Oh! happy hour! Methinks the angels smiled in their celestial abodes when they witnessed that dear mother’s joy. The reader naturally supposes that here my narrative ought to end; that, restored to husband, mother, and friends, my season of sorrow must be over. But not so. Other trials were in store for me, and, even fortified as I was by past tribulation, I sank almost despairingly under their affliction. Nor was I yet done with the Indians. Anxious to again establish a home, we left Geneva, went to Shawneetown, where we prospered; but better prospects offering farther west, we went to Ellsworth, a new town just staked out on the western line of Kansas. I was the first woman who located there. We lived in our wagon for a time, then built a hotel, and were prospering, when fears of the Indians again harassed us. The troops at Fort Harker, four miles east of Ellsworth, had been out, under General Hancock, in pursuit of the Indians, to punish them for murders and depredations committed along the line of the Pacific Railroad, and coming upon an Indian camp, destroyed it, inflicting a severe chastisement. This we knew would so exasperate the Indians as to render the situation of the exposed settlements one of great danger; and after my experience, a terrible dread of again falling into their hands intensified my apprehensions for our safety. The scouts, Jack Harvey and “Wild Bill,” were constantly on the lookout, and eagerly would we look toward the hills for any one who could give us news, and gather around them, when they came from the front, with anxious faces and listening ears. Meantime the population of Ellsworth had rapidly increased, and military companies were formed for protection. Thus we lived in a continual state of alarm, until at last one night the signal was given that the Indians were approaching, when every man flew to his post, and the women and children fled to the places of refuge that had been prepared for them, an iron-clad house and a “dug-out,” or place under ground. I fled to the latter place, where about fifty altogether had congregated, and among them were three young men who were the sole survivors of a large family—father, mother, and two sisters—murdered and horribly mutilated in the Minnesota massacres. The Indians were repulsed, but they continued to harass us and threaten the town, so that it became necessary to apply for military protection. Accordingly, a number of colored troops were sent there, which imparted a feeling of security. But Ellsworth was doomed to a more terrible scourge, if possible, than the Indians had threatened to be. The troops were recently from the South. Soon after their arrival among us, the cholera broke out among them, and, spreading among the citizens, created a terrible panic. The pestilence was most destructive, sweeping before it old and young, and of all classes. My husband fell a victim to the disease.