It is spring in Roscommon and I have a new book. This one is
another about an Indian who lived nearby (Grayling, MI) in the mid 19th
century. Writing this book was a natural outcome of my earlier work about a
local Indian, since the two men were friends and the Grayling newspaper frequently
reported on their comings and goings.
So, in case you are interested, here is a copy of the
Prologue to Michigan’s Ke-che-te-go Warriors, available in its entirety at
Amazon. com.
April 1865, near the close of the
Civil War
Big Tom Ke-che-te-go marched forward
with the men from his regiment. No one spoke as they marched toward the crater –
the big hole in the ground that the Union Army made by exploding 8,000 pounds
of explosives under the rebel lines in front of Petersburg, Virginia. None of
the men or officers in Tom’s outfit, the 1st Michigan Sharpshooters,
knew why they were attacking. The first troops sent in some 30 minutes earlier
had not been heard from, so now, the Sharpshooters were marching forward, just
behind the 30th United States Colored Troops.
The line of march was ominous for Tom and his men in Company
K, the celebrated all-Indian company. As Sharpshooters, his unit normally
fought as skirmishers or snipers in support of other Union regiments. Both
skirmishing and sniping required the Sharpshooters to be dispersed along the
battle lines, often creeping close to the enemy using whatever cover the men
could find. This time is different, Tom thought, as his regiment marched toward
the enemy in parade ground formation. We must be headed to the front lines as
reinforcements for the regular troops, Tom decided.
As they approached the crater, Tom gaped at the devastation
he saw. The early morning explosion had obliterated the rebel fort that formed
a salient in the rebel lines. What used to be a fort was now a widely scattered
mélange of broken logs, twisted lumber and chunks of foundation materials
thrown about as if a tornado had found a target. It was strangely quiet; Tom
heard only the occasional sound of canteens striking ammunition boxes and the
sucking sound of boots being pulled from the muck as the men marched forward,
making a long thin line of Union blue. As they reached the crater, they could
see grey and black smoke rising above the large mound ahead of them.
The men climbed the rise and Colonel De Land sent them over
the sides. The lip of the crater was too steep, the men slid down its sides
toward the milling mass of troops that were below. As soon as Tom slid down the
steep bank, he knew they were in trouble, even the closest Union troops were
being hit by rebel fire. Tom saw dead and dying men scattered about like cordwood.
Just as the men were assembling into ranks, a shell landed nearby creating a
flash of light and a shower of mud. The kaboom of the exploding shell proved
that it was close. As Tom gained his feet and his equilibrium, four of his
fellow Sharpshooters pushed him aside, carrying a wounded man. It was the
Colonel, injured by the bomb. The four men carrying De Land began struggling up
the side of the crater; it was the last Tom saw of them.
Pizzzz. A bullet whistled by Tom’s ear. He looked up, hoping
to see a flash of light and smoke from a rebel rifle that would become a target
for him. It was no use - there was smoke everywhere. The Lieutenant signaled
Tom and the Indian company to follow him. The men ran forward in a crouch along
the bottom of a ravine, past a company of colored troops who were trying to
form themselves into a battle line a dozen yards to their right.
As they ran past, a shell landed almost in the middle of the
line the colored regiment was trying to form. Some of the Sharpshooters stopped
to attend to the wounded men, but the Lieutenant waved them on. Tom saw other
Union troops to his right trying to find cover from the artillery shells and
the bullets that were raining on them. He kept moving forward. They were
traveling at a diagonal across the bottom of the crater until they reached its
opposite side on the left. Here, the troopers began clawing their way up the
steep sides until a rebel rifleman appeared above and fired into their ranks.
Tom hit the ground and rolled away from the rifleman’s downward trajectory.
Just above him was a broken log sticking out of the ground. Tom crawled toward
it, hoping for a small measure of protection. He peeked around the log to see
not one, but three rifles over the lip of the crater each with a head just
above. Tom got his rifle in position and fired a shot at the head closest to
him then jerked himself and his rifle back behind the log.
He tried to calm his labored breathing and listen for any
sounds indicating the presence of the riflemen above. Instead, he heard a
series of shots from men all around him – apparently, other Sharpshooters had
found a way to fire their rifles also. He waited another moment. Hearing
nothing, Tom peeked again. Neither heads nor rifles were showing. Tom decided
that being at the top of the crater could be no more hazardous than his current
position, so he crept around the log and resumed clawing his way up. Other
Company K men followed. Tom and the Lieutenant reached the top about the same
time. The Lieutenant pointed to the left, indicating a long trench down and
away from them that must have led to the fort before the explosion. Tom started
in that direction as another bullet found its mark. The Lieutenant fell back
clutching his upper arm. Tom headed toward the trench as another man helped the
Lieutenant back over the lip of the crater the group had just left.
