February, 2010

Issue #5

Apache Gold, Part One
by Kenneth Newton

Sgt. Sam Gage stopped his mount alongside Capt. Harlan Drake's horse. "Cap'n, you reckon we might git lucky enough to find the gold and git gone without runnin' into that big injun?"

"That would be OK with me, Sam," Drake replied, studying his map. "But right now I'm more worried about yanks. I think we're already a lot closer to Ft. Craig than I want to be. When we clear these hills, we'll bear southwest and put those mountains between us and the fort." He rolled the map and scanned the countryside. "But Milagro could be anywhere out here."

The remnants of Troop B, First Texas Volunteer Cavalry, were in a high desert valley with scattered patches of prairie grass, dotted with clumps of pinion pine and juniper shrubs. They were trying to stay close enough to the hills to be seen, but far enough away to avoid an ambush.

Sgt. Gage spoke up. "Ya figger that 'pache will take us fer soldiers in these rags?"

Drake had to agree that in his tattered gray tunic with its faded gold piping, he only slightly resembled a uniformed soldier. He wore a Confederate cavalry officer's hat, and sported the requisite beard. He had lived his life clean-shaven before the war, but there were things that took too much time and effort for a soldier more than two years in the field, and shaving was one of them. The gray whiskers made him look older than his years, but he was long past worrying about such things.

In their butternut homespuns, his men looked more like hard-scrabble farmers, save for the makeshift stripes on their sleeves. "He'll know were soldiers. He would've seen the stars and bars, or something similar, back in '62." He glanced up at the white flag high above Sgt. Gage's head. "And we know he's come in to talk under a white flag before. Let's hope he's willing to do it again, because he's bound to have us outnumbered. According to Colonel Becker, O'Kelly counted a good forty warriors, and a village of around two hundred all together."

Drake's conversation with Lieutenant Colonel Ellis Becker had taken place more than three months before, and a good 2,000 miles away. Drake had been summoned to the colonel's tent at their winter encampment near the Shenandoah Valley. "Captain," Becker said, warming his hands at his small stove, "it's no secret the Confederacy is strapped. It's near impossible to fight defensively, let along wage a campaign. There's damn little forage to be found, and we're running short of everything from ammunition to shoes."

"Yes, sir," Drake said, "including payroll."

Becker arched his brow. "You and your Texans are being paid every month, according to the paymaster, just like everyone else attached to my Division."

"True enough, sir, and we're not mercenaries, but everybody knows those Confederate shinplasters are next to worthless. I hear a pair of half-decent boots is $200.00 in Richmond. A trooper's $13.00 a month won't go far at that rate."

"Do yourself a favor and save those shinplasters, Capt. Drake. I guarantee you when this war is over, they will be accepted and highly-valued not only in this country, but around the world. But, having said that, your point is well taken." Becker handed Drake a cheroot as he seated himself and motioned for Drake to sit. "General Lee and President Davis are convinced, as am I, that the good folks up north will soon lose their stomach for this fight and convince old Abe to call it off. So, starting in the spring, we need to hit them hard--inflict heavy casualties. But we need supplies, or more to the point, the means to pay for supplies from overseas, and to incentivize the merchants to risk running the blockade. That's where you come in, Captain."

Drake managed a thin smile as he leaned forward to accept the light Becker offered him. "Well, I'm afraid I'm a little short right now, sir." He puffed the cigar to life. "Thanks. I guess I miss an occasional good smoke about as much as I miss anything these days."

"I'll personally see to it you're kept in honest-to-God Havanas for the rest of your life if you succeed in this operation."

Drake leaned back in the chair. "Well, sir, then I guess it's about time I found out just what it is you want me to do."

"You'll recall," began the colonel, "that we took a few prisoners at Cedar Creek before the tide turned and we had to fall back."

As he motioned his little column forward, Drake wished for the hundredth time they'd let those Yankees go, and he'd never heard of this "operation." Becker went on to explain that after spending two months in Libby Prison, one of the Federals managed to get himself brought before the prison commander. In exchange for his release, one Sgt. Michael O'Kelly offered to deliver to the Confederacy a fortune in Union gold. The camp commander had at first listened to the preposterous tale in weary amusement, but came to believe O'Kelly might be telling the truth, and relayed the story up the chain of command. It made its way back down the chain as far as Lt. Col. Becker, in the form of a note that said simply, "Jubal--War Dept recommends we pursue this matter soonest. I concur. Use your best judgement, and Godspeed. Signed, R. E. Lee." Jubal was Jubal Early, Commanding General of the Army of Northern Virginia's II Corps, who had personally delivered the note to Becker for action. Drake's assignment was to mount an expedition to New Mexico and retrieve the gold for the Confederacy.

