Free Lay the Mountains Low by Terry C. Johnston Page A

last night.”
    â€œI want only to find their location, then follow them with my trackers,” the general continued. “But I won’t come up on them and attack until I have been reinforced in the next few days. I’m afraid if your experience has taught me anything, it is that caution is the watchword.”
    Perry licked his lower lip. “I think we all have a newfound respect for their fighting abilities, sir.”
    â€œBesides discovering where the enemy is and where he is going, I also seek to honor those fallen men with a decent interment.”
    It made Perry’s skin crawl to think of those bodies having lain in the open for the last nine days—bloating in the rising heat, blackening with decay. A fallen soldier deserved far better from his fellows.
    A T six-thirty that Tuesday morning, barely an hour after sunrise, General Howard led his column of infantry, cavalry, and artillery out of that one-night bivouac at Johnson’s ranch and started for the White Bird battlefield.
    At the top of the hill, Howard had Arthur Chapman called over to the head of the march.
    â€œMr. Chapman, I’m putting you in charge of the Walla Walla volunteers.”
    â€œYou got something in mind for us?” the dark-eyed civilian asked.
    â€œA scouting mission,” the general said. “To determine where the Nez Perce have gone.”
    â€œVery good, General,” Chapman replied. He pointed off to the right of their line of march. “We’ll push west till we reach the edge of the canyon, staying with the top of this ridge, where Colonel Perry and the rest of his men straggled out of the canyon the morning of the fight.”
    Perry asked, “Will that give you a good vantage point to look into the valley of the Salmon?”
    But Chapman never looked at the captain. He merely nodded to Howard and answered, “None better. We’ll have us a good look around for them red murderers for you, General.”
    Howard rocked back in the saddle, arching his back as if attempting to relieve a knotted muscle. “Very good. We’ll be in the valley.”
    â€œGonna bury them soldiers?” Chapman asked with a great deal of curiosity in his eyes.
    â€œWe’re going to do what any God-fearing soldier would do for his fallen comrades.”
    Perry watched Chapman turn away without another word; then Howard spoke.
    â€œColonel, we’ll leave Whipple’s L Company and Captain Throckmorton’s artillery unit in an advantageous spot at the top of White Bird Hill, perhaps over there.”
    â€œThey’ll cover our advance in the event of a surprise, sir?”
    The general nodded. “Exactly.” Then he turned to a knot of nearby officers. “Colonel Miller?”
    The Massachusetts-born captain serving with the Fourth U. S. Artillery, Marcus P. Miller, urged his horse close to Howard’s. “Sir?”
    â€œYou’re assigned the advance as we enter the valley.”
    The captain saluted. “Yes, General. Captain Winters?”
    Henry E. Winters wheeled his mount and approached. “Am I given the honor of supporting the colonel?” He used Miller’s brevet rank.
    â€œYou are,” Howard replied. “Colonel Perry and I will follow you down with the rest of the command. When we reach the battlefield, the colonel himself will organize the search for the bodies of his dead.”
    The first corpse they found startled the men in the advance with Miller and Winters. From a distance, the figure appeared to be an Indian hiding behind a bush, perhaps even pointing a weapon at the oncoming soldiers. While the rest of the column watched, Winters sent three men forward—their carbines held at ready, prepared to fire, allaimed at the rigid corpse. Up close they discovered that it wasn’t an Indian at all, but a white man, his body standing, somehow attached to the spiny branches of a hawthorn bush—both arms outstretched as