Apache Campaigns - Fort Huachuca - U.S. Army

weather and make our report by mail. The last word in our code message at 9 p.m. was our
prognostication, “fair,” or “foul,” as to the ruling weather for the next twenty-four hours.
Prescott was at one end of a branch wire from the main line, Apache at the other. It was
some five hundred miles around that vast U, and about one hundred and fifty across its upper
end. I soon discovered that during an average period if it was clear and lovely at Apache, and
Prescott predicted “foul” for the next twenty-four hours at that place, it was safe to predict
“fair for Apache that time, but to make it “foul” for the next day’s prophecy. Nearly all storms
came from the west, and the rule generally held good during the seasons when storms were to
be expected....
The slender strand of wire which connected Fort Apache with the outside world in 1880
was very primitive. To the Apaches it was an exceedingly mysterious affair. The poles were
mostly cottonwood saplings, wired to cedar stubs set in the ground. One pole in fifty,
perhaps, could be called straight. The rest were as crooked as a ram’s horn.... With trees
falling across it and other accidents, the wire was down about as many days as it was up. 61
Colonel Eugene Asa Carr, commanding Fort Apache and the 6th Cavalry, was ordered to
arrest an Apache medicine man, Nokaydelklinne, whose preaching of an Apache rising was
stirring up trouble. Colonel Carr took Nokaydelklinne into custody and was returning to Fort
Apache on August 31, 1881, when he was surrounded by a large force of Apaches at Cibicu
Creek. In the ensuing melee, many of the Apache scouts with the column mutinied. Eleven
soldiers and seven civilians were killed, including several warriors.
Barnes was back at Fort Apache when the battle of Cibicu Creek was taking place. The
fort, largely undefended with Carr’s column in the field, feared an Apache attack. The telegraph
lines were out again, probably cut by hostile Indians, and the post was out of touch with the
network of Army posts. Rumors were being heard that Carr’s entire column had been wiped out,
leaving the small garrison at Fort Apache anxious about an attack. Barnes volunteered to man an
outlying mesa from which he could get a better view of the surrounding countryside and search
for a sign of Colonel Carr and his men. Threatened on all sides by hostile Indians, he remained in
position and with a signal flag alerted the fort to the return of Carr’s column. He was then sent
through hostile territory to relay news of the battle and ask for reinforcements. It was at a time
when few couriers were ever found alive again.
An account of Barnes’ actions was set down in later years by Brig. Gen. Thomas A.
Cruse, who as a lieutenant was stationed with the Signal sergeant at Fort Apache in 1881 and was
a member of Colonel Carr’s force.
[Major] Cochran [acting commander at Fort Apache in Carr’s absence] at last yielded
to the plea that some of the harried, retreating troops might be saved by prompt assistance,
which a signal from Barnes would enable him to give. So the Sergeant slipped out of the post,
carrying a good pair of field glasses, a revolver, and a small red signal flag.
He thought he was being very careful—so much so that the hostiles did not see him.
Actually, as the Apaches told us afterward, his every move was marked. But the Indians were
curious; and, since they felt that he could be killed at will, they let him go onto the mesa simply
to learn what he was about. Too, it was their idea that if the soldier were not fired upon,
others might be encouraged to venture out and their bag would be the larger.
Barnes went slowly and painfully to the mesa and there got out of the Indians’ view.
When an hour passed without sight of him some of the hostiles moved to the slope opposite the
post and started climbing to find and kill him. But he appeared suddenly on the very edge of
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HUACHUCA ILLUSTRATED