USA > Colorado > El Paso County > The Indians of the Pike's peak region > Part 4
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This valley is still frequented by these Indians as a summer haunt, when the heat of the plains renders them uncomfortable. The Utes were scouring it when we passed. Our guide informed us that the Utes reside on both sides of the mountains,-that they are continually migrating from one side to the other,-that they speak the Spanish language,-that some few half-breeds have embraced the Catholic faith,-that the remainder yet hold the simple and sublime faith of their forefathers, in the existence of one great, creating, and sustaining Cause, mingled
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with the belief in the ghostly visitations of their de- ceased Medicine Men, or Diviners; that they number one thousand families.
He also stated that the Cheyennes were less brave and more thievish than any of the other tribes living on the plains.
Farnham's description of the incantations practiced by the Utes is in the main probably true; the information on which it was based was doubtless obtained from his guide.
Ruxton tells of the use of the trail west of the present town of Monument by a war-party of Arapahoes on their way to the South Park to fight the Utes. In the night the band had sur- prised a small company of trappers on the head of Bijou Creek, killing four of them and capturing all of their horses. The following morning two of the trappers, one of whom was slightly wounded, started in pursuit of the Indians, intending if possible to recover their animals. They followed the trail of the Indians to a point in the neighbor- hood of the present town of Monument where they found that the band had divided, the larger party, judging from the direction taken, evidently intending to enter the mountains by way of Ute Pass. The other party, having all the loose ani- mals, started across the mountains by the pass to
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the west of Monument, probably hoping to get the better of the Utes by coming in from two different directions. The trappers followed the latter party across the first mountains where they found their stolen animals in charge of three Indians. The trappers surprised and killed all three of them, recaptured their animals, and then hurried on to the Utes, giving such timely warning as enabled them to defeat the Arapahoes in a very decisive manner.
The battles in the South Park and on the plains between the contending tribes were seldom of a very sanguinary nature. If the attacking Indians happened to find their enemies on level ground, they would circle around them just out of gunshot at first, gradually coming closer, all the time lying on the outside and shooting from under the necks of their ponies. These ponies were gener- ally the best that the tribe afforded and were not often used except for purposes of war. While engaged in battle, the Indians seldom used saddles, and in place of bridles had merely a piece of plaited buffalo-hide rope, tied around the under jaw of the pony. If the defending party was located in a fairly good defensive position, the battle consisted of groups of the attacking party dashing in, firing, and then dashing out again.
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This was kept up until a few warriors had been killed or wounded and a few scalps had been taken; then the battle was over, one side or the other retreating. With an Indian, it was a waste of time to kill an enemy unless his scalp was taken, as that was the evidence necessary to prove the prowess of the warrior. Engagements of the kind I have mentioned have occurred in almost every valley in and around the South Park at some time during the hundreds of years of warfare that was carried on in that region.
Frémont, on his return trip from California, during his second exploring expedition, crossed the Rocky Mountains by way of Middle Park, then across South Park, reaching the Arkansas River near the present town of Cañon City. On his way through the South Park he witnessed one of these battles, in describing which he says:
In the evening a band of buffalo furnished a little excitement by charging through our camp. On the following day we descended the stream by an excellent buffalo trail along the open grassy bottom of the river. On our right, the Bayou was bordered by a mountain- ous range crested with rocky and naked peaks, and below it had a beautiful parklike character of pretty, level prairies, interspersed among low spurs, wooded openly with pine and quaking asps, contrasting well with the denser pines which swept around on the
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mountainous sides. Descending always the valley of the stream, towards noon we descried a mounted party descending the point of a spur, and judging them to be Arapahoes-who, defeated or victorious, were equally dangerous to us, and with whom a fight would be inevitable-we hurried to post ourselves as strongly as possible on some willow islands in the river. We had scarcely halted when they arrived, proving to be a party of Ute women, who told us that on the other side of the ridge their village was fighting with the Arapahoes. As soon as they had given us this information, they filled the air with cries and lamen- tations, which made us understand that some of their chiefs had been killed.
