The Kiowa-Comanche Scout Detachment of the U.S. Scouts was located at the Indian agency near Fort Lone Wolf, Indian Territory. The unit was under the command of Captain Mack Hawkins, and had recently returned from a fighting expedition in the Rocky Mountains. Not long after they returned to their home garrison several significant changes occurred.
The first revision ordered the transfer of the scout unit from the agency to the garrison of Fort Lone Wolf. That meant they would perform their duties in accordance with Army and post regulations. They would dwell among white soldier’s families in an area called Soap Suds Row. And, like the whites, they would have the same type of two-room quarters.
The detachment quickly prepared for the move, packing belongings and taking down lodges. However, there was a rather sensitive problem that had to be taken care of first. Since polygamy was illegal in the United States, the post commander Major Thomas Berringer ordered that each scout could only take one of his wives to live with him in the garrison. This brought about a hurried conference between Captain Hawkins and his senior noncommissioned officer Sergeant Eagle Heart. Those two stalwarts decided that each scout would send one wife to live on his agency farm, taking all her children. The woman chosen to become an army wife would be transferred to Fort Lone Wolf with her brood. Several spats broke out among the women when choices were made, but the heavy hands of Indian husbands quickly settled those disagreements.
When all was ready, Captain Hawkins and Lieutenant Ludlow Dooley, along with the scouts, loaded their gear into quartermaster wagons to take property, wives and children to Fort Lone Wolf.
Hawkins and Ludlow, who had been living in tents, were given quarters located in the garrison on Officers Row. They each had a house made up of two rooms and a kitchen, though the captain’s was slightly larger.
There was a bit of a culture clash in the Indian households, since the scout’s wives had no idea how to cook on a stove. But luckily their oldest daughters had been taught that skill in the agency schoolteacher’s home. The girls quickly demonstrated the proper culinary skills to their mothers.
The post quartermaster provided further aid when he supplied the Indian families with brooms, buckets, pots, pans, skillets, and other domestic implements for the use of the women.
The Indian children of these families would no longer attend the agency school and would be getting their educations at the garrison schoolhouse. All the kids were fluent in the English language and had no trouble adapting to this change. Happily, neither white nor Indian children had any social or ethnical problems as they became playmates. The Indian boys took to baseball with gusto and several of them became the best players. The post schoolmaster found that boys will be boys no matter what, and the Indian girls became his best students the same as the white girls.
The Scout Detachment, being a military unit, was assigned an empty building as a combination orderly and supply room. Hawkins and Ludlow each had a desk and cabinets, which made tending to their paperwork much easier than it had been at the Indian Agency encampment. The other two buildings they needed— the ordnance storehouse and stables— were shared with other units at the garrison. This arrangement afforded them security for their weapons and ammunition. There was also the advantage of keeping their horses under roofs rather than outside in a corral.
From that point on, the scouts lived and worked as other soldiers in the United States Army. Their senior noncommissioned officer Sergeant Eagle Heart formed them up early each duty day, and marched them from their quarters over to the garrison area to begin a day of soldiering. They lived by the various bugle calls beginning with reveille and ending with call to quarters in a predictable schedule. The scouts were particularly happy when mess call was sounded by the post bugler. The rapid staccato of his musical instrument meant it was time to go to the mess hall for their mid-day meals.
The only thing hanging over their heads was the recent notice of a possible mission for them in the Arizona Territory. This had come some weeks earlier just after their arrival back at Fort Lone Wolf from Montana. Unfortunately, Captain Hawkins wasn’t able to get much information about the deployment. Lieutenant Ted Biltmore the post adjutant only knew that a possibility of a mission was in the works.
The people on the Guerras Apache Indian Reservation were busy preparing for the coming Ghost Dances. The tribal medicine man Pasimo had fallen completely under the spell of the Prophet. The pair did all the planning and preparation for the coming ceremonies. They found a spot away from the village in a hidden rocky gorge that was a perfect location for such a deeply religious ritual. Several teenage girls were given the task of sweeping the sandy ground with branches to make the dancing easier. When the task was done, Pasimo performed a purifying ceremony at the site. He spread sacred earth around the area while chanting words that only he and the Great Life Giver could understand.