Becker's tone was slightly apologetic. "We're in desperate straits, Captain. Desperate men must of necessity engage in acts of desperation."

Becker would give him only twenty men. "It's regrettable," he said, "but General Early was adamant that he couldn't commit a larger force to this mission. Regrettable, but convenient for me, because that's about how many men you currently have at your disposal, and your twenty are as good as any twenty I've got. I'm not sure Early believes this is worth doing, but like you and me, he has his orders. However, you'll have the best horses, mules, and equipment I can find." Becker hesitated. "And, uh, oh yes--a Gatling gun."

"A Gatling gun, sir?"

"Yes, we captured one at Lynchburg." He made a cranking motion with his right hand. "It's that wheeled rapid-fire contraption the some of the Union Infantry Divisions drag around but don't seem to ever use."

"I've heard of it, sir, and what I've heard is that it's a barely functional weapon, more trouble than it's worth."

The colonel sighed. "It's true they tend to jam, and aren't suitable for typical battlefield conditions. But I'm hoping it might impress this heathen Milagro into cooperating."

"I'm half afraid to ask at this point, Colonel, but who's Milagro?"

In late fall of 1862, according to Sgt. O'Kelly, the commander of the Federal army garrison at Denver, Maj. Thomas Reed, had found himself short of troops when most of his regulars were abruptly withdrawn to fight the rebels in the east. The few misfits, malcontents, and irregulars still at his disposal were barely adequate to maintain the garrison, let alone escort a number one priority, top secret shipment to Col. Edward Canby at Ft. Craig in New Mexico. He elected to transport the shipment on a caisson normally used for hauling ammunition, in hopes that the handful of men he could spare to send on the mission would look like just another routine patrol. Even though his orders were to deliver it in no more than ten days without fail, Reed professed ignorance as to the contents of the sealed iron strongbox. Nonetheless, by the time the escort was selected and ready to leave, the garrison was alive with the rumor that the heavy box contained king's ransom in gold bullion.

Sgt. O'Kelly and his nondescript caisson were less than a day from Ft. Craig when some twenty or thirty Mexican bandits encountered the convoy. Whether they were aware of the contents of the caisson or just wanted the weapons and horses, no one knew. But the bandits ambushed the soldiers near Socorro, killing all but one. Sgt. O'Kelly was taken alive as future trading stock, and the bandits began a hasty retreat for the border, certain the gringo federales would soon be out in force and on their trail.

Two days later, as they nursed the caisson through a narrow mountain pass in the Organ Mountains, the Mexicans were in turn set upon and slaughtered by a party of Mescalero Apaches led by a war chief O'Kelly would come to know as Milagro. The sergeant was thrown from his mount during the melee, and with his hands tied behind his back, had landed hard and been knocked senseless. His eyes focused just in time for him to see Milagro stay the hand of the warrior who was about to crush his skull with a stone war club.

Milagro knelt down and roughly grabbed a handful of O'Kelly's tunic, hauling him up until they were nose to nose. "Habla espanol?" asked the Apache. Milagro knew that very few white men would ever bother to learn the language of the Apache, but some could make the Mexican words. O'Kelly nodded that he did, and Milagro gestured toward the dead Mexicans. "Que paso?

O'Kelly told the Apache about the ambush at Socorro as one of the warriors brought over a heavy golden ingot for Milagro to see.

Milagro nodded. "The thing that makes the white men and Mexicans crazy," he said, then turned back to O'Kelly. "So the banditos thought if more bluecoats came, you would be of use. Will the soldiers come for you, and this box of gold?"

"To be sure. Hundreds of them, and soon."

