Little 'Prince", a pony I drove 15,000 miles in the work, was a jealous fellow. If I would talk to "Pansie", his mate, he would drop his head and go stumbling along, but when I would praise him up, both his head and tail were in the air and he would go skipping along like a little girl.

Lost Ponies on the Prairie.

The ways were not always smooth, but the results were blessed. My wife was with me when we undertook to go from Burwell to Valentine, Nebraska, to attend a Sunday school convention at the latter place. There was no road so we followed the "Bloody" to a point near where Duff is now. As night drew on and the ponies were tired, we decided to stop for the night. It was a lonely place, miles from any ranch or town, and surrounded by sandhills and lakes, but we knew we could go no further that night, so we sat up in the buggy. About two o'clock the mosquitoes were so numerous and fierce that our ponies broke loose and ran away. I followed them a distance but could not overtake them. At daylight we realized our situation, being out in a wild and uninhabitable section, so we left the buggy, walked seven miles in the sand and through lakes endeavoring to reach a man we saw camping the evening before. We reached his camp before he had eaten his breakfast, which he shared with us, and after talking the matter over we decided to leave Mrs. Frady with his wagon. Mr. Lilly, the name of the man, took one horse and rode back along the way we had come the day before. He went as far as Gracie Creek and stayed over night. I took the other horse and rode north and finally struck the trail of my ponies which I followed some distance. I found they kept their direction and did not turn aside for lake or anything and became convinced it was useless to follow them. Thus, following their trail back, I came to my buggy and after I had adjusted one set of harness to the horse I was riding, I hitched it to the buggy and led it to the place where my wife was, she being alone nearly all day among many wild range cattle. Again night came upon us without shelter.

White Faced Herd of Mark Downey, Georgetown. Photo Butcher Collection in Nebraska Historical Museum.

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We turned the man's wagon box upside down and crawled under it to get away from the mosquitoes. About ten o'clock we heard a roaring noise, soon several thousand cattle came madly rushing by. They had stampeded on account of myriads of mosquitoes and were hurrying to their laying grounds. They divided around our sleeping place first one and then another knocking the wagon box until it seemed it would surely be broken and we would be trampled beneath their merciless hoofs, but the wagon box withstood every jar and once more we were alone on the wide prairie. But no, not alone, for the cattle had left clouds of mosquitoes to annoy us. Wagon box or blankets did not seem to impede their ravenous work.

Mr. Lilly returned next morning, so we tied the buggy to his wagon and returned to Gracie Creek where we got something to eat, then went on to his home near Burwell (the town at that time was called Willow Springs). Mr. Lilly was a cowboy with a noble heart and would not forsake us. He was even willing to take us back to our home at Neligh a hundred miles away.

Troy Hale of Battle Creek.

On our way home we stopped at a cattle ranch on the Beaver Creek in Wheeler County. One of the rangers told me that a few miles out a party was camping who had bought a bunch of horses in the south and was taking them to the northern part of Nebraska to sell. Mr. Lilly and I rode out to the horse camp. I knew the man, Troy Hale of Battle Creek, Nebraska, and after relating to him my troubles he said that he had a large mare and a Jinney mule which were broken to drive and he would let me have them to finish our way back home. I had quite a task to adjust my pony harness to fit the large mare and the Jinny mule. Next morning after thanking the people who had entertained us over night and giving to Mr. Lilly seven

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Troy Hale was a brother of Senator F. J. Hale, a leading democrat, stockman and capitalist of northern Nebraska. The Hale brothers came from Virginia to Battle Creek and served in the confederate army during the civil war. Troy Hale was an "original character," even in a frontier region. He was one of the famous horse traders of the Elkhorn valley and possessed one of the most lurid and picturesque vocabularies the writer ever heard. He was warm hearted and generous, but certainly very far from being a Sunday School superintendent at the time the writer knew him.

dollars, being all the money we had, the amount meagerly paying him for his extreme kindness to us, we started. For awhile the little Jinney trotted along, keeping abreast with the mare, but finally lagged. Our direction was through the sandhills with no road and because of the slowness of the little mule we could not keep a straight line, consequently we had to tack, the same as sailors at sea, thus we made very slow headway. At nightfall we came to a place where a couple of men were building a barn near a settlement. We stopped, had no supper, and gathered the shavings together for a bed and fought mosquitoes. Next morning I walked a mile to a German's home where the lady gave me some bread and milk to carry back, which we ate and drank with a relish. Starting on we met a man and told him about our loss. In answer he said that his neighbor had taken up a span of ponies that fitted our description and on going to the place we found that sure enough they were ours. Referring to a map, I found that the ponies had kept a direct line from the place sixty miles from where they had broken loose and were traveling in line of Neligh, our home. It was Sunday morning when we recovered our ponies and after hitching them up we canvassed two settlements that day and organized two Sunday schools. Monday, the next day, we reached home.

I picketed out the man's animals on good grass and had another person take care of them until the owner would come after them which he did two weeks later.

Major Clifford, Indian Agent, Gives Help.

 The next day driving into the agency at Lame Deer I saw the stage was just leaving for Rosebud. Major Clifford, the agent, was on the stage. He asked the driver to wait, for he wished to see a party just coming in. The Major came up and shook hands with me and said, "Elder, I wish to congratulate and thank you for the wonderful work and interest that you established among the Indian parents to have their children educated." He told me that every effort put forth heretofore had only secured at any one time thirty‑seven pupils, counting all in attendance at the Government school at the agency and the Catholic Parochial

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school out at Tongue River; but since you were here the parents have shown much interest in having their children educated" saying further, "last week I sent 150 Indian boys and girls to Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and now I am going to Rosebud to make arrangements to send as many more next week. Stop a few days with us again, put your team in the government barn, and you and your daughter go to the hotel and I will see that all bills are paid." We remained a few days, visiting the Indians during the day, and held special meetings for the soldiers in their quarters in the evening.

From thence we went to the Crow Agency and on arriving there, I saw a tepee across the way. Going over to it I found an elderly Cheyenne Indian and his daughter fourteen years and his son twelve years occupied the tepee. The Indian father stood and said, "I am an old tree, limbs broken off, leaves nearly all fallen off, I no good," but pointing to his daughter and son said, "These heap good, young trees, they go to Carlisle, get much in head, come back by and by, have many limbs, much leaves, read to me, help Cheyennes, I go back home, soon die, but these live long"' He took my hand and thanked me for what I had been able to do for them. Both he and his children remembered me.

Crows Take up Collection for Missionary Wife.

This tribe I did much for and found a good spirit among them. Just here I would like to relate two or three instances:

First -- By accident, I left a letter which I had received from my wife, at Rev. Burgess' home where I stopped. My wife stated in the letter that she was in destitute circumstances, living then near Chadron, Nebraska, that year being a drouth. Bro. Burgess read the letter to the Sunday school and the Indian boys and girls of the school brought an offering of $35.00 and sent it to my wife. He did not know where I was at that time.

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© 2004 for the NEGenWeb Project by Ted & Carole Miller