The men prepared for the holy war by giving close attention to their personal arms and ammunition. This weaponry was given them as part of the treaty after their defeat. Unfortunately, the arms were obsolete single-shot Springfield Model 1870 .50 caliber carbines formerly used by the Army. The Apaches, now considering themselves warriors again, complained to both the Prophet and Pasimo that the weapons were not adequate for going on the warpath. The enemy would have much newer and better weapons. This meant it would take more time to kill off the whites. But the Prophet assured them there was nothing to worry about; the Great Life Giver would provide a solution in his own way.
Most of the time now, the warriors of the tribe sat around talking excitedly about the great adventure that awaited them. The women kept the camp running by doing their usual chores. Between their tasks, the wives also prepared the traditional clothing of their tribe for their men in this holiest of holy wars. They went to secret hiding places, bringing out the forbidden headbands, breechclouts, boot-length moccasins and medicine pouches.
The atmosphere on the reservation hummed with a hushed, but zealous anticipation.
Back at Fort Lone Wolf, another blessing occurred for the scout detachment that was the result of their accomplishments in Montana. This was the arrival of five Winchester 73 rifles. The weapons were part of twelve that the Northern Plains Railway System had purchased for use by Pinkerton Detectives originally hired to protect the railroad workers. Unfortunately, the private policemen suffered so many casualties that their bosses pulled them out of the project. They returned the Winchesters to the Northern Plains Railway and headed back east to their home office.
When the Kiowa-Comanche Scout Detachment showed up in the Montana Rocky Mountains, they were tasked with battling snipers. These bushwhackers were firing at surveyors laying out tracks in the mountains. For some unknown reason they did not want a railroad running through that particular area.
It wasn’t long before Captain Hawkins discovered his unit was outgunned by the outlaws. The scouts had single-shot Springfield Model 1890 carbines that were regular army issue. The Railroad quickly gave them seven of the superior Winchester 73 Rifles. The detachment used these weapons and, after accomplishing the mission, was allowed to keep them.
Now, because the danger to the railroad was over, the president of the line sent rifles in their stock to Fort Lone Wolf for the scout detachment’s permanent use. This windfall included five hundred rounds of ammunition. The repeating long arms had fifteen-round cartridge tubes that provided better firepower than army carbines
After these unexpected weapons were placed in the ordnance storehouse, Captain Hawkins and his men had one more pleasant surprise. This was an authorization from Department Headquarters at Fort Sill to enlist one more Kiowa or Comanche Indian as a scout. When this was announced, it started a great stir among the male Indians at the agency who had been forced into farming; an activity they loathed with every fiber of their being.
When Captain Mack Hawkins and Lieutenant Ludlow Dooley went out to the Southern Kiowa-Comanche Agency to enlist a single volunteer, they were overwhelmed by the number of Indians who wanted to join the United States Army. The agent Ned Turpin provided a table and two chairs inside the agency store to hold interviews.
Many of the applicants were older men even though it had been announced the age for enlistment was between eighteen and thirty years. A few of these individual Indians had actually fought against the U.S. Army in the old days, and argued that age was irrelevant. They had already proven their fighting ability. The youngest of these former Kiowa and Comanche warriors were in their forties while one wrinkled old ex-warrior was obviously in his eighties. There were also some young aspirants with obvious physical disabilities that would prevent them from passing the army medical exams. They were turned down politely and gratefully by Hawkins and Ludlow.
The process took all that day and it wasn’t until early dusk that the captain and lieutenant enlisted who they considered the right man. He was an eighteen-year-old Kiowa by the name of Michael Strongbow. He was physically fit, intelligent and literate, being a graduate of the agency school.
When Michael first stood in front of the officers, Ludlow asked him about his name. The young man replied, “My father’s name is Strong Bow. I am now using it as our family name. All my children will have the surname of Strongbow. Then my grandchildren and great-grandchildren forever and ever will be known as the Strongbow family.”
“That makes sense,” Captain Hawkins allowed. “So why did you choose to call yourself ‘Michael’?”
“I learned in church that Michael the Archangel cast Satan into hell,” Michael answered. “That makes him the strongest warrior of them all. I wish to carry his name.”
Ludlow smiled. “That’s a pretty good recommendation, Michael.”
Hawkins put the enlistment papers on the table. “Sign on the bottom line, Scout Strongbow.”