Fifty Years on the Old Frontier

As Cowboy, Hunter, Guide, Scout, and Ranchman

James H. Cook

• Publisher: Papamoa Press
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9781789123043
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Military & Maritime History
• Index: History

Of all that has been written of the cowboy and the life of the cattle range, very little has been written by the principal actors themselves. The same is equally true of the famous government scouts, mail riders and other adventurous figures, who were men of deeds rather than words. Not many possessed, like David Crockett and W. F. Cody, the power to dramatize themselves. James H. Cook, the author of Fifty Years on the Old Frontier, first published in 1923, was, however, a genuine cowboy, and he was able to recount in a most readable way his adventures over half a century. During the Seventies and part of the Eighties he rode the ranges in Texas and New Mexico. A vivid account is to be found in the first part of the book of the life of the cattlemen in the Southwest, including such details as rounding up entirely wild cattle and horses, and the conveying of droves of animals hundreds of miles through extremely rough, Indian-infested territory. Those who desire thrills can find them here. The author served as government scout in the campaign against Geronimo in 1885, and later, in the North, saw much of the unfortunate troubles with the Sioux and the Cheyennes, whom he showed to have been shamefully misused by the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Much space is given to the Sioux chief, Red Cloud, of whom Cook was a champion and faithful friend. Not the least entertaining parts of the book are the narratives of hunts after big game in the Rockies, during the years when Cook was one of the foremost guides and hunters of the regions bordering the one transcontinental railway.An invaluable addition to any Old West collection!

PART I—COW WADDIES AND CATTLE TRAILS TEXAS

MY early boyhood days were spent in southern Michigan, where I was born August 26, 1857. My mother having died when I was two years of age, my father, who was a seafaring man, placed me with a family named Titus. This family was one of the oldest and most respected in that country; its members had been raised after the severest models of order, industry, frugality, integrity, and every Christian virtue. Their highest aim in life was to try to prepare themselves, and those in their keeping, for the life to come.

I believe that no young person can ever escape from the impressive and controlling influences exerted on the bent of his future life and the formation of his character by those of superior years to whom he looks up with confidence and admiration. To the loving care and training of this noble family during my childhood days, I feel that I am indebted for whatever strength I have possessed in resisting some of the evils that have beset me as I have journeyed along over rugged trails.

Those were great days for a boy of my inclinations. I think the spirit of a hunter was in me at birth. The Titus family and most of their relatives and friends were pioneers of Michigan. The men took pride in their skill as marksmen. Hunting and trapping were their chief forms of recreation. Sturdy sons of the forest, they could swing the scythe or the grain-cradle from sunup to sundown. They were masters of the arts of the woods, being equally skilful with axe and rifle, and at home in a log canoe, spearing fish. (In those days it was considered almost a crime to spear a fish, no matter how fast it might be moving, in any spot but just behind the gills, or to shoot a squirrel anywhere but through the head.) At a very early age I was given instruction in the use of a muzzle-loading rifle. I was also taught a few things about the building and managing of a canoe, and how to trap for fur-bearing animals such as the fox, mink, otter, and muskrat.

At that time the passenger pigeons were very numerous in Michigan. Countless flocks of them would come at nesting-time and congregate at what were called “roosts.” When these birds were leaving the roosts in the morning for their feeding grounds, or returning in the evening, they would be so numerous as fairly to darken the sky. Vast numbers of them were caught in nets at these roosts by market hunters. The squabs were killed with clubs in countless thousands. Pigeon shooting was good within a radius of many miles of these roosts for anyone who owned or could borrow a “scatter-gun.” I was not very expert with the old musket of which I had the use when I wanted to shoot pigeons, for the recoil of that ancient firearm was something of which I could stand but a few doses.

The passenger pigeon has disappeared from view, I saw quite large flocks of them in the timber of the Indian Territory (now Oklahoma) in 1874 and 1875. In 1882 I am quite sure that I saw seven of them on the west side of the continental divide, in Grant County, New Mexico. I should have been able to recognize a bird that had been such a common sight to me as a boy, for I think I was, even at the age of my earliest hunting days, a fairly close observer of every creature with which I came in contact.

To the men who in those days instructed me in marksmanship—my most noted accomplishment as well as one of the most useful assets of my life—I am greatly indebted.