Extending along the river directly ahead of us was a low piny ridge, leaving between it and the stream a small open bottom on which the Utes had very injudiciously placed their village, which, according to the women, numbered about three hundred warriors. Advancing in the cover of the pines, the Arapahoes, about daylight, charged into the village, driving off a great number of their horses, and killing four men, among them the principal chief of the village. They drove the horses perhaps a mile beyond the village to the end of a hollow where they had previously forted at the edge of the pines. Here the Utes had instantly attacked them in turn, and, according to the report of the women, were getting rather the best of the day. The women pressed us eagerly to join with their people, and would immediately have provided us with the best horses at the village, but it was not for us to interfere in such a conflict. Neither party were our friends or under our protection, and each was ready to prey upon us that could. But we could not help feel-
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ing an unusual excitement at being within a few hundred yards of a fight in which five hundred men were closely engaged, and hearing the sharp cracks of their rifles. We were in a bad position and subject to be attacked in it. Either party which we might meet, victorious or defeated, was certain to fall upon us, and gearing up immediately, we kept close along the pines of the ridge, having it between us and the village, and keeping the scouts on the summit to give us notice of the approach of the Indians. As we passed by the village which was immediately below us, horsemen were galloping to and fro, and groups of people were gathered around those who were wounded and dead and who were being brought in from the field.
We continued to press on, and crossing another fork which came in from the right, after having made fifteen miles from the village, fortified ourselves strongly in the pines a short distance from the river.
During the afternoon Pike's Peak had been plainly in view before us and from our encampment bore north 87° east by compass. This was a familiar object, and it had for us the face of an old friend. At its foot were the springs where we had spent a pleasant day in coming out.
In 1859, a battle between the Utes on the one side, and the Cheyennes, Arapahoes, and Sioux on the other, was fought six miles north of Colorado City, in the valley now occupied by the Modern Woodmen's Home. There were several hundred warriors on each side and the battle was of unusual
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duration, continuing for almost an entire day. The Utes were finally victorious and drove their enemies back to the plains.
Until 1864, every spring after the white settlers came into this region, war-parties of Cheyennes, Arapahoes, and Sioux would come trailing in from the plains, pass through Colorado City, stopping long enough to beg food from the families living near the line of their march and then go on to the soda springs; here they would tarry long enough to make an offering to the Great Spirit who was supposed to be manifest in the bubbling waters, and then follow, in single file, up the Ute Pass trail into the South Park, where they would scout around until they had found a band of Utes. If they succeeded in surprising the latter, they would probably come back with a lot of extra ponies and sometimes with captured squaws and children, in which case they would exhibit a jubilant air; but at other times on their return, they would present such a dejected appearance that one could readily surmise that they had suffered defeat. These annual visits were discontinued after the tribes became involved in warfare with the whites.
Referring again to the mineral springs at Mani- tou, I quote from Col. R. B. Marcy, of the United States Army, who, with his command, camped
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there during the whole of the month of April, 1858. He tells not only of the springs and the game of that neighborhood, but of a frightful snowstorm that delayed them, near Eastonville in El Paso County, for several days at the begin- ning of the following month. He says:
Having accomplished the objects of my mission to New Mexico, by procuring animals and other supplies sufficient to enable the troops at Fort Bridger to make an early march into Salt Lake Valley, I, on the 15th day of March, left Fort Union on my return for Utah, intending to pass around the eastern base of the mountains near Pike's Peak and the headwaters of the Arkansas and Platte rivers, following the Cherokee trail from the Cache la Poudre. The command was well organized, and we made rapid progress for about two hundred and fifty miles, when, on the 27th of March, I received an order from the General in Command in New Mexico, to halt and await rein- forcements. I was obliged to obey the order and went into camp upon the headwaters of a small tributary of the Arkansas, called Fontaine qui Bouille, directly at the foot of Pike's Peak and near a very peculiar spring which gives the name to the stream.
