Vanished Arizona: Recollections of the Army Life by a New England Woman. Martha Summerhayes
indulging in some rather harsh comments upon a government which could treat lieutenants' wives so shabbily, I began to investigate my surroundings.
Jack had placed his furnishings (some lace curtains, camp chairs, and a carpet) in the living-room, and there was a forlorn-looking bedstead in the bedroom. A pine table in the dining-room and a range in the kitchen completed the outfit. A soldier had scrubbed the rough floors with a straw broom: it was absolutely forlorn, and my heart sank within me.
But then I thought of Mrs. Wilhelm's quarters, and resolved to try my best to make ours look as cheerful and pretty as hers. A chaplain was about leaving the post and wished to dispose of his things, so we bought a carpet of him, a few more camp chairs of various designs, and a cheerful-looking table-cover. We were obliged to be very economical, as Jack was a second lieutenant, the pay was small and a little in arrears, after the wedding trip and long journey out. We bought white Holland shades for the windows, and made the three rooms fairly comfortable and then I turned my attention to the kitchen.
Jack said I should not have to buy anything at all; the Quartermaster Department furnished everything in the line of kitchen utensils; and, as his word was law, I went over to the quartermaster store-house to select the needed articles.
After what I had been told, I was surprised to find nothing smaller than two-gallon tea-kettles, meat-forks a yard long, and mess-kettles deep enough to cook rations for fifty men! I rebelled, and said I would not use such gigantic things.
My husband said: "Now, Mattie, be reasonable; all the army women keep house with these utensils; the regiment will move soon, and then what should we do with a lot of tin pans and such stuff? You know a second lieutenant is allowed only a thousand pounds of baggage when he changes station." This was a hard lesson, which I learned later.
Having been brought up in an old-time community, where women deferred to their husbands in everything, I yielded, and the huge things were sent over. I had told Mrs. Wilhelm that we were to have luncheon in our own quarters.
So Adams made a fire large enough to roast beef for a company of soldiers, and he and I attempted to boil a few eggs in the deep mess-kettle and to make the water boil in the huge tea-kettle.
But Adams, as it turned out, was not a cook, and I must confess that my own attention had been more engrossed by the study of German auxiliary verbs, during the few previous years, than with the art of cooking.
Of course, like all New England girls of that period, I knew how to make quince jelly and floating islands, but of the actual, practical side of cooking, and the management of a range, I knew nothing.
Here was a dilemma, indeed!
The eggs appeared to boil, but they did not seem to be done when we took them off, by the minute-hand of the clock.
I declared the kettle was too large; Adams said he did not understand it at all.
I could have wept with chagrin! Our first meal a deux!
I appealed to Jack. He said, "Why, of course, Martha, you ought to know that things do not cook as quickly at this altitude as they do down at the sea level. We are thousands of feet above the sea here in Wyoming." (I am not sure it was thousands, but it was hundreds at least.)
So that was the trouble, and I had not thought of it!
My head was giddy with the glamour, the uniform, the guard-mount, the military music, the rarefied air, the new conditions, the new interests of my life. Heine's songs, Goethe's plays, history and romance were floating through my mind. Is it to be wondered at that I and Adams together prepared the most atrocious meals that ever a new husband had to eat? I related my difficulties to Jack, and told him I thought we should never be able to manage with such kitchen utensils as were furnished by the Q. M. D.
"Oh, pshaw! You are pampered and spoiled with your New England kitchens," said he; "you will have to learn to do as other army women do—cook in cans and such things, be inventive, and learn to do with nothing." This was my first lesson in army house-keeping.
After my unpractical teacher had gone out on some official business, I ran over to Mrs. Wilhelm's quarters and said, "Will you let me see your kitchen closet?"
She assented, and I saw the most beautiful array of tin-ware, shining and neat, placed in rows upon the shelves and hanging from hooks on the wall.
"So!" I said; "my military husband does not know anything about these things;" and I availed myself of the first trip of the ambulance over to Cheyenne, bought a stock of tin-ware and had it charged, and made no mention of it—because I feared that tin-ware was to be our bone of contention, and I put off the evil day.
The cooking went on better after that, but I did not have much assistance from Adams.
I had great trouble at first with the titles and the rank: but I soon learned that many of the officers were addressed by the brevet title bestowed upon them for gallant service in the Civil War, and I began to understand about the ways and customs of the army of Uncle Sam. In contrast to the Germans, the American lieutenants were not addressed by their title (except officially); I learned to "Mr." all the lieutenants who had no brevet.
One morning I suggested to Adams that he should wash the front windows; after being gone a half hour, to borrow a step-ladder, he entered the room, mounted the ladder and began. I sat writing. Suddenly, he faced around, and addressing me, said, "Madam, do you believe in spiritualism?"
"Good gracious! Adams, no; why do you ask me such a question?"
This was enough; he proceeded to give a lecture on the subject worthy of a man higher up on the ladder of this life. I bade him come to an end as soon as I dared (for I was not accustomed to soldiers), and suggested that he was forgetting his work.
It was early in April, and the snow drifted through the crevices of the old dried-out house, in banks upon our bed; but that was soon mended, and things began to go smoothly enough, when Jack was ordered to join his company, which was up at the Spotted Tail Agency. It was expected that the Sioux under this chief would break out at any minute. They had become disaffected about some treaty. I did not like to be left alone with the Spiritualist, so Jack asked one of the laundresses, whose husband was out with the company, to come and stay and take care of me. Mrs. Patten was an old campaigner; she understood everything about officers and their ways, and she made me absolutely comfortable for those two lonely months. I always felt grateful to her; she was a dear old Irish woman.
All the families and a few officers were left at the post, and, with the daily drive to Cheyenne, some small dances and theatricals, my time was pleasantly occupied.
Cheyenne in those early days was an amusing but unattractive frontier town; it presented a great contrast to the old civilization I had so recently left. We often saw women in cotton wrappers, high-heeled slippers, and sun-bonnets, walking in the main streets. Cows, pigs, and saloons seemed to be a feature of the place.
In about six weeks, the affairs of the Sioux were settled, and the troops returned to the post. The weather began to be uncomfortably hot in those low wooden houses. I missed the comforts of home and the fresh sea air of the coast, but I tried to make the best of it.
Our sleeping-room was very small, and its one window looked out over the boundless prairie at the back of the post. On account of the great heat, we were obliged to have this window wide open at night. I heard the cries and wails of various animals, but Jack said that was nothing—they always heard them.
Once, at midnight, the wails seemed to be nearer, and I was terrified; but he told me 'twas only the half-wild cats and coyotes which prowled around the post. I asked him if they ever came in. "Gracious, no!" he said; "they are too wild."
I calmed myself for sleep—when like lightning, one of the huge creatures gave a flying leap in at our window, across the bed, and through into the living-room.
"Jerusalem!" cried the lieutenant, and flew after her, snatching his sword, which stood in the corner, and poking vigorously under the divan.
I rolled myself