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stopped behind him. The driver, flashing his lantern on the upturned face, said he was dead. Not yet, old man,' was the reply of the youth, as he opened his eyes. I'm not yet even a candidate for the hospital!' He was placed on a sleigh and carried the rest of the journey; and next morning, after a good sleep and warm breakfast, he was as lively as a cricket, and ready for the fray."

Such are a few of the incidents of this eventful and trying march. It is but just to say that the officials of the Railway Company did everything that was possible to mitigate the discomforts of the passage. The supply officers on the line of march also did their duty in providing the men with the creature comforts. The strain on the resources of the railway, involved in the movement of the eastern volunteers to the front, was great, but great as it was the staff was equal to the demands upon the road. In the first twenty days of April, the Railway Company conveyed over its nearly two thousand miles of track 3,000 officers and men, 150 horses, and four guns, in addition to the Winnipeg regiments and other local organisations moved to various points in the west.

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CHAPTER XVIII.

MIDDLETON'S MARCH TO CLARKE'S CROSSING.

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O mass two or three thousand troops, on war's horrid mission, in the peaceful valley of the Qu'Appelle seemed little short of an outrage, Had the season been summer, when the prairie flowers were in bloom, it would have been desecration. To have cut up that rich carpet of red lilies, white anemones, and purple pentstemons, with the great wheels of the cannon, and trampled its beauty under the heedless heel of armed men, would have been a great wrong to Nature, and wakened keener sorrow than that which stirred the heart of the Scottish poet when his ploughshare upturned the Mountain Daisy and crushed it "beneath the furrow's weight." But Nature's protecting covering was still over the region, and the rich soil had not yet thrown up its scented life to be mangled under foot. No matter were winter's robe soiled by the tramplings of the troops, and its beauty marred by the movement of three or four hundred transport carts, for the storm-king was abroad as the troops mustered at Qu'Appelle, and the day's soilings would be eavily coated by the night's white shroud.

"The night sets in on a world of snow,

While the air grows sharp and chill,
And the warning roar of a fearful blow

Is heard on the distant hill;

And the norther, see! on the mountain peak

In his breath how the old trees writhe and shriek !

He shouts on the plain, ho-ho! ho-ho!

He drives from his nostrils the blinding snow,
And growls with a savage will."

But the valley of the Qu'Appelle had seen strife ere now Long ago its plains had often witnessed the shock of intertribal encounter. Between the Crees and the Blackfeet there had been years of feud, though the presence of the Mounted Police and the influence of a better day had now taught them peace. Savagery was in truth giving place to civilisation. The beautiful district was fast becoming the favoured resort of the settler, from the issue of the river at "The Elbow," on the South Saskatchewan, to its junction with the Assiniboine, at Fort Ellice. The region, geographically, belongs to the Second Prairie Steppe, succeeding that of the Lake Winnipeg basin, which forms the First. It extends from the Souris River on the south, and circling round the Pheasant, File, and Touchwood Hills, bears away northward to the Birch Hills, this side of Prince Albert. On the east it is bounded by the western limits of the Province of Manitoba, in long. 101° 30′, and extends to the Lignite Tertiary Plateau, in about long. 107° W. North-westward of this great tract lay the scene of the insurrection. In that quarter, also, stretched the line of loyal settlement along the North Saskatchewan that was in jeopardy from the outbreak. Hither had General Middleton and his staff* come, with the Winnipeg volunteers, to organise the

* The following officers composed the General's Field staff: Lord Melgund; Hon. Maurice Gifford, brother of Lord Gifford, of Ashantee fame; Hon. C. Freer, grandson of Lord Saye and Sale; Capt. Wise, and Lieut. Doucet, A.D.C. Capt. Buchan, of the 90th Winnipeg Rifles, and formerly of the " Queen's Own," Toronto, acted as Field Adjutant.

North-West Field Force and determine the plan of the campaign. The date of the encounter with the rebels at Duck Lake, it will be remembered, was the 26th of March. On the 23rd, anticipating trouble in the North-West, the Major-General in command of the Militia, left Ottawa for Winnipeg. On the 26th he reached the Prairie Capital, and the following day left, with the Manitoba troops, for Qu'Appelle. Here was the military rendezvous and the base of operations.

The morning of the 30th of March saw the first, though a precautionary, movement of the Field Force. On that day the General sent forward from the Fort three companies of the Winnipeg Rifles and the Armstrong gun, to protect the northern approaches to the rallying-place, to gather news of the rebels and of the threatened rising of the Indians in the neighbourhood, and to extend succour to such of the northern settlers as were fleeing from their homes to a place of safety. With the rebels, it was thought, there would be a speedy reckoning, though the character of the country was favourable to guerilla warfare, and the half-breeds knew every nook and covert of the region. The chief alarm was as to the attitude of the Indians. All eyes were turned upon their reserves, and the restless movements of the young braves of the several tribes gave occasion for much uneasiness. Where the Indians were likely to be approached by the disloyal half-breeds, it was feared they would go on the war-path. In the isolated districts in the north, where hunger was not satisfied, it was considered certain they would make descent upon settlements and raid Hudson Bay posts for food and provender. Battleford and Prince Albert were known to be in especial danger. Hence the campaign had in view, not only to suppress the half-breed insurrection, but to relieve the settlements on the North Saskatchewan from apprehended attack. The more speedy

the attainment of this dual object, the less danger there would be of a general Indian uprising.

With wise and prompt decision, General Middleton's design was to make an instant movement on the heart of the insurrection. Not an hour had been lost in reaching the base of operations; and with cool impatience the General awaited the arrival of the troops from the East. Nor had the latter tarried on the way; in ten days, thanks to the railway facilities, two thousand miles had been covered, plus the weariful march over "the gaps" on the road. This, it will be remembered, was a greater distance than that traversed in 1870 by General Wolseley's expedition, which consumed the whole summer of that year in its transportation from Toronto to the Red River. But toilsome as had been the journey of the troops to Qu'Appelle, a forlorn two hundred mile march lay before them ere they could look upon the foe.

The period of the year, as it happened, was the worst the Fates could have chosen for moving a body of men over the Prairie trail to the front. Earlier, or later, in the season travel over the region would have been shorn of its discomfort and difficulty. From the arsenals of the north, the hoar monarch was discharging the last of his wintry weapons. Snow still lay heavy on the plains, and the warm spring sun melted down earth's white covering to be frozen over night and again thawed the next day. The line of march was either spongy with sodden earth or covered with water a foot deep. Such was the condition of the country the Field Force had to traverse, in this “land of magnificent distances."

Pending the arrival of the Eastern troops there was much to be done. The organisation and equipment of an army in the field was no light task, with every contingency to be provided for, and provision made for a distant march from the

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