The first night out
they made Pueblo. Sometime in the night forty horses were stolen. In the
morning Shaw sent an escort on with the other horses, while he and Ad.
Williamson went to look for the missing ones.
Shaw and Williamson
traced the horses up the Little Fountain. After proceeding a few miles,
they came upon a Mexican in a thicket of willows. When Shaw questioned him
in regard to the missing horses and asked if he had seen any stray ones,
the Mexican would answer, "No savy, senor, no savy." The deputy marshal
being familiar with the bluffs and deceiving qualities of the Mexicans,
thought he not only fully understood the question but also knew the
whereabouts of the horses, so he used a stronger method. Turning to
Williamson, he said, "Ad., shoot that Mexican; see if he can savy that."
The Mexican undoubtedly did, for he raised his hands and said, "No
shootie me, no shootie me."
"Can you tell us where the horses
are*?"
"Look in the brush," and the Mexican pointed farther up the
creek. They followed his advice and found the horses tied in the willows.
Shaw sent Williamson on with the horses to overtake the others while he
went scouting. He came upon a camp of Ute Indians and stopped there all
night. The Indians took a fancy to the scalps he had taken at the Sand
Creek fight, so when he was leaving the next morning he gave them the
scalps to show his appreciation of the hospitality they had extended to
him. The Ute Indians were a peaceful band and feared the others as much as
the settlers did. After riding all day he joined the command and the
escort with the horses that same night in Colorado City.
Before
leaving Pueblo, Major Bowan began drinking. Arriving in Colorado City
where more liquor was available, he started in on a good spree. Colonel
Chivington noticed the condition he was in and took him upstairs and
locked him in his room.
The shrewd Major upon finding himself
locked in and his booze all gone, took his sword and unscrewed the door
latch.
The soldiers sleeping near the stairway were disturbed by
the clink, clink of a sword as it went thumping over the steps. The Major
made several trips up to his room carrying the glasses and bottles from
the cellar and had a midnight spree all by himself. Next morning he
stopped at the head of the stairs, looking down to the soldiers below,
said in a very eloquent style that only a practised lawyer or orator could
use, "What would Mrs. Bowan say if she saw me now? Would it be, 'There
comes that old Bowan drunk again'?" Then more emphatically, "No, never,
but instead, 'there comes my dearly beloved husband."
The command
left that morning to cross the divide, the horses waiting a day longer in
Colorado City to give the command a chance to get across before crowding
upon them.
The snow was so deep in the mountains that it seemed at
first impossible to get over the divide. But with the cavalry horses
plunging through the snow and the cannon and wagons ploughing along behind
them, they finally succeeded in arriving in Denver about the first of the
year, where they received their discharge papers, and the hundred day
volunteers went back to their homes and farms with a stronger assurance
that in the future they could till their lands and build up their homes
without so great a fear of violence from the Indians.
After the
command was safe over the divide, Shaw started across with the horses.
They only got up to Mrs. Culberinie's place the first day. The horses were
weak and could not travel far at a time. There were four large fine mules
in the bunch that Shaw took quite a fancy to, so he hid them out and
intended to return for them, but someone else admired those same mules.
When Shaw went to get them, he only found a note saying, "I will see you
later." But we can be sure he never did.
Mrs. Culberinie had shown
such kindness to the escort and gave them such a welcome that upon leaving
Shaw presented her daughter, Hersey, with a little pinto pony that the
girl had become so attached to.
When the volunteers were called
out, Governor Evans had issued a proclamation allowing the soldiers to
keep the trophies they captured from the Indians. Shaw remembered this and
took advantage of it, so when he arrived in Denver he had eighty-four left
out of the seven hundred horses, from these he kept a pair of little pinto
ponies and one little white one for himself. Later he gave the pinto team
to Major Downing who sent them east.
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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