This beautiful fountain issues from the center of a basin, or rather bowl, about six feet in diameter, and throws out a column of water near the size of a man's arm. The receptacle, which is constantly filled but never runs over, seems to have been formed by the deposit of salts from the water, and is as perfectly symmetrical and round as if it had been cut
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out with a chisel. As the fountain is constantly playing and never overflows, it of course has a sub- terranean outlet. The most remarkable feature, however, in the Fontaine qui Bouille, is the peculiar taste of the water. It is pungent and sparkling and somewhat similar in taste to the water from the Con- gress spring at Saratoga, but sweeter, and to my palate pleasanter. We drank it every day in large quantities without perceiving any ill effect from it, and the men made use of it instead of yeast in raising their bread, which induced the belief that it contained soda or some other alkali.
The Indians believe it to possess some mysterious powers, the purport of which I could not learn, but there were a great many arrows, pieces of cloth, and other articles that they had deposited in the spring, probably as an offering to the Big Medicine Genius that presided over it. We remained at this place a month, during which time we amused ourselves in hunting elk, mountain sheep, and blacktail deer, all of which were very abundant in the surrounding country, and our larder was constantly supplied with the most delicious game.
I remember that one morning just at daybreak, I was awakened by my servant, who told me there was a large herd of elk in close proximity to the camp. I ran out as soon as possible and saw at least five hun- dred of these magnificent animals, drawn up in line like a troop of cavalry horses, with their heads all turned in the same direction, and from the crest of a high projecting cliff, looking in apparent wonder and bewilderment directly down upon us. It was to me a most novel and interesting spectacle. The noise made in the camp soon frightened them, however,
Ouray Chief of the Utes
A
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and they started for the mountains. They were pur- sued for some distance by our hunters, who succeeded in killing six before they escaped.
On the 30th day of April, our reinforcements having joined us, we gladly resumed our march for Utah, and at about one o'clock encamped upon the ridge that divides the Arkansas from the Platte rivers. The day was bright, cheerful, and pleasant, the atmosphere soft, balmy, and delightful. The fresh grass was about six inches high. The trees had put forth their new leaves and all nature conspired in giving evidence that the somber garb of winter had been cast aside for the more verdant and smiling attire of spring. Our large herds of animals were turned out to graze upon the tender and nutritious grass that everywhere abounded. Our men were enjoying their social jokes and pastimes after the fatigues of the day's march and everything indicated contentment and happiness. This pleasant state of things lasted until near sunset, when the wind suddenly changed into the north. It turned cold and soon commenced snowing violently, and continued to increase until it became a frightful winter tempest, filling the atmosphere with a dense cloud of driving snow, against which it was utterly impossible to ride or walk. Soon after the storm set in, one of our herds of three hundred horses and mules broke furi- ously away from the herdsmen who were guarding them, and in spite of their utmost efforts, ran at full speed directly with the wind for fifty miles before they stopped. Three of the herdsmen followed them as far as they were able, but soon became exhausted, bewildered, and lost on the prairie. One of them succeeded in finding his way back to camp in a state of great prostration and suffering. One of the others
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was found frozen to death in the snow, and the third was discovered crawling about upon his hands and knees in a state of temporary delirium, after the tempest subsided. This terrific storm exceeded in violence and duration anything of the kind our eldest mountaineer had ever beheld. It continued with uninterrupted fury for sixty consecutive hours and during this time it was impossible to move for any distance facing the wind and snow. One of our em- ployes who went out about two hundred yards from the camp, set out to return, but was unable to do so and perished in the attempt. Several antelope were found frozen upon the prairie after the storm.
At the termination of this frightful tempest, there was about three feet of snow upon the ground, but the warm rays of the sun soon melted it, and after collecting together our stampeded animals, we again set forward for Utah and on the third day following, struck the South Platte at its confluence with Cherry Creek. There was at that time but one white man living within one hundred and fifty miles of the place, and he was an Indian trader named Jack Audeby, on the Arkansas.
