It was early in the spring of fifty when Kit Carson, Jim Bridger, and myself met at Bent’s Fort, which was on the head waters, of the Arkansas river.  Bridger and I had just got in from our winter’s trapping ground and had disposed of our furs to a very good advantage; Carson had just returned from a trip back east.  Carson said to Bridger, “Now Jim, I’ll tell you what I want you to do.  I want you and Will (meaning me) to go over to Fort Kerney and escort emigrants across to California this season, for the gold excitement back in the eastern states is something wonderful, and there will be thousands of emigrants going to the gold fields of California, and they do not know the danger they will have to contend with, and you two men can save thousands of lives this summer by going to Fort Kerney and meeting the emigrants there and escorting them through.  Now boys, you must understand that this undertaking is no child’s play.  In doing this apparently many times you will seem to take your lives in your own hands, for the Indians will be worse on the plains this year than they ever have been.  At the present time there is no protection for the emigrant from the time they get twenty-five miles west of Fort Kerney, until they cross the Sierra Nevada mountains, and there are to be so many renegades from justice from Illinois and Missouri that it is going to be fearful this season, for the renegade is really worse in some respects than the Indian.  He invariably has two objects in view.  He gets the Indian to commit the murder which is a satisfaction to him without any personal risk besides the plunder he gets.  I know, boys, you can get good wages out of this thing, and I want you to take hold of it, and you, Jim, I know have no better friend than Gen. Kerney, and he will assist you boys in every way he can.  I almost feel as though I ought to go myself, but I cannot leave my family at the present time; now, Jim, will you go?” Bridger jumped up, rubbed his hands together and said, “I’ll be dog goned if I won’t, if Will goes with me.”

[Illustration:  As soon as they were gone I took the scalp off the dead Chief’s head.]

To which I replied, “I will go with you, and I think the quicker we start the better it will be for all parties concerned.”  Carson said, “You can’t start too soon, for the emigrants will be arriving at Fort Kerney by the time you get there.”

The next morning Jim and I were up and had an early breakfast and were ready to start.  Uncle Kit said to us, “Now boys, when you come back this fall I want you to come and see me and tell me what kind of luck you have had, and all the news.”

We now bid him good bye, and we were off.

I will here inform the reader that Carson had taught me to call him Uncle Kit when I was fourteen years old, and I always addressed him in that way.  Jim and I were off for Fort Kerney, which was a journey of about three hundred miles and not a sign of civilization on the whole trip.  It was a wild Indian country the entire distance, but we knew where the hostile Indians were and also the friendly Indians.  Consequently we reached Fort Kerney without having any trouble.