Summit SpSummit Springs Battleground. Sterling, Colorado. Oil n canvas. 50 x 66 inches. 2000

Journal additions January 2, 2000 Summit Springs, Sterling Colorado
Stopping at a Texaco station in Fort Morgan for fuel, the grease-monkey manning the pump warned me that Wray—and nearby Beecher’s Island battlefield—would be another 90 miles, more than two hours’ drive to the east, serious distances that in the dead of winter would demand a more serious vehicle than my fishtailing rear-wheel drive 1996 Ford Ranger.
I never traveled into the Rockies or out onto the plains, without an emergency supply of energy bars and water, a couple of Mylar survival blankets, an army surplus folding spade, some flares, and a .357 revolver loaded alternately with snake-shot and hollow-points. My first cell-phone purchase was almost a year in the future. GPS was unavailable for civilian use. The gas-station attendant warned me to be on the lookout for police.
“It’s a hell of a boring trip along here. Cops out there are plenty bored. They might just stop you to have someone to talk to. I got pulled over, once driving a truck that couldn’t go 60. Speed limit out here is 65.”
He tells me that brother got stopped for speeding one day on the road to Wray. An open warrant on some minor offense landed him in the county calaboose. Getting to Beecher’s Island would require a full day of cop-dodging mind-numbing travel in a four-wheel drive vehicle. That was the gist of it. This new intelligence caused me to abandon the idea in favor of a return visit to Tall Bull’s last stand.
Steering onto the off-ramp at Sterling I turned east, diving into the rolling high plains that spread out before me like a vast sea of burnt grass. Wire fences snagged tumbleweeds. A jackrabbit darted across the unpaved road fifty yards ahead. Clouds of brown dust tossed up in the whirlwind wake of my pickup truck. Beneath golden skies, the blue saw-tooth horizon of the Rockies disappeared from my rearview
Arriving at Summit Springs battlefield at around 3:30 in the afternoon, a bright sun blazed above a wall of dark clouds rolling in from the southwest. Stepping out of the vehicle, I noticed a few clumps of brown fur on a patch of earth stained with about as much blood as might be contained by a rabbit. Strewn about were more bits of the same fur, souvenirs of a savage feast enjoyed perhaps by some coyote, or feathery raptor.
Making drawings and photographs of the deep gully canyon and the narrow vale that separated me from it, I worked in haste as storm-clouds approached
Someone had put the leg bone of a slightly larger animal, perhaps a coyote, atop Susanna Alderdice’s grave-marker. A new penny rested on a ledge of a stone monument to Frank and Luther North. The stone obelisk had been dedicated on the fortieth anniversary of the fight in 1909. Luther North attended the ceremony. His more famous brother Frank had passed away many years before. A member of Buffalo Bill Cody’s Congress of Rough Riders, Frank North later struggled with celebrity, drink and depression.
The North brothers had earned a reputation by leading a battalion of Pawnee scouts into various actions against hostiles during the 1860s and 1870s. Attached to Eugene Carr’s command, the North brothers and their Pawnee Battalion participated in the attack against Cheyenne Dog Soldiers, who were encamped along a small creek near a maze of deep gullies visible today.
Re-enacted many times his “Wild West” show, the battle culminates with Carr’s favorite scout rushing to the aid of two white women. Moments after Susanna Alderdice is tomahawked, Buffalo Bill Cody comes galloping up. He dispatches Tall Bull with a six-shooter, saving Teutonic beauty Maria Weichel from the same fate as her fellow captive.
An eyewitness account alleged that amid the confusion and panic during Carr’s attack, Weichel and Alderdice were confronted by Tall Bull’s wife, a jealous woman who sought to kill them both. Alderdice took the first bullet and died instantly. Struggling with her assailant, the rifle discharged, sending a bullet through one of her breasts just as Cody, or perhaps someone else, intervened to save her. Described as unusually attractive, a disfigured bosom did not keep Weichel from finding a husband and getting on with her life. Conflicting reports credit Frank North with killing the Cheyenne leader, who with his men had taken shelter in the muddy canyon northwest of the monuments. Most are willing to let Cody take the credit. Scholars and western-history buffs debate the point, but Carleton Young’s memorable line from John Ford’s classic film, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, seems to sum it up.
“When the legend become fact, print the legend”