Milagro shoved him roughly to the ground. "Hundreds!" he spat. "There are not one hundred, and I know it. First you fought with the Mexicans, then you fought the other white soldiers--the graycoats--and all the time you were fighting the Apache, too. No one can fight so much for so long and have hundreds of men, and those you do have are running away. I have seen it, and I know it is so. The bluecoats drove out the graycoats, and now the Apache have driven the bluecoats from Apache land! Soon there will be no more of you. Hundreds! Why do you lie?"

O'Kelly was unsure how to deal with the Apache's notion that the troop withdrawals signalled a retreat. "Well," he said, "there might not still be hundreds here, but they'll be along for me and the gold." He considered mentioning that back east there were not hundreds, nor thousands, but tens of thousands of bluecoats, but he feared the Indian would surely kill him in a fit of rage over a "lie" of that size. "We're still fighting the rebs--the graycoats. Not around here, anymore, but far away." He pointed. "Back east."

Milagro put a knife to O'Kelly's throat. "And now you want me to believe the soldiers who fled from the Apache have only gone to fight the other white men? Still you lie."

"Well, I meant some of them went to fight the graycoats. Most of them ran away from the Apache."

Milagro put pressure on the tip of the blade. This white man would say whatever it was he thought a man with a knife wanted to hear. He applied pressure until the blade made a small scratch on the white man's throat and shook his head in disgust as the bluecoat yelped in pain. Milagro stood and walked away, crooking a finger at the warrior who still stood over the enemy soldier, war club poised to strike. "Bring him," he said.

Sgt. Gage pulled up and dropped back to regain his position in the column. As he looked for signs of life in the forbidding landscape, Drake asked himself the same question he had asked Col. Becker. "Why me?"

"Because you speak Spanish, for one thing, which is a fairly rare commodity in my Division, and also because I know your pedigree, Captain. You served with Sam Houston during the war for Texas independence, you fought in the Mexican War, and then you chased outlaws with the Texas Rangers. Happily, you're also experienced in dealing with Indians--talking when you can, and fighting when you have to, even if your area of expertise is Comanche." The colonel paused in the middle of Drake's resume to catch his breath. "But you didn't sign on with Sibley for the Western Campaign in '62. That was rather uncharacteristic of a gladiator like you, Captain Drake."

"I'm no gladiator. It just seems like ever since I was a boy there's been something going on in Texas that was important enough to fight about. But I couldn't see the point in going to New Mexico."

"Jeff Davis could. He believed possession of New Mexico could lead to further Confederate acquisitions in the west."

"Well, Colonel, that made about as much sense to me as seceding from the Union in the first place."

"Ah, yes. Find a way to compromise. A Sam Houston man to the end."

"I suppose I am, plus I had a cattle ranch to look after. Still do, I hope. And to be truthful, I didn't think the Confederacy was going to need my help."

Becker nodded. "A lot of us thought it was going to be a short fight." He paused as if to reflect on the magnitude of that particular miscalculation. "We've all suffered losses of one kind or another, Captain, and I sincerely hope your ranch is there waiting for you when you get home. But the secession wasn't about whether you were doing well in San Antonio, or whether I was fat, dumb, and happy in Virginia. It was about the fact that every new western state added to the Union was going to be a nail in the coffin of the southern states. Several nails, really, in the form of two senators and God knows how many congressmen who might well be expected to vote one day to abolish slavery in the United States of America, thereby impoverishing every state south of the Mason and Dixon line. Some will cite other reasons besides slavery, and they're real enough. But absent the so-called "peculiar institution," the southern states had no viable future in the Union, and you know that, as well as I do."

Drake crossed to the door of the tent, drawing aside the flap to look outside at the heavy grayness of the bleak, dormant landscape. "Well, sir," he said, "here's something I know. I never laid claim to ownership of another man, and never would. But if we made this fight over slavery, one day we're going to have to answer to Almighty God for it."

"It's a bit late for those sentiments, Captain. Old Abe has made a big show of freeing the slaves, to rub our noses in it. Both sides crossed the Rubicon some time ago. There's no turning back now."

Drake let the flap fall and turned to face Becker. "No, I suppose not."

"I gather that when Canby ran Sibley out of New Mexico, you changed your mind about this fight."

