I always wondered who could of done such a thing. This country is chock full of terrible violent men. But that is by the by for as we did amble that snowy Indiana platform one of the days we came upon that dirty nuck of a Sutler there in his gleaming beaver coat & you will not believe it but he smiled when he saw us.
“You might of bought a 2nd cleaning kit after all boys the way you are looking now,” says he & I smiled back at him but the brother did not.
“The coal ash does get in even with the windees closed,” says I tipping my kepi to him but he only winked his eye & said no more turning to one of the soldiers minding him for a match for his cigar.
His fat wife gave us the onceover for a mere tick & then turned away with her hands tucked into a fox fur muff. For the like of us soldier filth did be of no interest to her but for what her bent Sutler husband could cull from us in coin. God Forgive Me for we know now what did befall the woman Lord Have Mercy On Her but that is how I felt. It is how I still feel. For I will tell you she had a black cruel heart bedded down under the fine fat tits of her & well what happened in the end she might of had it coming some would say.
But I only say this now after knowing her later & after that time on the wind roughed platform in Indiana we saw no more of them on the train. Nor did we see them that winter in Leavenworth & did not see that Sutler & his wife again until Ft. Caldwell in the Nebraska Territory when we set out from there on our journey to this place we call the Powder River Valley.
It is of no bearing on my testament at all but did you know Sir that this Valley is called Absaraka by the Indians who once lived here but lost these sweet lands to the terrible Savage Sioux? Absaraka means Home of the Crow. That is the tribe of Indians not the bird & that tribe might be fine allies in our fight with Red Cloud but they have no stomach for it at the moment. We do not see much of them.
I tell you it would make you laugh thinking on how the Crow got whipped by the Savage Sioux & run out rightly to the bad lands of dry grass & little game & now here are we the US Army trying to run them Sioux off just the same. It would crease you it would the joke of it. The 18th is made up nearly 1/2 of Irishmen & every Mick among us is doing to them Sioux what them Sioux did to the Crow & what the English (God Curse Them!) done to poor old Ireland. To hell or Connacht for the poor Indians only now it is us playing the b_______ Cromwell’s men. It is enough to make you laugh.
I did say it before & I will say it again but it is a fierce queer f_______ world we do live in.
13
December 8, 1866—Fort Phil Kearny, Dakota Territory
ON THEIR SECOND FULL DAY AT THE FORT, MOLLOY awakes and asks for Kohn. The morning is bright, the parade ground brilliant with snow beginning to melt under the winter sun.
Before entering the hospital barracks, Kohn stops and looks up into a sky as bright blue and clear as any he has ever seen. In the distance, beyond the half-mile surround of the log palisade, the Big Horn range rises up, snow-capped, glorious. Fifteen odd miles away, he has heard, and in the clear winter air the mountains look close enough to touch. This is the first time the weather has lifted, allowing him to see them. Something rare and wonderful about this place. Even he can see it, a Cleveland Jew with no more mind to open spaces than a tick in a sow’s ear. Still, a cavalryman for the better part of five years, Kohn can spot good grass as well as any man, knows the value of icy streams that run all summer long with snow melt.
A sergeant bunking in with Kohn has told him it is the best grazing he has ever seen in the most beautiful valley on earth and