Tom reached the trench and jumped in, hoping to be protected
from the whiz of bullets that he continued to hear as he made his way to the
trench along with a dozen other Sharpshooters. As soon as he dropped into the
trench, Tom stopped and reloaded his rifle and snapped the bayonet in place on
the end of the muzzle. He looked at the other men behind him and saw that all
had followed his lead in checking their weapons. With Tom in front, they
started moving along the trench to the left, walking warily in expectation of
finding a line of rebels facing the front. The walk was short. After creeping
forward a few minutes, Tom saw a rebel soldier with his rifle resting on the
forward edge of the trench. He fired his rifle instinctively and the body in
front of him twitched. Tom stepped backward two paces and pushed his back hard
against the rearmost earthen wall, hoping he was out of the line of fire.
He waited a moment, heard nothing, and then crept forward to
the reb he had shot. The body had not moved. Tom walked up to him, grabbed his
arm and twisted the body around to see his face. He was shocked to see a young
man, barely old enough to shave. Blood had streaked across his face and an
empty eye socket showed where one bullet entered with another in his neck.
Tom’s bullet was in his chest. He had shot a dead man. He turned back to the
troops behind him and signaled them forward, then continued his cautious pace
forward. The trench soon opened up into a room with six rebel gunners lining a
front wall. Some were headless; others had equally gruesome injuries, all
fatal, victims of a Union bomb blast. Behind them were stacks of guns and
ammunition in disarray from the blast.
The Sharpshooters behind Tom were just filling the room when
a shell landed close by, in front of the trench. A rebel artilleryman must have
seen them through the smoke and fire. The men returned to the narrow trench
they had just left. They gathered there, waiting for someone to decide what to
do. Tom took a quick look at the men; all he could see were Indians and he was
their Sergeant. He looked over the back ledge of the trench where he believed
the rebel lines were. A bullet whizzed by, the rebs must have a bead on them.
Tom considered their position for a moment and looked at the men, waiting for
someone to say something. There was silence.
“Let’s go back to the crater and join up with the rest of
the regiment,” Tom said. The troops were willing to follow Tom’s lead. They
retraced their steps until they came to the open area next to the crater. Two
hundred yards off to their left, they could see a line of rebel infantry coming
forward with puffs of smoke issuing from their rifles. Several of the troopers
took shots at the advancing line, but it seemed to have no effect. Several men
turned to Tom, awaiting his orders.
“Let’s spread out. Head for the crater. Two men at a time,”
he said in the Ojibwa language. “Go!”
Tom waved his arm and two men from
the company sprinted forward. He waited for another moment and then repeated
his command, “Go!”
He decided to watch the fate of those he sent forward before
sending others. The first two made it almost halfway when one of the men seemed
to jump backward. He had been hit. His companion grabbed him and the pair
continued forward with the wounded man dragging one leg. Tom watched as they
disappeared over the lip of the crater. As soon as they topped the ridge, Tom
signaled the next two who were in line awaiting his signal.
“You two, go that way first before turning toward the
crater.” He pointed toward the Union lines to the right. “Go!” When he saw
those men make it halfway, he sent four men forward in the same direction.
There was just one other man and Tom left. Tom looked at him. He was an Indian
from Saginaw, Amos Chamberlain. They started
together and finished together, both running as hard as they could. When they
reached the lip of the crater, Tom yelled for Amos to jump.
They nearly landed on top of several Company K Indians who
had made it to the crater ahead of them. These men were lying just below the
edge of the crater and firing at the line of rebel soldiers who had been
pursuing them. The Indians were calmly rising above the edge, firing their
rifles and then falling back to reload. They were having the effect of slowing
the advance, but there were too many oncoming soldiers and Tom knew that in a
few more moments the rebels would be on top of them. He called out for the men
to go down the sides of the crater and search for cover. It was an act of
desperation because the crater below them seemed a hell-hole of crying, falling
men taking rebel fire.The Indians began running, sliding and falling downward.
Before they reached bottom, the whine of bullets indicated live fire everywhere
around them. Tom saw a man in front of him fall down as he clutched at his
back. There was a slight rise in the ground that Tom fell behind. It offered
the barest hope of shelter from the rain of bullets that dug holes in the earth
all around. Tom lay panting behind it, unable to see any Indians around him or
rebel soldiers above him.
He believed he was taking his last breaths. When the
advancing rebel soldiers reached him, he expected to be killed or captured.
Maybe they would take his scalp – certainly his rifle. Whites craved Indian
rifles with their ornately carved stocks that Indians worked on in camp, hour
after hour. He should have told the Lieutenant where he wanted to be buried.
Perhaps he would be lucky and his bones would be carried back to Saginaw to lie
with his father’s bones as all his ancestors would want. Once again, he
wondered why he was fighting this White man’s war as he waited for the sound of
the coming rebels.
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