I had other creatures besides pigeons upon which to test my skill in shooting. Black, gray, and fox squirrels were very numerous, and a few wild turkeys still roamed the woods about my neighborhood.

Occasionally someone who had been over the trails to California would return to Michigan with wonderful stories about the West and Southwest. Their tales filled me with a desire to see the country of big game and wild Indians. I had a chum about my own age who was as fond of hunting as myself; and we had no trouble getting our heads together and planning a western trip, saving the money which we could earn, or which was given to us. We went to Leavenworth, Kansas. At a hotel there we met some cattlemen, who told us that the best way to see the West was to get work with some cow outfit and go to Texas. The best place to “get broke in,” they said, was in either Sedgwick or Sumner County, Kansas. Going thither, we secured work as herders with a bunch of beef cattle that were to be held near old Fort Harker. After working with these cattle for a couple of months, my chum decided to remain in that country. But, an opportunity presenting itself, I went to southwestern Texas with some cowboys who had brought a herd of cattle up from that country to Kansas, and who were then about to make the return journey. I had purchased a fine Comanche pony at Fort Harker for $15 and a good second-hand Texas saddle for $5. I had traded a pistol brought from Michigan for a Spencer carbine, and was therefore fixed for the journey.

I saw some of the West before we reached our destination. We trailed leisurely, and I had a good chance to see wild Indians, buffalo, cowboys, freighters, stage drivers, emigrants, whiskey peddlers, desperadoes, and about all that moved in the regions through which we traveled. On this trip I learned, too, something about the details of roughing it. We had no tents or bed tarpaulins or sleeping bags; not even a “blow bed,” or pneumatic mattress, such as some people who ˙”rough it” nowadays use. A “Tucson bed” was quite a common thing on that trip, and on many a trip thereafter. As some readers may not know what a “Tucson bed” is, I will explain that it is made by lying on your stomach and covering that with your back. It was allowable to put your saddle and saddle-blanket over your head, should you happen to have such articles with you, when any hailstones larger than hens’ eggs came along.

Soon after starting on this long ride, we reached what was called the “Cross Timber” of the Indian Territory. Here we saw a few buffalo, wild turkeys, and deer in abundance. This timber was a sort of scrub oak or black jack. We saw plenty of Indians all the way through the Indian Territory, or “Nation,” as it was also called, but we had no trouble with them. A guard was kept on our horses day and night; for walking never was considered good form by cowpunchers. The journey through Texas, as far south as San Antonio, was interesting to me in many ways, but not exciting.

When we reached San Antonio I found a city that did both interest and excite me. I had heard of the Alamo, and it was one of the first places I visited. Soon after my arrival in San Antonio I was fortunate enough to meet one of the most noted frontiersmen of Texas—Captain or, as he was commonly called, “Bigfoot” Wallace. He told me the history of the fight at the Alamo. When he recounted how that little band of fearless men died, fighting against about as long odds as the greatest warriors of earth could desire, the brave old veteran became fired with enthusiasm; and certainly he had me excited to the point of thinking that those heroes of the Alamo were the greatest men who ever lived, except, perhaps, Ethan Allen or Daniel Boone.

Captain Wallace was a giant in stature. He had gone through some thrilling and awful experiences during his earlier years, and was still, at the time I first met him, capable of doing considerable damage to an enemy. We became friends, and about a year later he presented me with one of the best of his three-year-old colts. He was raising some good horses of the kind most needed at that time in Texas.

Meeting John Longworth, one of old Ben Slaughter’s caporals or foremen, I secured employment from him. I was to go with him out to the Frio and Nueces rivers country and help catch wild cattle, just as soon as Longworth should go broke playing Spanish monte and drinking whiskey. In the meantime I took in the sights of San Antonio. The old “Green Front” and the Jack Harris Variety theaters and dance halls were running full blast, and every night found them packed with the hard riders from the cattle ranges, as well as with other gentry. Gambling halls, where the ceiling was the limit to the amount one could bet on the turn of a card, were numerous and well patronized. Everyone seemed to have money that he wanted to get rid of. Being a tenderfoot or “shorthorn” kid in that country, I could only look on and enjoy the excitement among the people with whom I had chosen to cast my lot. While waiting for Longworth I also rode out to San Pedro Springs and down the San Antonio River a few miles, enjoying the beauty of the country—to me, a new and interesting world. There was no railroad in San Antonio at that time, but a line was reaching out toward it.

