CHAPTER 3

THE MEXICAN WAR, 1846 - 1848

 

Santa Fe was a busy staging post, and the Union Army were eager to take anyone who offered his services. The recruiting sergeant looked the two young men up and down. "Age?" he barked.

"Sixteen." they both replied.

The sergeant looked askance but did not question them further. "Next of kin?"

"Don't have any." replied John, his blue eyes widely innocent.

"Orphan?"

"Yes, sir!

"That go for you too, son?" he asked Orville.

"Yes, sir." Orville's face was expressionless.

"Right - sign here - and here." he pointed to the form. "Hm. Had some book-learnin', eh?" he asked John, as he saw him reading the form and writing his name clearly.

"A little, sir."

"You too?" he said, addressing Orville.

"I can count and write some, sir."

"Good. Officer material. We leave for Fort Apache in the mornin'."

---oo0oo---

Orville hated the drilling, square-bashing and discipline that is part and parcel of a good efficient army. He felt rebellious and nearly quit, except that John kept goading him as "Chicken" when he heard his friend complain.

As soon as they had been trained to fire a musket, gun and use a bayonet and knife for hand-to-hand combat, they were sent out with a detachment to fight the Mexicans for their territory.

For two years the war waged between New Mexico, Arizona and California. By his own intelligence and through heavy losses, Sherman was soon promoted to Captain and insisted on Orville serving with him as his Lieutenant. Together they shared the exhilaration and squalour of war, shared their last drops of food and water together, fought back to back and side by side. The better organised American Army defeated the Mexicans but with heavy loss of life on both sides. The camaraderie and friendship between Orville and John deepened and, as the war drew to its inevitable end, they discussed what they would do on their discharge. Both agreed to go home again. They had sent letters to their parents in Kansas, but had had no word back. They simply took it that the cause was the irregular and unreliable mail service.

---oo0oo---

News spread around the barracks and forts that the peace treaty was to be signed within the next few days. Troops were ordered to report to the recruiting post they had enlisted at to receive their demob papers so a detachment, headed by Captain John Sherman, rode out of Silver City towards El Paso. There were 20 men in the detachment, riding in twos with pride and. precision. Riding by Sherman's side, as always, was Lieutenant Orville Miller. They were riding through a canyon in the late afternoon, watching the walls of the sharp cliffs for any movement. The only warning they got was a shout of "Viva Mexico!" before a fusillade of bullets tore into the detachment. As if in slow motion, Orville saw a puff of dust as a bullet hit John in the chest, a look of surprise crossing his face before he slid from the saddle. Orville's horse went from under him. The troop were being picked off one by one, and Orville tried to get beside his fallen comrade. John was lying face down, a grimace of pain on his face. Suddenly enraged, Orville broke from the cover his dead horse afforded him and lay beside John, shooting at the puffs of smoke on the canyon walls. He saw one man tumble from his high position, then another, before a searing pain lanced along the side of his head, and he knew no more.

---oo0oo---

The first sensation he was aware of as consciousness returned was pain in the side of his head. He was lying on top of someone. Very slowly, he opened his eyes. It was nearly dark, and, as he stirred, he felt a tiny movement from the man beneath him.

"John?" he whispered, afraid that the killers were still around. A tiny sound came from John, who was still lying face down in the sand. Orville flicked his eyes around as far as he could see without moving. He heard low moans from one or two other survivors of the massacre, but could see none of the marauders. Grimacing, he gingerly touched the side of his head. His hand came away wet with blood. He gently rolled away from John and could see a large pool of blood staining the sand under him.

"John! Can you hear me?" Slowly he turned his friend over and was shocked to see the navy blue uniform soaked with blood.

"Orville." The word was a mere whisper.

"Hold on, John, you're gonna be all right! We're gonna make it!" he said, cradling his friend in his arms as he lay by his side.

"No," whispered John. "No more ... time." he gasped. He feebly raised his right hand, then his left, and tried to take the gold ring he wore off the third finger of his right hand. "No strength. This ring. Take ... this ring home to papa. Tell them I love them ... Orville ..." Then he shuddered violently, his hand fell to his side and the blue eyes looking up at Orville saw no more.

Orville, tears flowing unashamedly from his eyes, took the ring from the dead hand and placed it on his own finger. He still sat, gently rocking John's body, as the sun sank behind the canyon walls. The pain in his head soared as the bleeding started again, and he slowly slipped into unconsciousness.

---oo0oo---

The detachment which left Silver City an hour behind them found the two friends like that, as darkness enveloped the canyon of death. Orville was the sole survivor.

---oo0oo---

Orville regained consciousness in a bed, his head swathed in bandages. A man was sitting at the bedside. "Welcome back." the man said in a southern drawl. "Don't move, you've had a bad crease in yore haid. Just close your eyes if you can hear me."

Orville closed his eyes.

"Good, good. You're in El Paso, and you're gonna stay in that bed till I tell yew ta get up. Clear?"

Orville closed his eyes again. He really didn't feel like leaping up and riding around at that moment, anyway. With his right thumb he felt John's ring on his finger. He sighed, a feeling of unbearable sorrow deep within him.

"Now, yew jest drink this - it'll make yew sleep s'more, 'n the more yew sleep, the quicker y'all get better."

The doctor placed a cup against his lips and Orville drank. As the potion took effect, he closed his pain-filled eyes and slept.

---oo0oo---

Three weeks later he was sitting on the sidewalk in the warm sunshine. The war over, he had received his discharge papers and a medal for the last action. "A medal for getting massacred." he thought, ironically. He took the medal off with his uniform, and never wore it again. He rode out to the military garrison and laid the medal on John's grave, lightly burying it in the topsoil. "This is for you, my friend." he thought. "I must go now, but we will ride together again, some other day." Then, mounting his horse, he rode away.

The victorious Army had given him the horse, civilian clothes and enough money to return to Kansas. It seemed to the 17-year-old Orville that he had already lived a lifetime.

---oo0oo---

CHAPTER 4

CONTENTS