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Show I Ii f ft SmoKe From the WeeKly I II SI'1 Pipe. lis 1 IB ! I I fiS' Provo, Utah, August 12, 1903. IH n With tents pitched on tho shores of the Utah I m I aft lake, lapped almost by waves fierce as the bat- I W I w tles tliey "Sht in days of old, the grizzled and I Si I Sm' bewhiskered veterans of the Blackhawk war are mm 9 i foregathered in battle array. The occasion" for mm '' I l the tented formation is the annual encampment I ! of these Ancient of Days, who erewhile cavorted i I belligerently with the marauding redskin. Most J , of the old aboriginal warriors have gone to the t ' eternal big game pastures, and most of the men who smote them with flail and flintlock are bowed i under the burden of the rolling years, but they 1 ' i are still sufficiently athletic to relate far into the !i night by the flickering campflres the tales of their I prowess on the gory battlefields from Mt." Pleas- ant to Richfield, where the eventual overthrow of I ii ' the brunette visaged purloiner of cattle was en- J I compassed. I v t t 5 ti ? tJ j ? I ' i On Wednesday the veterans deyoted the day 1 1 to relating how Blackhawk was followed to his I ' lair and received the 113th wound, which sent ' p ' him to the sward for the full count; also there s,'f were graphic narations of how many flint-tipped J arrows the veterans were forced to swallow dur- j k ing the famous maneuvers. There are about two I a ! hundred and fifty veterans at the encampment, , If i J and the oratory made It apparent that each one !H w ) f of the survivors was the man who killed Black- H I iff hawk, with the exception of Mr. John R. Twelves H I i ! Provo, who admits that he only wounded him. mL , I 'I : j j Every once in a while the battle waged so stren- I I ' J uously that some unwary Blackhawk veteran was , ' !' I seriously maimed by the Indian marksman. For- H I ' I ' instanco, there was the case of 'Beefsteak" John- H 1 1 J. son, who carelessly wandered beyond the skir- H ; f j. mish lines into a choice section of hunting ground, H Mrfj and before the two Blackhawk bullet-eaters who IB 0) essayed his rescue could rea"U him, received a H u 11 ' total influx of fifteen arrows Ju his anatomy. For 1 l-i'1 i f. M months and months afterwards he stated that he m f (i f i , f felt occasional acute paints. Just as the two vet- H l If ' erans were rescuing him and removing some sec- H I jf I , tions of the arrows tho Indians re-formed in battle H foil array and charged, 1,312 strong. "It was 900 yards I P ft to tlie camP" sad a veteran, "and 200 yards to p j m the cedars. While the arrows ere hailln' around l' ' I, us we made the cedars. It's been estimated that U , two Injuns was wounded in the battle." H ' f I ' One of the battles of most thrilling interest H fjlji during the momentous encounters occurred near H gk f T ' ' Springville. "Tho fight," narrated a veteran Hp r , whose whiskers swayed to his waistband, "lasted Hi yil from dawn until sunset, and several times we H J 4 thought all our scalps would be hanging in a m I'tf f wigwam before midnight. But we fit and fit and H P i H just before dark we sent 3,000 ot them skurrying M I ( S into the cedars. It was a giand victory." M y Jl "How many werfi killed?" asked some callow B BJ It M V 4 i stranger who had listened with breathless in- terept to tho ancient man's narrative. "Well, 1 can't say as, how there was any casualties cas-ualties to us," replied the veteran, "but Jim Ivy's stallion was killed." Whereat the waves resumed their lapping at the shore, as if infused with the battle spirit by the narrative of the Othello like exploiter of the grim war story. v &Z One grand feature of the encampment is that while each one of the two hundred, besides being the slayer of the Blackhawk, has the same military mili-tary rank, and no. one disputes any narrative related re-lated by his comrade. Each one is a brigadier-general, brigadier-general, except Mr. Twelves of Provo, who states that the only military titleto which he can lay claim is that of colonel. But withal the band of old and honored heroes he-roes look like the stern faced warriors of olden days. And if all of them did not kill Blackhawk, it is safe to say that one of them did, and in a society of such urbane and unalloyed fraternity of spirit it mattereth little. It s a much thinner and more venerable host than was gathered there one year ago, and the lapping of the waves which sound like lullabys to these grand old pioneers is scarcely swifter than the feeing years which will shortly carry them to the last great bivouac, where there will be no more tales of strife and no more wars. A. K. N. |