A year later, after the Pike's Peak mining excite- ment had started, Marcy issued a handbook for overland expeditions, in which he says, referring to a point at the mouth of Monument Creek, which he calls the forks of the Fontaine qui Bouille :
The road to Cherry Creek here leaves the Fontaine qui Bouille and bears to the right. There is a large
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Indian trail which crosses the main creek and takes a northwesterly course towards Pike's Peak. By going up this trail about two miles, a mineral spring will be found which gives the stream its name of "The Foun- tain that Boils." This spring, or rather these springs, for there are two, both of which boil up out of the solid rock, are among the greatest natural curiosities that I have ever seen. The water is strongly impreg- nated with salts, but is delightful to the taste and somewhat similar to the Congress water. It will well compensate one for the trouble of visiting it.
Marcy claims that while waiting at the mouth of Cherry Creek for a ferry-boat to be constructed to take them over the Platte River, which was very high at the time, one of his employees washed a small amount of gold dust from the sands of Cherry Creek. This employee was discharged soon after and went direct to St. Louis, where he told of his discovery, and Marcy claims that this was the beginning of the mining excitement in the Pike's Peak region. This is different from other versions of the event, the most probable of which is that the discovery of gold was first made by the semi-civilized Cherokee Indians on their way to California.
What was known as the old Cherokee trail came up the Arkansas River to a point about twelve miles below the mouth of the Fontaine qui Bouille. From that place it ran in a north-
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westerly direction across the hills, striking that creek about eight or ten miles above its mouth; thence up the valley of the Fontaine to a point near the present town of Fountain; turning northerly by the way of Jimmy's Camp to the head of Cherry Creek, and down Cherry Creek to its mouth, where Denver now stands. From this place, after running northerly along the base of the mountains for a considerable distance, it struck across the mountains through Bridger's Pass, and then turned westerly along the usual traveled road to California. This trail was used by the first gold-seeking parties which came to the present State of Colorado in 1858. The first of these parties arrived at Cherry Creek only about two months after Marcy left. The second party followed a week or two later, and the third party, of which Anthony Bott, of Colorado City, was a member, was close behind it. Members of this third party explored the region around where Colorado City now stands, and later, with some others, returned and laid out the town.
In 1859, occurred the memorable visit of Horace Greeley to the Pike's Peak region. He arrived in Denver, June 16th, having come by the Smoky Hill route. Writing from Denver, he says, among other things:
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I have been passing, meeting, observing, and trying to converse with Indians, almost ever since I crossed the Missouri River. Eastern Kansas is checkered with their reservations,-Delaware, Kaw, Ottawa, Osage, Kickapoo, Potawatamie, while the buffalo range and all this side belong to, and are parceled among the Cheyennes, the Arapahoes, and the Apaches, or perhaps among the two former only, as Indian boundaries are not well defined. At all events, we have met or passed bands of these three tribes, with occasional visitors from the Sioux on the north, and the Comanches on the south, all these tribes having for the present a good understanding. The Utes who inhabit the mountains are stronger and braver than any one of the three tribes first named, though hardly a match for them all, are at war with them. The Arapahoe Chief, Left Hand, assures me that his people were always at war with the Utes; at least he has no recollection, no tradition, of a time when they were at peace. Some two or three hundred lodges of Arapahoes are encamped in and about this log city, calculating that the presence of the whites will afford some protection to their wives and chil- dren against a Ute onslaught, while the braves are off on any of their fighting-that is stealing-expedi- tions. An equal or larger body of Utes are camped in the mountains some forty or fifty miles west, and the Arapahoe warriors recently returned in triumph from a war party on which they managed to steal about one hundred horses from the Utes, but were obliged to kill most of them in their rapid flight so that they only brought home forty more than they took away. They are going out again in a day or two, and have been for some days practicing secret in-
