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Show 256 LEADING FACTS OF NEW MEXICAN HISTORY great blowhard. The counsel for the defense, whose name I have forgotten, was, as well as Wharton, a volunteer private, on furlough for the occasion. They had no doubt joined the ranks in hopes of political preferment on their return home, and the forests of Missouri may yet re-echo with Wharton’s stentorian voice, proclaiming to his hero-worshiping constituents how he ‘fought, bled, and died’ for his country’s liberties. . . Mr. St. Vrain was interpreter. When the witnesses (Mexican) touched their lips to the bible, on taking the oath, it was with such a combination of reverential awe for the book, and fear of Los Americanos, that I could not repress asmile. The poor things were as much frightened as the prisoners at the bar. It certainly did appear to be a great assumption on the part of the Americans to conquer a country, and then arraign the revolting inhabitants for treason. American judges sat on the bench, New Mexicans and Americans filled the jury-box and American soldiery guarded the halls, Verily, a strange mixture of violence and justice —a strange middle-ground between the martial and common law. ‘After an absence of a few minutes, the jury returned with a verdict of ‘guilty in the first degree’ — five for murder. one for 3 guardian for his children. graveyard which lay a short fort. About 1835 William He was buried distance near northeast Bent married his brother, of the northeast Owl Woman, Robert, in the bastion of the the daughter of White Thunder, an important man among the Cheyennes, and at that time the keeper of the medicine arrows. There were four children of this marriag e, Mary, born about 1836, Robert in 1839, George in 1843, Julia in 1847. Owl Woman died in 1847 in giving birth to Julia and and Colonel Bent afterwar ds married Yellow Woman, \ a sister of Owl Woman. Charles Bent was a child of this second marriage. Colonel Bent understood the Sioux language thoroughly, oe learned it while in the employ of the American Fur Company as early as _ About seventy miles above Bent’s Fort and immediate ly on the Arkansas river, there was a small settlement, the prin cipal part of which was composed of old trappers and hunters; the male part were mostly Americans, MissouriFrench, Canadians, and Mexicans, They had a tolerable supply of cattle, horses, mules, etc.; they raised a good crop of beans, corn, pumpkins, and other vege tables. They numbered about 150 souls, and of this number about sixty were men, nearly all having wives and some having two. Indian tribes, as Cheyenne, Pawnee, follows: Snake, Blackfoot, Sinpach (from the mouth of the Columbia) women were Mormons; a party of parture for California, left behind Assiniboine, (from west These wives were of various Aricaras, of the Great Sioux, Lakes) Arapaho, Chinook, Mexicans, and Americans. The American Mormons wintered there and on their detwo families, These people lived in two other; one called ‘‘Pueblo’’ and the other Separate establishments near each Hardscrabble.’’ Both villages were fortified by a wall twelve posed of adobe. These places became the resort of idlers and feet high comloafers. They were also the depots for the smugglers of liquor from New Mexico; and it was ering by American army officers that the places be carefully watched.— son to the Report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, Ex. Doe. 1, Pueblo Indian Governors who visited Washington, D. C., in 1862, to whom President Lincoln gave Canes, now used by all the Pueblo Governors as Badges of Authority |