CHAPTER XXIV. A RAPID PURSUIT--“THE ARKANSAS TRAVELER”--GAME CHICKENSAND COCKING MAINS.
|The union army followed closely after the rebel one, and for more thana hundred miles the chase was continued. Sometimes the advance of thepursuers was not more than a mile or two from the rear of the pursued. Aretreating army always has the advantage, as it has a clear road, whilethe advancing one must carefully reconnoiter the ground to preventfalling into ambuscades. Then, too, the retreating force can forageupon the country, where there is anything to be obtained in it, and byclearing it of provisions and supplies of every kind make it a difficultmatter for the pursuers to feed themselves, unless by waiting forthe wagon-trains, which are always an encumbrance and hinder rapidmovements.
General Price did not stop to form ambuscades or otherwise engage theadvance of General Curtis, but kept straight on toward the southwesttill he formed a junction with McCulloch at Cross Hollows in northernArkansas. Cross Hollows is a curious sort of a place, and is welldescribed by its name. The rolling and hilly country is suddenly brokenby a series of ravines that spread out from a common center like therays of a star. Ravines in this part of the country are generally knownby the more prosaic name of “Hollows,” and the crossing of the hollowsgives the name to the locality.
The main road from Springfield to Fayetteville and the southwesttraverses the center of the hollows. A short distance before reachingthe hollows it crosses a fine stream of water, which bears the name ofSugar Creek. The water of Sugar Creek is pure, like that of a mountainbrook. In its shallow parts it is without color, but wherever it attainsa depth of thirty inches or more it is deeply tinged with blue. This isthe character of the streams generally through that section of country,and when one looks down from a height upon the valley of one of thesestreams the effect of the pools of blue alternating with the white waterof the shallow portions and the green of the enclosing banks forms avery pretty picture.
Down to that time none of the union forces in southwest Missouri hadever crossed the line into Arkansas. General Vandever’s brigade wasleading the advance of the infantry column, a half mile or so behind thecavalry, and Jack and Harry were as far in front as they were permittedto go. When the head of the column reached the line a halt wasordered, the regiments were closed up, and preparations were made forcommemorating the invasion of the seceded state in an imposing manner.
For some days the bands had been practicing the music of “The ArkansasTraveler,” one of the far-seeing officers of the staff having suppliedthe leaders with the score. After the column had been halted two of thebands were brought forward and stationed on each side of the road, wherea post marked the boundary between Missouri and Arkansas. When allwas ready the bands started up “The Arkansas Traveler,” and with theirrifles at right-shoulder shift, and in column of fours the infantryfiled past. As each company crossed the frontier a loud cheer was given,and the greatest enthusiasm prevailed. To add to the good spirits of themen the news of the fall of Fort Donelson reached them and spread likewildfire on their first night in camp on the soil of Arkansas.
Price and McCulloch united their forces at Cross Hollows and made astand against the union advance, though evidently not a serious one, asthere was only a slight skirmish, after which the rebels retired inthe direction of Fayetteville twenty-two miles further on. The cavalrydivision pursued them to that point, but the infantry halted at CrossHollows. Even at Fayetteville the rebels did not feel strong enough tomake a fight, but continued their retreat after a short resistance overthe Boston Mountains in the direction of Fort Smith, where for a longtime the United States government had formerly maintained a militarypost.
The rebels had accumulated at Fayetteville a considerable supply ofbacon, corn and other materials for feeding their army, and when ourtroops arrived most of the storehouses containing these supplies were onfire. It was afterward ascertained that the burning of these storehouseshad been the cause of a serious dispute between Price and McCulloch--arenewal of their quarrel at the time of the Wilson’s Creek campaign.
Price wanted to leave these supplies for the use of the union army, andhe argued as follows: We’ve got to retreat, and the union army is goingto stay here till we drive them out. They are in our country, and morethan two hundred miles from their base. They will forage on the countryfor a large part of their supplies, and if we leave this bacon and cornthey will have just so much less to take from the people, who are ourpeople, and not theirs. Arkansas is a seceded state, and the Yankees andDutch won’t have any compunctions about living on the state that theymight have in Missouri, which they claim to be still in the union, andare trying to keep there. The easier it is for them to find their livingthe easier it will be for Arkansas.
On this line of argument Price opposed the destruction of the supplies.McCulloch opposed his view of the matter, and said it was no part oftheir business to help feed the Yankee army, and what happened to thepeople was simply the fortune of war. The quarrel reached its height andcame near a fighting point when McCulloch accused Price of disloyalty tothe South and a willingness to see Arkansas subjugated by the Northerntroops.