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cantations and public observances with reference thereto. Last midnight they were to have had a great war dance and to have left on the warpath to-day, but their men sent out after their horses reported that they saw three Utes on the plain, which was regarded as premonitory of an attack, and the braves stood to their arms all night and were very anxious for white aid in case of the Ute foray on their lodges here in Denver. Such an attack seems very improbable and I presume the three Utes who caused all this uproar were simply scouts or spies on the watch for just such marauding surprise parties as our Arapahoe neighbors are con- stantly meditating. I do not see why they need to take even this trouble. There are points on the mountain range west of this city, where a watchman with sharp eyes and a good glass could command the entire plain for fifty miles north, south, and east of him, and might hence give intelligence of any Arapahoe raid at leasta day before a brave entered themountains ; for though it is true that Indians on the warpath travel or ride mainly by night, I find that the Arapahoes do this only after they have entered on what they con- sider disputed or dangerous ground; that they start from their lodges in open day and only advance under cover of darkness after they are within the shadows of the mountains. Hence the Utes, who are con- fessedly the stronger, might ambush and destroy any Arapahoe force that should venture into their Rocky Mountain recesses, by the help of a good spy-glass and a little "white forecast"; but the Indians are children. Their arts, wars, treaties, alliances, habita- tions, crafts, properties, commerce, comforts, all be- long to the very lowest and rudest ages of human existence. Any band of schoolboys from ten to fif-
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teen years of age are quite as capable of ruling their appetites, devising and upholding a public policy, constituting and conducting a state or community, as the average Indian tribe.
I have learned to appreciate better than hitherto, and to make more allowance for the dislike, aversion, and contempt wherewith Indians are usually regarded by their white neighbors, and have been since the days of the Puritans. It needs but little familiarity with the actual, palpable aborigines, to convince anyone that the poetical Indian-the Indian of Cooper and Longfellow-is only visible to the poet's eye.
The Utes seldom visited Colorado City and the region round about in the early days, except in the winter, which was the only time they could do so with a fair degree of safety. A majority of the tribe had been on friendly terms with the English-speaking people from the time of their earliest contact with that race. It is true that straggling bands of Utes occasionally committed acts of depredation, and such bands on one or two occasions killed white people, but these acts were not approved by the majority of the tribe.
One of these exceptions occurred on Christmas day, 1854, at Fort Napesta, on the present site of the city of Pueblo. It is said that the men who occupied the fort were celebrating the day with the liquid that both cheers and inebriates, and in
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the midst of their jollity, a band of wandering Utes came by and was invited to join in the revelry. The Indians, nothing loath, partook of the white man's Taos lightning, the product of a distillery at Taos, New Mexico, and the natural consequence was an attack upon the whites which resulted in all the latter being killed.
In 1866, a small band of Utes began a raid upon the settlers on Huerfano Creek, but when the news reached Ouray, the head chief of the tribe, he sent runners out at once to warn the settlers and then went to the scene of action with a band of his faithful warriors. He soon afterwards took the hostile Indians prisoners and compelled them to go to Fort Garland and remain there, in this manner quickly ending the trouble. Ouray was always the friend of the whites, and is entitled to the very greatest credit for the able manner in which he held the Utes under control up to the time of his death, in 1881.
Ouray was born at Taos, New Mexico, in 1833. His father was a Tabeguache Ute and his mother a Jicarilla Apache. His boyhood was passed among the better class of Mexicans, chiefly as a herder of sheep. He learned Spanish and always preferred it to his native tongue. When eighteen years of age, he joined the band of Utes of which his
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father was leader, then located in southwestern Colorado. From that time until about 1860, he led the life of a wild Indian, passing his time hunting in the mountains and on the plains, varied by an occasional battle with the hereditary enemies of his people, the Kiowas, Sioux, Cheyennes, and Arapahoes of the plains, in which he acquired the reputation of a courageous and skillful warrior. In 1859, he chose a wife, named Chipeta, from among the Tabaguache maidens, to whom he was always devotedly attached, and who bore him a son. This child was captured by the Cheyennes in 1863, they having surprised a hunting camp of Utes under Ouray's command, near the present site of Fort Lupton on the Platte River. The boy was never recovered and, indeed, was never heard of afterwards.
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