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The
White-Red
Man
of
Oklahoma
submitted
by
granddaughter-
Trisha
Davis
(originally
submitted to
True West as
told by
Ollie Stewart printed
in
the May-June
1965,
Volume 12, No. 5
as told
to
Olevia E.
Myers)
Page
3
Me and a bunch of other young hellions--Walking Stick,
Squirrel, Quail,
Going
Snake
and
Man-Who-Walkes
(so
called because
he had fell
off his pony
when he was a baby), Custanala (he
was a
full-blood Creek), the
others was Cherokees
all
but Man-Who-Walks
who was an
Osage--we
all
got
to going
over to Fort Smith on
our own
and
gitting
whiskey and
bringin it
over
ourselves.
We'd git a
bunch together then, and
have ourselves a
time.
I remember
one time we all went
over and got a jug
apiece and when we got
back,
a white
feller,
name of
Ed
Brown--he was
a
outlaw too--guess we
all
was but,
you know, we
never considered
ourselves
outlaws--anyway, Ed
Brown was
sort of
in our gang, and
we had
asked him to
help
us git
the redeye
acrost
the
river and he wouldn't do
it. We went on and
got a jug apiece
anyway. Then when
we
got back, we all
went
to
a place way down in
the
bottom, close to the
river where a
full-blood
Creek
named
John Rawhide
lived in a
sort of brush house
with
earth packed all
over
the darn
thing. He
said he
always
built
his
house that way
and when
it started gitting old
and saggin
and
about to
fall in, he
jest built
another
one. God, but
it
was always dark
in
Rawhide's
shelter, and
smelled like the devil
hisself had died
in
there.
Rawhide
had
a
squaw that was
afeared
of
crossing him
in any
way,
as he would take a
rawhide whip
to her
iffin she
so much
as
looked cross-eyed at
him. I always
wondered if that's
where
he got his
name.
Anyway, we
all went
down to old
John
Rawhide's and
started
drinking and
eating.
Old John
had that squaw
kill a
dog and start
it
roasting and we all
started in on it
when
it
waren't more'n
half
done. We all got
drunker'n seven
hunderd
dollars,
and
purty
soon that
little ol' dog
was all gone, and
Rawhide started
hollering at the squaw
for
more
food.
There
waren't not more, so
Rawhide
said we'd "go
steal-um cow from
Brown."
We
all
thought this was
a
good
idea
since he
had
refused to
help us git
the whiskey
acrost the
river. We
went
over to Brown's
pasture
and picked out a
nice
young heifer and drove
her to Rawhide's.
While we was doing
this,some of the
other
bucks went
for
their
squaws.
You see, a
buck would never do
anything but jest kill
the meat, and then the
squaw had to
dress
it
out. Oh
well,
the
bucks
always--if they
was real hungry--cut the
critter open and while the blood was
still
jest
pouring, they'd
reach inside, pull our
the liver and heart,
and
eat 'em blood
raw. Many a time
I've seed a buck give
his
half-growed
son the
heart while it
was
still
quivering and tell
him,
"Eat much
quick--make-um
strong." They
would take that hot
liver
and tear great
chunks
offen it and eat
'er
down, blood running
ever'where.
On
this night when we got
back to Rayhide's with
the fat heifer,
there
was five or six
more
squaws there and they
had
a good fire
a-going;
and
there was a
whole
passel of papoosies--from
tiny ones in their board
heds to toddlers--all
a-setting and
laying
around on
blankets
by the
fire.
Funny
thing about
an
Injun
kid--they
never
hawl. Iffin
they started
fretting, the
squaw
picked 'em up and
just
went "shu-shu-shu," and
them kids jest
hushed.
Well, when
we got the heifer
there,
we
all started
having a
dance around
the
fire before we
killed heifer and purty
soon them bucks
was
a-gobbling and
a-stomping
and carrying
on a
sight. Then we
drove,
or drug rather,
that heifer inside the
dancing
ring, and
Rawhide let
out a
war-whoop and sliced her
throat
from ear to
ear.
We all threw her
down
and Rayhideset on her
and while she was still
kicking, he cut into
her, pulled out the
heart--it was
jumping
like a
bullfrog--and he
started
eating.
Soon as he had out the
heart and liver, which
he give to the other
bucks, the squaws
took
over.
Them
squaws
knelt down
right
there
in the
dirt and
started
skinning and
cutting. One squaw
reach
in, pulled
out the
guts,
dragged 'em
a
little bit back so the
others could go
on
cutting, and I'm a-telling
you--this is the
God's
own truth--that
squaw
took
them
guts,
cut 'em into
pieces-oh 'bout
eighteen
inches
long--helt each
piece up as
she cut it off,
took a
thumb and
forefiner,
stripped the awful stuff
from inside, and
handed each
papoosie
there, that was big
enough to eat, a string
of
that gut.
Them
kids
started
sucking and
chewing like
they had
a piece of
horehound candy.
Now, if that
hain't the God's
truth,
I hope I
die this
minute.
Well,
we had
us a time and
then
we
felt so big, us boys
I
mean, that we decided
to go back and
git
some
more redeye and
peddle
it to the
other
bucks. We made
several trips like
this,
always being
careful to
cross
the
river
twixt
Fort
Smith and the
Injun
country at a
place which
the lawmen
never watched.
Them Injun bucks knowed
more ways to dodge the
Federal men than
a
thousand legged worm has
legs.
Besides,
there was
a
God-awful lot
of Injun
country for them.