"I did. Sibley was an acquaintance of mine, and his men were friends and neighbors--even relatives, some of them--and they came back in pretty rough shape. We raised a troop of cavalry, looking to go back out to Mew Mexico, and wound up here. But understand this, Colonel. I make no secret of the fact that my allegiance is to Texas. For better or worse, Texas has thrown in with the Confederacy. I've stood shoulder to shoulder with you Virginians from Chancellorsville to Gettysburg to Cedar Creek. But hell, I'm damn near fifty years old. Besides, I get seasick. If the boat ride to Galveston doesn't kill me, the ride across Texas will." He turned back toward Becker. "Much as I'd like the stogies, you need a younger man for this job. And O'Kelly speaks Spanish--he could interpret for whoever you chose to send."

"I choose to send you and your cavalrymen," Becker said. "I know you've turned down promotions to stay with the men you brought here, and that kind of cohesiveness is important." The colonel sighed and continued. "And, well, about O'Kelly. Of course, the intent was that he guide the expedition, but the fact is we no longer have him. I guess he didn't really trust us to set him free in New Mexico, because he somehow overpowered his guard and escaped between Richmond and here. I expect by now he's been caught behind our lines and shot for a spy. But we have the maps he drew, and Major Reed's confidential orders regarding the shipment, which are what made his story believable in the first place. O'Kelly lived with the Apaches for six months, and we have detailed locations and descriptions of their camps, water holes, and even the cave where Milagro put the gold." Becker rubbed at his beard. "That name--Milagro--it has a Spanish ring to it."

Drake nodded. "It means miracle. Used as a man's name, I reckon it would mean he's a fella that's a cut or two above a normal man. Whoever hung that moniker on him believes this Apache has powerful medicine."

Becker chuckled. "Well, this miracle man is apparently quite the sport. After six months, he told O'Kelly he was tired of looking at him, and turned him loose, just like that. Told him to go get his hundreds of long knife buddies and come back and get the gold, if they had the cojones for the job. Much to the sergeant's surprise, Canby was singularly uninterested in undertaking such an expedition, and the next thing O'Kelly knew, he was in the eastern theater."

Drake sat staring at his boots. "Lucky for me, I guess. It seems odd Canby wouldn't go after the gold."

"Yes, it does. And for all we know, he might well have gone and got it after O'Kelly was transferred. Maybe he wanted to wait until after the war and finish off the Apaches first, so he wouldn't have to fight his way to that cave. Or maybe it was so hush-hush that Canby didn't even know what was in the shipment, and didn't believe O'Kelly. I don't know. Look, Captain. The War Department has been over and over and around and around this thing. They think this is a trip worth taking."

"Any suggestions as to how I go about claiming this gold for the cause?"

"Any way you can. Negotiate, offer a treaty on behalf of the Confederacy. Tell the Apaches we'll see to it the bluecoats don't bother them any more, we'll run the settlers and Mexicans out. Hell, tell this Milagro anything you have to, and promise him the moon. Failing that, I'm sure you're aware Congress has authorized discretionary extermination of hostiles as required. I don't care if you have to kill every warrior, squaw, and papoose in New Mexico. Your orders are to do whatever you have to do to get that gold."

Drake shook his head; Lt. Col. Becker hadn't done much Indian fighting, as simple as he made it sound. Just roll out the ol' Gatling gun and exterminate the lot of 'em, end of report. "As I recall, Sibley's orders in '62 were to run the Federals out of New Mexico, and then carry on as appropriate, using his own good judgement. If I have the same leeway, why don't I just go ahead and take California while I'm out there? It seems a shame to take a half a platoon of cavalry that far and not finish the job."

Becker flared. "God damn it, Captain, I know!" he shouted, then just as quickly calmed down. "I know. But we simply have no choice. We have to try."

Drake nodded. "Sorry, I was out of line."

"Never mind, and by the way, you won't have to worry about seasickness. The blockade is too formidable. The odds of making Galveston would be remote."

Drake sighed heavily, somehow not surprised. Of course, the Navy wouldn't risk a valuable blockade runner on a job such as this.

Becker walked across the tent and put a hand on Drake's shoulder. "I know you could simply lead your men home to San Antonio, and forget all about this unpleasantness, but I know you won't. You have quite a ride ahead of you, Captain, and you need to get started. Every day is precious to the Confederacy."

"Riders comin, Cap'n!" Gage was alongside again, offering Drake his binoculars. "I think we found us some 'paches."

Click here to be notified when each new issue comes out!