When Spring came around in the year 1867 we were moved to Tubac, where we were joined by K Company of my regiment and C Company of the Thirty-Second Infantry. Tubac, considered by some to be the oldest town in Arizona, before the consummation of the Gadsden Treaty was a military post at which the republic of Mexico regularly kept a small garrison. It was situated on the Santa Cruz River, which at this point generally had considerable water in it. This was probably the reason for the establishment of the town, for water has always been the controlling factor in a settlement's progress in Arizona. The river is dry at Tubac now, however, except in unusually rainy seasons, irrigation and cattle having robbed the stream of its former volume.

At the time we were quartered there Tubac was a place of no small importance, and after Tucson and Prescott were discounted it was probably the largest settlement in the Territory. Patagonia has now taken the position formerly occupied by the old adobe town as center of the rich mining zone of Southern Arizona, and the glories of Tubac (if they can be given that name) are, like the glories of Tombstone, gone. Unlike those of Tombstone, however, they are probably gone forever. Tombstone may yet rise from the ashes of her splendid past to a future as one of the important towns of the Southwest, if the stories of untold riches near by her are to be believed.

A little to the east of Tubac and separating that town from Patagonia is Mount Wrightson, one of the highest mountains in Arizona. Nicknamed "Old Baldy" after its famous namesake in California, this mammoth pile of rock and copper was in the old days a landmark for travelers, visible sometimes for days ahead on the wagon trails. It presaged near arrival in Tucson, for in a direct line Old Baldy is probably not further than forty miles from the Old Pueblo.

We camped at Tubac during the summer and part of the winter of 1867 and I remember that while we were there I cooked a reception banquet to Colonel Richard C. McCormick, who was then and until 1869 Governor of the Territory of Arizona. I forget his business in Tubac, but it was either an electioneering trip or one of inspection after his appointment to the office of Governor in 1866.

In the early part of 1868 we moved to Fort Buchanan, which before the war had been a military post of considerable importance. It received its name from the President before Lincoln and was garrisoned by Confederates during the Civil War. We re-built the fort and re-named it Fort Crittenden, in honor of General Thomas L. Crittenden, a son of the Hon. John J. Crittenden of Kentucky, who was then in command of the military district embracing that portion of the Territory south of the Gila River. Crittenden was beautifully situated on the Sonoita, about ten miles from where I now live and in the midst of some of the most marvelously beautiful scenery to be found on the American continent. Fort Crittenden is no longer occupied and has not been for some time; but a short distance toward Benson is Fort Huachuaca, where at present a garrison of the Ninth Cavalry is quartered.

During part of 1868 I carried mail from where Calabasas is now—it was then Fort Mason—to Fort Crittenden, a proceeding emphatically not as simple as it may sound. My way lay over a mountainous part of what is now Santa Cruz county, a district which at that time, on account of the excellent fodder and water, abounded with hostile Indians.

On one occasion that I well remember I had reached the waterhole over which is now the first railroad bridge north of Patagonia, about a half mile from the present town, and had stopped there to water my horse. While the animal was drinking I struck a match to light my pipe—and instantly I ducked. A bullet whistled over my head, near enough to give me a strong premonition that a couple of inches closer would have meant my end. I seized the bridle of my horse, leaped on his back, bent low over the saddle and rode for it. I escaped, but it is positive in my mind today that if those Apaches had been better accustomed to the use of the white man's weapons I would not now be alive to tell the story.

I was a great gambler, even in those days. It was the fashion, then, to gamble. Everybody except the priests and parsons gambled, and there was a scarcity of priests and parsons in the sixties. Men would gamble their dust, and when that was gone they would gamble their worldly possessions, and when those had vanished they would gamble their clothes, and if they lost their clothes there were instances where some men even went so far as to gamble their wives! And every one of us, each day, gambled his life, so you see the whole life in the Territory in the early days was one continuous gamble. Nobody save gamblers came out there, because nobody but gamblers would take the chance.

As I have stated, I followed the natural trend. I had a name, even in those days, of being one of the most spirited gamblers in the regiment, and that meant the countryside; and I confess it today without shame, although it is some time now since I raised an ante. I remember one occasion when my talents for games of chance turned out rather peculiarly. We had gone to Calabasas to get a load of wheat from a store owned by a man named Richardson, who had been a Colonel in the volunteer service. Richardson had as manager of the store a fellow named Long, who was well known for his passion for gambling. After we had given our order we sought about for some diversion to make the time pass, and Long caught sight of the goatskin chaperejos I was wearing. He stared at them enviously for a minute and then proposed to buy them.

"They're not for sale," said I, "but if you like I'll play you for 'em."

"Done!" said Long, and put up sixteen dollars against the chaps.