Unlike Cody, the North brothers today have faded from memory. One of the most touching battle markers I have ever visited is a standing vertical slab of rough-cut stone, honoring the Cheyenne boy who was shot down, as he attempted to rescue the pony-herd. Bundles of dried flowers and herbs rest around its base. Smooth pebbles balanced on its flat upper edge remind me of visiting-stones on Jewish graves, or Major Patrick Ferguson’ grave.
On October 7, 1780, a force of Patriot militia attacked a detachment of British and Loyalist troops under the command of Ferguson at Kings, Mountain North Carolina. Killed in action, hastily buried by his slayers, Ferguson’s body was covered with stones. Adding stones to the pile, reverent visitor over the years have built a substantial cairn. The tradition seems to traverse cultural boundaries. One of the landmarks of Ireland is Cnoc na Riabh, the grave of Queen Maeve. The large cairn crowns a ribbed hill, on the Atlantic coast of Sligo. Leaving a stone may bring good luck, but removing one risks being cursed. No archaeologist has dared to excavate the monument.

Kealakekua Bay. Hawai’i Skechbook. July 9, 2015. Across the bay a small monument stands, marking the place where Royal Navy Captain James Cook was killed in a skirmish that could have been avoided by giving the indigenous warriors a bucket of nails.

I encountered similar traditions on the island of Hawai’i. Leis had been presented to me as greeting-gifts and marks of respect. Discovering that they never would be allowed to return with me to the mainland, I drove to the end of Puuhonau Road, to cast them into Kealakekua Bay. Standing near a small heiau, two indigenous men were pitching unlicensed snorkel-tours. The younger man had a stunning physique, his torso covered with traditional tattoos. Explaining my dilemma to them, the young man said to me,
“These leis were made with love, and given to you with respect. They’re yours. It’s a bummer you can’t take them home with you. I appreciate that you don’t want to put them in the garbage. Go ahead and lay them on the water. That’s cool. But whatever you do, don’t take anything from the island, not even a shell, a rock or a pebble. They belong to the sea and the land. We have to respect that.”

Summit Springs Battleground. Sterling, Colorado. Oil on canvas. 30 x 5 inches. 2000

Setting up next to the battle-monument, I take notes and make sketches. A large SUV arrives. Three white males emerge, dressed in blaze-orange ball-caps and vests. Drawing their weapons from soft cases, they nod to me politely, scramble over the wire-fence and march off to a pond half a mile away. Working on a small oil-study, I hear the distant bark of shotguns. An hour later the hunters return, each with a couple of canvasback ducks. The depart. I linger awhile. After five o’clock the light fades. The mercury suddenly plunges. Purple shadows flood the wide hollows between prairie-swales tipped with gold. A sudden burst of sunlight reveals Tall Bull’s last refuge, jagged gashes, ripped by giant claws into the prairie. Removing the painting from the easel, I set the panel inside the upturned lid of a cardboard banker-box that served as my drying-tray. Wiping my brushes, I scraped the palette, packed my box-easel, securing it all with bungee cords, in the bed of my truck. Climbing into the cab, I take a swig of cold coffee, light a cigar and throw the truck into gear. Loading the Chieftains’ album, The Long Black Veil into the cassette-player, the first track is a lamentation performed by Sting.

Sé mo laoch mo ghile mear
Sé mo Shéasar, gile mear
Suan gan séan ní bhfuair mé féin
Ó chuaigh I gcéin mo ghile mear

A bold and gallant chevalier
A high-born scion of gentle mein
A fiery blade engaged to lead
He’ll break the bravest in the field

Driving up and away from the muddy turnaround is like rising up out of a tomb. In raking sunlight, dust-clouds chase my truck, glowing like afterburners. Stretching out across the plain from both sides of the road, blazing amber stubble fades to rust. A jackrabbit darts across the road. Storm-clouds roll east toward Kansas to bust up trailer-parks, or deliver farm-girls to Munchkins. Along the southwestern horizon, the twin summits of Long’s Peak rise above the shadowed plain. A gash in the clouds glows fiery orange. A thousand points of light appear in black skies overhead. Near the ground an eerie toxic glow to the southwest–the orange luminiescence of a great metropolis. Night falls over central Colorado.
Southbound from Fort Morgan, on Interstate 76, traffic increases. Occasional truck-stops, mini-marts and ranches give way to housing-clusters, settlements, and the sprawling fringe of suburbia. Returning to Denver at night was like flying into the bright heart of a galaxy. Abandoning the darkness and desolation of the High Plains, an unsettling sense of absence overtakes me. Something forgotten, or left behind. Nobody lives at Summit Springs, but something abides.

(A preview of SKETCHBOOK TRAVELER by James L. McElhinney (c) 2020. Schiffer Publishing).

Copyright James Lancel McElhinney (c) 2020 Texts and images may be reproduced (with proper citation) by permission of the author. To enquire, send a request to editions@needlewatcher.com