When we arrived at the fort and Lieut. Jackson made his report
Gen. Crook was more than pleased with the success we had met, and
I succeeded in getting George's wages raised from seventy-five to
one hundred dollars per month, unbeknown to him.
It was now in the fall of the year, and the General decided to
send us back again with two companies of cavalry and one company
of infantry, calculated more for camp and guard duty than for
actual service.
After we had rested up a month or such a matter the General had
six or eight mule teams rigged up, also fifty burros for pack
animals, and started Lieut. Jackson back again with three hundred
soldiers.
CHAPTER XXX.
A WICKED LITTLE BATTLE.--CAPTURE OF ONE HUNDRED AND EIGHTY-TWO
HORSES.--DISCOVERY OF BLACK CANYON.--FORT YUMA AND THE PAY MASTER.
We traveled very slowly and cautiously, and at the foot of the
mountains, one hundred and fifty miles from Fort Yuma, we met a
freight train from Santa Fe loaded with flour and bacon,
principally, bound for Tombstone, Arizona. This train was owned by
a man named Pritchett; but he was generally known as "Nick in the
Woods." His party had had a fight with the Indians in the
mountains the third day before we met him, and he had lost several
mules killed and two of his teamsters were wounded. He informed us
that the mountains were swarming with Indians, so the Lieutenant
sent one company ahead of the command, George Jones and I going as
scouts.
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