Now, Long was a game sport, but that didn't make him lucky. I won his sixteen dollars and then he bet me some whiskey against the lot, and again I won. By the time I had beat him five or six times, had won a good half of the store's contents, and was proposing to play him for his share in the store itself, he cried quits. We loaded our plunder on the wagon. Near Bloxton, or where Bloxton now is, four miles west of Patagonia, we managed to upset the wagon, and half the whiskey and wheat never was retrieved. We had the wherewithal to "fix things" with the officers, however, and went unreproved, even making a tidy profit selling what stuff we had left to the soldiers.

At that time the company maintained gardens on a part of what afterwards was the Sanford Rancho, and at one time during 1868 I was gardening there with three others. The gardens were on a ranch owned by William Morgan, a discharged sergeant of our company. Morgan had one Mexican working for him and there were four of us from the Fort stationed there to cultivate the gardens and keep him company—more for the latter reason than the first, I believe. We took turn and turn about of one month at the Fort and one month at the gardens, which were about fourteen miles from the Fort.

One of us was Private White, of Company K. He was a mighty fine young fellow, and we all liked him. Early one morning the five of us were eating breakfast in the cabin, an illustration of which is given, and White went outside for something. Soon afterward we heard several reports, but, figuring that White had shot at some animal or other, we did not even get up from our meal. Finally came another shot, and then another, and Morgan got up and peered from the door. He gave a cry.

"Apaches!" he shouted. "They're all around! Poor White——"

It was nip-and-tuck then. For hours we kept up a steady fire at the Indians, who circled the house with blood-curdling whoops. We killed a number of them before they finally took themselves off. Then we went forth to look for White. We found our comrade lying on his back a short distance away, his eyes staring unseeingly to the sky. He was dead. We carried him to the house and discussed the situation.

"They'll come back," said Morgan, with conviction."Then it's up to one of us to ride to the Fort," I said.

But Morgan shook his head.

"There isn't a horse anywhere near," he said.

We had an old army mule working on the gardens and I bethought myself of him.

"There's the mule," I suggested.

My companions were silent. That mule was the slowest creature in Arizona, I firmly believed. It was as much as he could do to walk, let alone gallop.

"Somebody's got to go, or we'll all be killed," I said. "Let's draw lots."

They agreed and we found five straws, one of them shorter than the rest. These we drew, and the short one fell to me.

I look back on that desperate ride now with feelings akin to horror. Surrounded with murderous savages, with only a decrepit mule to ride and fourteen miles to go, it seemed impossible that I could get through safely. My companions said good-bye to me as though I were a scaffold victim about to be executed. But get through I did—how I do not know—and the chillingly weird war-calls of the Indians howling at me from the hills as I rode return to my ears even now with extraordinary vividness.

And, as Morgan had prophesied, the Apaches did "come back." It was a month later, and I had been transferred back to the Fort, when a nephew of Colonel Dunkelberger and William J. Osborn of Tucson were riding near Morgan's ranch. Apaches ambushed them, slew the Colonel's nephew, whose name has slipped my memory, and wounded Osborn. The latter, who was a person of considerable importance in the Territory, escaped to Morgan's ranch. An expedition of retaliation was immediately organized at the Fort and the soldiers pursued the assassins into Mexico, finally coming up with them and killing a number. I did not accompany the troops on this occasion, having been detailed to the Santa Rita range to bring in lumber to be used in building houses.

I returned from the Santa Ritas in July and found an order had been received at the Fort from the War Department that all men whose times had expired or were shortly to expire should be congregated in Tucson and from there marched to California for their discharge. A few weeks later I went to the Old Pueblo and, together with several hundred others from all parts of the Territory, was mustered out and started on the return march to Wilmington where we arrived about October 1. On the twelfth of October I was discharged.

After working as cook for a short time for a company that was constructing a railroad from Wilmington to Los Angeles, I moved to the latter place and obtained employment in the Old Bella Union Hotel as chef. John King was the proprietor of the Bella Union. Until Christmas eve I stayed there, and then Sergeant John Curtis, of my company, who had been working as a saddler for Banning, a capitalist in Wilmington, came back to the kitchen and said:"John, old sport, let's go to 'Frisco."

"I haven't," I told him, "enough change to set 'em up across the street, let alone go to 'Frisco."

For answer Curtis pulled out a wallet, drew therefrom a roll of bills that amounted to about $1,000, divided the pile into two halves, laid them on the table and indicated them with his forefinger.

"John," he offered, "if you'll come with me you can put one of those piles in your pocket. What do you say?"