Before many days Mr. Longworth went broke, and was sick enough to want to get out of town. In San Antonio he had hired several riders, all Mexicans except myself. All of us started out together, taking with us some pack ponies loaded with provisions and a few cooking utensils. Longworth could speak Spanish fluently. I did not understand a word of the conversation as we rode along, but I became very familiar with the expression “San Antonio Querido” (“dear San Antonio”), for it was repeated many times in a song that seemed to please the rest of the party and was sung quite frequently. Longworth appeared rather surly to me, and I soon found out that he was a vicious, dangerous man, but a good vaquero, or brush runner, when it came to catching wild cattle.

In about four days we reached the ranch home of Ben Slaughter, father of Charlie, Billy, and John Slaughter, later the big cattle drovers on the Texas trail to Kansas. We made camp a little distance from the ranch house.

After a while a little old man walked down from the house to our camp. He wore a belt filled with Henry rifle cartridges, and the handle of a big butcher knife was sticking out of one of his boot-tops. Thinking that he was some old Mexican, I used about all the Spanish I had learned from Longworth on our way out from San Antonio, trying to say “Good evening” to him. When I was through with my efforts to speak a couple of Spanish words, he looked me over for a moment and said, “Yes, this is a mighty pretty evenin’.” He then began to talk to Longworth, using both Spanish and English. I soon discovered that this man was none other than Ben Slaughter himself, who was now my employer. I had a talk with him that evening, and he told me he would pay me $2 a month more than the Mexicans he employed. My wages were to be $10 a month; he paid the Mexicans $8. Board was included; so that all I had to do was to earn my money.

Very early the next morning, while the stars were yet shining, as if to help the fire make our coffee, we were astir. I had no more idea what my work was to be like than a pig has about watch-making; but I did know how to eat my breakfast of broadside pork and corn bread. When this meal was dispatched Longworth and two or three of the Mexicans rode to a pasture a short distance away and brought in a bunch of about forty or fifty saddle horses. All hands now went to the corral into which the animals had been driven, and Longworth selected one for me to ride. He pointed out three or four others that were also to be mine to use. He also selected each Mexican’s mounts. I looked mine over very carefully, so as to know them when I saw them again.

Longworth now threw his lasso on the pony he had first selected for me, and told me to saddle up, as we were to go after a beef which was to be butchered. I saddled my pony. When I tightened the cinch the pony jumped into the air and tried to turn cartwheels. I felt a little lump in my throat about the size of a piece of chalk, but after a time I managed to get into the saddle. He proved to be a good cow horse, but an awful bluffer to a stranger. I certainly was glad when he trotted off without trying to “sun my moccasins.” The Mexicans, who were expert riders and ropers, had little trouble with their mounts.

When we were all ready we entered a pasture, rounded up fifty or seventy-five head of cattle, and drove them to camp. These cattle were not what would have been called gentle in any part of the United States save western Texas. They had been separated from the wild herds, and were “gentle” to just the extent of having become accustomed to the sight of a man on horseback, so that they could be controlled to a certain extent by riders. They all belonged to the Spanish longhorn breed. It required but little to frighten them into a rage that knew no bounds when they were brought to bay. Longworth told me that this was to be our decoy herd. What that meant I did not then know.

Longworth now drew a rifle from the scabbard on his saddle and started to look the cattle over for a fat one. In the meantime Mr. Slaughter had mounted a horse and come out where we were herding the cattle. He rode close to me and said, “What’s the matter? Can’t John find a fat one?”

Just at that moment I observed a fine fat heifer coming along the edge of the herd. I pulled the Spencer carbine which I was carrying, pointed it toward the animal (not intending to shoot unless he told me to), and exclaimed, “There is a good one.” Mr. Slaughter started his horse toward me, fairly yelling, “Hold on, young man; don’t you see that’s a T-Diamond?”

“Yes,” I replied. “What brand is that?”

“I reckon that’s my brand,” was the answer. “We don’t kill that kind in this country. Kill an L O W or a W B G”—meaning anyone’s brand but his own. “They taste better.”