Federal
men
to
kiver. Old
Ed
Brown wanted to go
with
us
for a load of
redeye
again, but
some way the bucks never
trusted
him after he
wouldn't
help us
that
time, so we
always jest slipped away
from him
and
didn't want no
more
dealings with him
a'tall. He come
over
after we was all
out of
redeyeexcept a
little
we'd saved to drink
ourselves--we'd
sold the
rest--and he wanted
to
drink with us.
Walking Stick said,
"No.
You no help
git--you no help drink," or
words to
that
effect.
You see I was
talking Creek,
Cherokee
and Osage by then,
jest
like the full-bloods. Funny thing
how
a kid can pick up so
many languages so
easy. Anyway, we
talked
in whatever
language was
handy.
Sometimes we;d be
chattering
away
in Creek
or Osage,
and a Cherokee
would
start
talking in
that
language
and we'd
all
start talking
Cherokee.
anyway,
old Ed
Brown
got
maddern's a
wet hen when
Walking
Stick told him he
couldn't drink with
us. He went of
muttering to hisself, and
Walking Stick
watched him a moment and
said,
"Sometime we
have
kill."
We let
it go at
that and
fergot
about it till we went
to Fort
Smith
again fer
likker
and got
caughter purty
as you please
by
the
Government
boys. Jest as we
was
crossing the
river at
our private crossing
place, here come
Ledbetter (U.S. Marshall
Bud
Ledbetter),
and
Deputy
Jeff Carter, and
Deputy
Rose. They
was
waiting for us on the
Nation side.
Walking Stick's keen eyes
spied the
bushes
move
and he--quick as
anything--slid his two
jugs
off the saddle
horn
into
the river. So did the
rest of us,
and
when we got
acrost, we
was bare of redeye as a
baby's
bottom.
Ledbetter
jest
pushed his
old hat back, wiped his
forehead, and
grinning, said
"You
son-of-a-b--think
you air
smart! Well,
young'uns, you air
gonna'
wind up in the
Hold under Parker's
court." We
laughed
at him and rode
on.
We hung
around in the Nations for a
few days before we
tried
for more redeye. You see, I had to do
all the buying because
the law wouldn't let a
person sell firewater
to
Injuns. So I'd
buy the stuff, a couple a
gallon-jugs at a
time,
and take it
to the bucks down in the
river
bottoms on the
Arkansas
side. Then
I'd go back to a different
salon and git
some
more,
till I had us
all a couple a jugs
apiece. I never
cheated on my friends or
made 'em pay more
than the firewater cost
me like a lot of
fellers
did--including
Pappy.
Finally we
slipped acrost the river
again, this tim going
to Van Buren right
at
the bend of the
river. Here
Squirrel would get on top of
the
high bluff and act as a watch-out while
the
rest of us gathered
the
firewater. If he
saw any movement or
anything at all
suspicious, he'd hoot
like an owl and we'd git
out of there
fast.
We went on back to
John Rawhide's and had us another
stomp dance,
and this
time, it was a ring-tailed tooer.
Rawhide had asked Ed
Brown to come and he was
there big as life and
acting tickled that he
was back in the gang
again. When it got
late at night
and the
fire was burning down a
big bed of red coals,
ever'one, including the
squaws, was dancing
around the fire in a big
circle, the
bucks
a-gobbling and the squaws
a-screeching.
A
couple of bucks dragged
a fat pig inside the dancing ring, and
Rawhide
let out a
war-whoop and jumped astride the pig, cut his
throat, ripped him open
and started eating the
heart.
Then
suddenly he shouted to
the
squaws to git inside, this was war, or at
least that's as near as
I can tell you what he
said in
English
Anyway, them squaws scooted
inside and
Rawhide's squaw come back outside carrying a grisly
looking bundle and handed it to him.
Rayhide started the high
shrill war cry of the
Creeks and started the war dance. That
war dance is the fiercest, most savage thing
you ever seen. It
makes your hair stand
on end. All the Injuns, and me too, and
Ed Brown, started dancing in that circle, and
purty soon Rawhide
gives a extra shrill sort
of whoop which means
"Kill-Kill-Kill!"
Quickly the bucks surrounded Ed Brown, who
by
now was so drunk he didn't even know what was going on, or so it
seemed to me, and they walked him away from
the fire into the thick
blackness of the river
bottoms. I knowed what was coming so I
had pretended to pass out a few moments before
the finish. I
laid there acting passed
out drunk while they led him off.
Purty
soon all the bucks was back and soon as they was, Rayhid
undone that little bundle the squaw had
brought him. He
started jumping and
giving the war-whoop. When he flung the
thing and it unrolled, it were a white woman's
scalp; long, blonde
hair it were, and it about
made me sick to my stummick to think
about it,
but I also knowed how the whites had butchered their
squaws and papoosies, so I reckoned it were
just about even.
Later, I asked Walking
Stick and Squirrel, and the others what they
had done with Brown, and Walking Stick laughed
and said, "River
get-um our firewater because
Brown tell lawmen on us--river ge-um
Brown,
too. No more tell on friends.: Walking Stick,
pulled out the great sharp knife he always
carried and, waving it
around, he gobbled like
a turkey and made motions of throat-cutting
and ripping open. Then he said, "Take-um
out guts, put-em in
rock-man sink like jug
firewater with cork out." Anyway, Ed
Brown, never shoed up around there agin, and
when others asked what
had become of him,
there was only silence.
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