I think few of the people of our country today realize how recently such horrors have been committed. For most of them it is a matter of the long forgotten past. We left Fort Sill about the middle of August, 1871 and had for company Mrs. Harmon, wife of Lieutenant Harmon, who captured the horse thieves and Mrs. Brown, wife of the post surgeon, and their little baby and nurse girl. We had an escort of a half dozen men under command of a sergeant as far as Fort Gibson, Indian Territory, near the junction of the Grand and Arkansas rivers, and from there to the end of the railroad two or three men to help about camp. The M., K. and T. railroad was then only finished to Pryor's creek and we had to take a freight train from there to Chetopa, Kansas, the end of the passenger run. We camped at Stearn's ranch the first night out of Fort Sill. As we were starting the following morning we were informed that a dead man had just been found near the road we were to take, and only two or three miles away. We got some tools at the ranch and stopped long enough to bury him. He had soldier's clothes on and had probably been only recently discharged from the service. A little money was found in his pocket which I told the sergeant to take and on his return to Fort Sill try and have the man identified, if possible, and send the money to his friends. He had not been dead long as the wolves had not disturbed the body. Our night camp on the Washita was something we shall always remember. Before it got dark the mosquitoes had made our acquaintance in such numbers that we were doubtful of our night's rest, but we had the tent put up and supper over without suffering serious loss of blood. They kept coming in greater numbers until we realized that the first were only installments of the advance guard, and by bedtime they were almost unbearable. We smudged the tent to drive them out but only succeeded in driving out the little nurse girl who was caring for the baby. I tried my usual place in the ambulance for a nap but could not sleep and heard the women talking in the tent until toward midnight when I called my wife and told her that if she would come out to the ambulance I would try and keep the mosquitoes off her until she could get a little rest. We tried that for an hour but had to acknowledge our defeat and we still heard the other women talking in the tent. I was now ready to surrender, so called the sergeant and told him to have the ambulance driver hitch up and we would get out of there and he and the escort could come on when they liked, as we were then away from danger from the Indians. We drove for some time after daylight and found a beautiful camp ground with fine running water and went into camp. The escort was not far behind us--they had also met with defeat. We spent that day and the following night in that camp and had a good rest. The escort had brought a cub bear along and he was a very amusing rascal although a cause of some anxiety to the women.