By this time Longworth had selected a beef that suited him. He fired, but failed to kill it. He fired another shot or two, but only succeeded in further wounding the animal. The herd by this time was milling around, badly frightened. One of the Mexicans threw his rope on the animal as it came near him, and started his horse on a run for the purpose of throwing the wounded beast down. When his horse came to the end of the rope, the strain was too great and it snapped, giving the beef an awful jerk. The animal was now thoroughly infuriated, and as it happened at the moment to be headed toward Mr. Slaughter and myself, it charged us. I had not thought such a thing would occur. Acting on impulse, and being probably somewhat excited, I snatched my carbine from my saddle and, when the steer was within six feet of me, shot it in the center of the forehead, killing it instantly. Mr. Slaughter was trying to spur his old pony out of harm’s way, but when he saw the result of my shot he turned, saying, “I reckon you’ll do to help fight the Comanches.” I was pretty proud of my shot, although it was more good luck than anything else.

After the animal was dressed out and such portions of the meat as were desired had been hung up in the mesquite trees near camp, and after the cattle herd had been returned to the corral, we proceeded to put in the rest of the day making hobbles for our saddle horses. They were manufactured from fresh beef hide. This was new work to me; but it was not many months before I could work up rawhide into saddle rigging, ropes, quirts, and reins, doing all sorts of knot-tying and braiding or plaiting. My Mexican instructors were all very kind to me. It was not long before I had picked up a little of their language, especially such words as pertained to the work in which we were employed. The Mexicans seemed to derive pleasure from trying to teach me.

I learned a few things during that day. One of them was that, on account of the plenitude of cattle and because the climate was too warm for meat to keep longer than a day or two, only the most desirable parts were used. I have helped kill many cattle just to get their ribs and hides. It was a common thing to kill a beef each day in a cow camp. The meat was generally cooked by thrusting long green pointed sticks through it, sticking one end into the earth, and broiling the meat over a good bed of mesquite or live oak coals.

I began to realize that I was now on the frontier, sure enough. Everybody went armed to the teeth at all hours. No man removed more than his coat or brush jacket when he lay down to sleep. There was danger on all sides, and from many sources. Light sleeping soon became a habit. Nobody had more than one bed blanket, but such as we did have were generally good, strong, hard-woven ones of Mexican manufacture.

When in San Antonio I had purchased at a pawnshop a very fancy bowie knife of great weight. On its blade was engraved this inscription: “Never draw me without cause, nor sheathe me without honor.” I must have been a fit subject to take up the spirit of the times quickly, for as I lay in that camp, waiting for the hour to come when we should start out after wild cattle, I wondered who, or what, would be the first victim of that wondrous blade. I don’t think I was at all bloodthirsty, but I felt that, should man or beast attempt to secure my scalp-lock, I would do my best to protect it.

I had succeeded in transplanting myself from a state where the people—good citizens who loved God and nature—had accepted and, as a rule, lived up to the Ten Commandments; where, when trouble arose between men, it seldom was carried to a point beyond a fist-fight. But in the section of country which I had now entered, different conditions and codes prevailed. The War of the Rebellion, then so recent, had caused numerous men who had survived it, and who had committed all sorts of desperate crimes, to seek refuge in the wilds of the land of chaparral and cactus, where the strong arm of the law seldom entered, and where, when it did, the refugee would be apt to have a little the best of it. A majority of the ranchmen in the country preferred aiding a white refugee to helping bring him to justice. This preference sprang from a motive of self-protection, for the enmity of such characters was a most dangerous thing. As there was in that section but little employment other than working with stock, naturally these men took up the life of the cowboy—when their time was not occupied dodging State Rangers or robbing stages and small settlements. Almost every dispute had to be settled with a gun-or knife-fight or else assassination. Such people, added to thieving bands of Mexicans and Indians, wild beasts of many sorts, and other terrors such as centipedes, tarantulas, and rattlesnakes, were a help in making life interesting for the “pore little mite from Michigan.”

Sitting around the fires in those cow camps, I heard many a tale of adventure and the experiences of numerous ex-Confederate soldiers. Among these story-tellers were members of the band who had fought...

Table of contents

• Title page
• TABLE OF CONTENTS
• DEDICATION
• PREFACE
• LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
• INTRODUCTION
• PART I-COW WADDIES AND CATTLE TRAILS TEXAS
• PART II-HUNTING BIG GAME WYOMING
• PART III-THE APACHE WAR NEW MEXICO
• SUPPLEMENTARY CHAPTER-THE AGATE SPRINGS FOSSIL BEDS
• REQUEST FROM THE PUBLISHER