I finally ventured home—­not without some fear, however, of the Gobel family—­and was delighted to learn that during my absence mother had had an interview with Mr. Gobel, and having settled the difficulty with him, the two families had become friends again, and I may state, incidentally, that they ever after remained so.  I have since often met Stephen Gobel, and we have had many a laugh together over our love affair and the affray at the school-house.  Mary Hyatt, the innocent cause of the whole difficulty, is now married and living in Chicago.  Thus ended my first love scrape.

In the winter of 1856-57 my father, in company with a man named J.C.  Boles, went to Cleveland, Ohio, and organized a colony of about thirty families, whom they brought to Kansas and located on the Grasshopper.  Several of these families still reside there.

It was during this winter that father, after his return from Cleveland, caught a severe cold.  This, in connection with the wound he had received at Rively’s—­from which he had never entirely recovered—­affected him seriously, and in April, 1857, he died at home from kidney disease.

This sad event left my mother and the family in poor circumstances, and I determined to follow the plains for a livelihood for them and myself.  I had no difficulty in obtaining work under my old employers, and in May, 1857, I started for Salt Lake City with a herd of beef cattle, in charge of Frank and Bill McCarthy, for General Albert Sidney Johnson’s army, which was then being sent across the plains to fight the Mormons.

Nothing occurred to interrupt our journey until we reached Plum Creek, on the South Platte river, thirty-five miles west of Old Fort Kearney.  We had made a morning drive and had camped for dinner.  The wagon-masters and a majority of the men had gone to sleep under the mess wagons; the cattle were being guarded by three men, and the cook was preparing dinner.  No one had any idea that Indians were anywhere near us.  The first warning we had that they were infesting that part of the country was the firing of shots and the whoops and yells from a party of them, who, catching us napping, gave us a most unwelcome surprise.  All the men jumped to their feet and seized their guns.  They saw with astonishment the cattle running in every direction, they having been stampeded by the Indians, who had shot and killed the three men who were on day-herd duty, and the red devils were now charging down upon the rest of us.

I then thought of mother’s fears of my falling into the hands of the Indians, and I had about made up my mind that such was to be my fate; but when I saw how coolly and determinedly the McCarthy brothers were conducting themselves and giving orders to the little band, I became convinced that we would “stand the Indians off,” as the saying is.  Our men were all well armed with Colt’s revolvers and Mississippi yagers, which last, carried a bullet, and two buckshots.