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Vanished Arizona, las recollections of the army life de Martha Summerhayes, una chica de Nantucket casada con un teniente destinado al Territory en 1874. Para hacerse una idea de lo que era aquello, basta saber que tuvo que ir hasta San Francisco y bordear en un vapor la entera península de California con objeto de alcanzar la desembocadura del Colorado y remontar el río. En los mapas que no eran recientes la zona era señalada como “Unexplored”. Una vez allí, esta joven que se había dedicado a estudiar alemán experimentó de lleno la frontier life: atravesó en carreta montañas por las que nunca había pasado una (sic), vivió en acantonamientos en medio de los belicosos apaches o en mortecinos villorrios mexicanos, tuvo un hijo en las condiciones precarias que cabe suponer para la época y el lugar, cruzó desfiladeros con un revólver a mano por si tenía que evitar un destino terrible para ella y su hijo... Martha es una excelente y encantadora narradora que nos hace partícipes absortos de sus vivencias.

Les copio unos fragmentos:

I concluded that my New England bringing up had been too serious, and wondered if I had made a dreadful mistake in marrying into the army, or at least in following my husband to Arizona. I debated the question with myself from all sides, and decided then and there that young army wives should stay at home with their mothers and fathers, and not go into such wild and uncouth places. I thought my decision irrevocable.

***

The Indians who lived on this reservation were the White Mountain Apaches, a fierce and cruel tribe… But this tribe was now under surveillance of the Government, and guarded by a strong garrison of cavalry and infantry at Camp Apache. They were divided into bands, under Chiefs Pedro, Diablo, Patone and Cibiano; they came into the post twice a week to be counted, and to receive their rations of beef, sugar, beans, and other staples, which Uncle Sam's commissary officer issued to them.
In the absence of other amusement, the officers' wives walked over to witness this rather solemn ceremony.
I used to walk up and down between the lines, with the other women, and the squaws looked at our clothes and chuckled, and made some of their inarticulate remarks to each other. The bucks looked admiringly at the white women, especially at the cavalry beauty, Mrs. Montgomery, although I thought that Chief Diablo cast a special eye at our young Mrs. Bailey, of the infantry.
Diablo was a handsome fellow. I was especially impressed by his extraordinary good looks.
Some of the younger girls were extremely pretty… The Apaches, both men and women, had not then departed from the customs of their ancestors, and still retained the extraordinary beauty and picturesqueness of their aboriginal dress.
The young lieutenants sometimes tried to make up to the prettiest ones, and offered them trinkets, pretty boxes of soap, beads, and small mirrors (so dear to the heart of the Indian girl), but the young maids were coy enough; it seemed to me they cared more for men of their own race.

***

I had no time to be lonely now, for I had no nurse, and the only person who was able to render me service was a laundress of the Fifth Cavalry, who came for about two hours each day, to give the baby his bath and to arrange things about the bed. I begged her to stay with me, but, of course, I knew it was impossible.

So here I was, inexperienced and helpless, alone in bed, with an infant a few days old. Dr. Loring, our excellent Post Surgeon, was both kind and skillful, but he was in poor health and expecting each day to be ordered to another station. My husband was obliged to be at the Commissary Office all day, issuing rations to troops and scouts, and attending to the duties of his position.

But, realizing in a measure the utter helplessness of my situation, he sent a soldier up to lead a wire cord through the thick wall at the head of my bed and out through the small yard into the kitchen. To this they attached a big cow-bell, so, by making some considerable effort to reach up and pull this wire, I could summon Bowen, that is, if Bowen happened to be there.

But I grew weaker and weaker with trying to be strong, and one day when Jack came in and found both the baby and myself crying, he said, man-like, "What's the matter?". I said, "I must have some one to take care of me, or we shall both die".

***

In the course of the day, we had passed a sort of sign-board, with the rudely written inscription, "Camp Starvation", and we had heard from Mr. Bailey the story of the tragic misfortunes at this very place of the well-known Hitchcock family of Arizona. The road was lined with dry bones, and skulls of oxen, white and bleached in the sun, lying on the bare rocks. Indeed, at every stage of the road we had seen evidences of hard travel, exhausted cattle, anxious teamsters, hunger and thirst, despair, starvation, and death.

***

The next morning we entered the vast Colorado desert. This was verily the desert, more like the desert which our imagination pictures, than the one we had crossed in September from Mojave. It seemed so white, so bare, so endless, and so still; irreclaimable, eternal, like Death itself. The stillness was appalling… It seemed very far off from everywhere and everybody…
We drew up before a large wooden structure. There were no trees nor grass around it. A Mexican worked the machinery with the aid of a mule, and water was bought for our twelve animals, at so much per head. The place was called Mesquite Wells; the man dwelt alone in his desolation, with no living being except his mule for company. How could he endure it! I was not able, even faintly, to comprehend it; I had not lived long enough. He occupied a small hut, and there he staid, year in and year out, selling water to the passing traveller; and I fancy that travellers were not so frequent at Mesquite Wells a quarter of a century ago.
The thought of that hermit and his dreary surroundings filled my mind for a long time after we drove away.

***

The Piute Indians were supposed to be peaceful, and their old chief, Winnemucca, once the warlike and dreaded foe of the white man, was now quiet enough, and too old to fight. He lived, with his family, at an Indian village near the post.

He came to see me occasionally. His dress was a curious mixture of civilization and savagery.
Winnemucca did not disdain to accept some little sugar-cakes from me, and would sit down on our veranda and munch them.

He always showed me the pasteboard medal which hung around his neck, and which bore General Howard's signature; and he always said: "General Howard tell me, me good Injun, me go up—up—up" —pointing dramatically towards Heaven. On one occasion, feeling desperate for amusement, I said to him: "General Howard very good man, but he make a mistake; where you go, is not up—up—up, but", pointing solemnly to the earth below us, "down—down—down". He looked incredulous, but I assured him it was a nice place down there.
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