Price was overruled and the stores were set on fire. His prediction wasverified, as the union forces foraged right and left among the people,and certainly caused them much more hardship than would have been thecase had the supplies fallen into our hands. Which of them was right inthe argument the reader may decide for himself. Certainly the question,like most matters on which men differ, had two well-defined sides.
McCulloch’s army had spent the winter at Cross Hollows, where it erectedbuildings capable of lodging eight or ten thousand men. When the rebelsretired from Cross Hollows these buildings were set on fire, and by thetime our troops arrived all but half a dozen of them had been consumed.The ashes remained to mark the spot, and the positions of the smokingash-heaps showed that the cantonment was laid out with the regularity ofa carefully-platted town.
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The Third Illinois Cavalry, which was attached to General Vandever’sbrigade, followed closely upon the heels of the enemy after the skirmishat Sugar Creek, and pushed on in the direction of Fayetteville. A singlecompany was retained by the general for scouting purposes, and to thiscompany Jack and Harry were temporarily attached. The youths were amongthe first to enter the rebel cantonment and try to save what they couldfrom the flames.
Harry’s sharp eyes fell upon some chickens, of which a hundred or morewere running wildly about the place.
The slaughter of the innocents began at once; chickens were not abundantin that part of the country, and Harry thought a fine fowl would be verywelcome at the general’s mess-table that evening, and he was also of theopinion that a similar bird would taste well for himself and Jack.
He secured two, and remarked to Jack that they were the thinnest birdsof the kind he had yet come across. “But they’re chickens, anyhow,” saidhe, “and if they’re too tough for broiling they will do well in a stew.”
Jack was equally fortunate in his chicken hunt, but his second bird wasa surprise that caused his eyes to open very wide.
“Just look at this,” said he to Harry, as he pointed to the legs of thefowl; “wonder what this means?”
The objects that arrested his attention were a pair of steel “gaffs” assharp as needles, and attached by straps and cords to the legs of thechicken; they were hollow at the base, so that they passed over thenatural spurs of the bird.
“I never saw anything like this,” said Jack, “and don’t believe it growsthere.”
“Nor I either,” replied Harry. “Here comes the general; let’s show itto him and find out what it’s all about.”
Jack ran to General Vandever and exhibited his discovery. The latterimmediately ordered the slaughter of the chickens to cease, and it wasstopped at once, but not till two-thirds of the number about the camphad fallen.
“These are game cocks,” said the general, “and they’re kept for fightingpurposes. I heard that the Third Louisiana h
ad a lot of game cocks,and were keeping them here for amusing themselves. They come from achicken-fighting region, and this is one of their favorite sports. Theyget up matches, on which they bet heavily, and then the fighting-cocksare equipped with these spurs or gaffs, and put in the ring againsteach other. The bird that can first pierce the other with these gaffsgenerally wins the fight, as a well-directed blow with them is fatal.
“Probably we interrupted a fight,” the general continued. “This bird wascertainly all ready for the ring, and if you look around you ‘ll findanother similarly equipped and about to proceed to business.”
Sure enough, the antagonist of the bird was found in the hands of asoldier; at any rate, there was another chicken with the gaffs on thathad been killed before his character was known. Game chickens are notconsidered edible except in case of emergency. Those that had beenkilled were, however, duly served up, as it was thought extravagant towaste anything in the chicken line at that particular time. It was asHarry had predicted, the chickens were not good for broiling, but theydid fairly well when stewed, especially when the stewing continued allnight.
The birds that were saved from slaughter were the source of muchamusement to the officers while the army remained in camp at CrossHollows. Almost every day there was a cock-fight in front of one of thetents, but it was generally bloodless, as nobody knew anything abouthandling the birds, and the steel gaffs were never used. The namesof the rebel leaders were given to the fighters, and it was a commonoccurrence to have Beauregard pitted against Jeff Davis, Price againstMcCulloch, or Lee against Johnston. General Vandever turned two ofthe birds over to the care of Jack and Harry. Harry’s pet was calledMagruder, and Jack’s received the fighting name of Breckinridge.
In the first encounter Breckinridge tore three feathers out ofMagruder’s neck and otherwise disabled him, so that Harry lost hiswager. But as betting in money was not in order, and the stakesconsisted only of army crackers, the youths’ losses were not heavy.
One after another the fighting-chickens went to the cooking-pots, asthey were not securely guarded and several of the officers had negroservants. There is a traditional affinity between the negro and thechicken, an affinity which results in the absorbing of the latter bythe former. Some of the negro servants were good foragers, and ranconsiderable risk in their search for supplies, as we shall see lateron.