Inasmuch as I had had previously little opportunity to really explore San Francisco, the idea appealed to me and we shook hands on the bargain. Christmas morning, fine, cloudless and warm, found us seated on the San Jose stage. San Jose then was nearly as large a place as Tucson is now—about twenty odd thousand, if I remember rightly. The stage route carried us through the mission country now so widely exploited by the railroads. Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo and Monterey were all towns on the way, Monterey being probably the largest. The country was very thinly occupied, chiefly by Spanish haciendas that had been in the country long before gold was discovered. The few and powerful owners of these estates controlled practically the entire beautiful State of California prior to '49, and at the time I write of still retained a goodly portion of it. They grew rich and powerful, for their lands were either taken by right of conquest or by grants from the original Mexican government, and they paid no wages to their peons. These Spaniards, with the priests, however, are to be credited with whatever progress civilization made in the early days of California. They built the first passable roads, they completed rough surveys and they first discovered the wonderful fertility of the California soils. The towns they built were built solidly, with an eye to the future ravages of earthquakes and of Time, which is something the modern builder often does not do. There are in many of their pueblos old houses built by the Spaniards in the middle part of the eighteenth century which are still used and occupied.

We arrived in San Francisco a few days after our departure from Los Angeles, and before long the city had done to us what she still does to so many—had broken us on her fickle wheel of fortune. It wasn't many days before we found ourselves, our "good time" a thing of the past, "up against it."

"John," said Curtis, finally, "we're broke. We can't get no work. What'll we do?"

I thought a minute and then suggested the only alternative I could think of. "Let's get a blanket," I offered.

"Getting a blanket" was the phrase commonly in use when men meant to say that they intended to enlist. Curtis met the idea with instant approval, if not with acclamation, and, suiting the action to the words, we obtained a hack and drove to the Presidio, where we underwent the examination for artillerymen. Curtis passed easily and was accepted, but I, owing to a wound in my ankle received during the war, was refused.

Curtis obtained the customary three days' leave before joining his company and for that brief space we roamed about the city, finishing our "good time" with such money as Curtis had been able to raise by pawning and selling his belongings. After the three days were over we parted, Curtis to join his regiment; and since then I have neither seen nor heard of him. If he still chances to be living, my best wishes go out to him in his old age.

For some time I hung around San Francisco trying to obtain employment, without any luck. I was not then as skillful a gambler as I became in after years, and, in any case, I had no money with which to gamble. It was, I found, one thing to sit down to a monte deck at a table surrounded with people you knew, where your credit was good, and another to stake your money on a painted wheel in a great hall where nobody cared whether you won or lost.

Trying to make my little stake last as long as possible, I roomed in a cheap hotel—the old What Cheer rooming house, and ate but one "two-bit" meal a day. I was constantly on the lookout for work of some kind, but had no luck until one day as I was passing up Kearney street I saw a sign in one of the store windows calling for volunteers for the Sloop-o'-War Jamestown. After reading the notice a couple of times I decided to enlist, did so, was sent to Mare Island Navy Yard and from there boarded the Jamestown.

It was on that vessel that I performed an action that I have not since regretted, however reprehensible it may seem in the light of present-day ethics. Smallpox broke out on board and I, fearful of contracting the dread disease, planned to desert. This would probably not have been possible today, when the quarantine regulations are so strict, but in those days port authorities were seldom on the alert to prevent vessels with diseases anchoring with other shipping, especially in Mexico, in the waters of which country we were cruising.

When we reached Mazatlan I went ashore in the ordinary course of my duties as ward-room steward to do some marketing and take the officers' laundry to be washed. Instead of bringing the marketing back to the ship I sent it, together with a note telling where the laundry would be found, and saying good-bye forever to my shipmates. The note written and dispatched, I quietly "vamoosed," or, as I believe it is popularly termed in the navy now, I "went over the hill."

My primary excuse for this action was, of course, the outbreak of smallpox, which at that time and in fact until very recently, was as greatly dreaded as bubonic plague is now, and probably more. Vaccination, whatever may be its value in the prevention of the disease, had not been discovered in the sense that it is now understood and was not known at all except in the centers of medical practice in the East.

Smallpox then was a mysterious disease, and certainly a plague. Whole populations had been wiped out by it, doctors had announced that there was practically no cure for it and that its contraction meant almost certain death, and I may thus be excused for my fear of the sickness. I venture to state, moreover, that if all the men aboard the Jamestown had had the same opportunity that I was given to desert, they would have done so in a body.

My second excuse, reader, if one is necessary, is that in the days of the Jamestown and her sister ships, navy life was very different from the navy life of today, when I understand generous paymasters are even giving the jackies ice-cream with their meals. You may be entirely sure that we got nothing of the kind. Our food was bad, our quarters were worse, and the discipline was unbearably severe.