of the leaders of the six horse
team was killed and Davis' son was shot in the groin, and for two months
we did not expect to see him get well. The Indians changed his mind for
him concerning themselves, and he wrote another letter to his father about
the cruel savages and the brave frontiersmen. A letter entirely different
from the first.
Some of the Pioneers of Colorado
Source: True History of some of the Pioneers of Colorado, by Miss
Luella Shaw, Press of Carson Harper Co, Denver, Colorado, 1909 |
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