“Grab the boys,” yelled Split Nose, “I’ve got the two girls.” The 3-year-old twin girls were too frightened to scream as the fierce-looking Indian grabbed them. Wild Pony, a second Indian, swung the 6-year-old boy under his arm, muzzling him with a hand over his mouth. A third Indian, Tall Oak, swept up the other boy, a 4-year-old. The three Indians raced their horses, and the children, into the forest. They quickly melted among the trees. The kidnapping had taken barely a minute. When he first heard the sounds of commotion, the children’s father, Ab George, rushed out of his little cabin. As he reached the open air, he saw the Indians fading off into the distance, quickly disappearing into the forest. He realized that the Indians had just kidnapped his four children and had carried them away. He began to run after them but his wife, Katy, shouted to him to stop. She raced up to him and grabbed his arm. “Don’t go,” she said, firmly, with a look of desperate determination on her face. “Don’t leave me alone here with the baby.” Ab stopped in his tracks, his shoulders sagged and he slowly sank to his haunches, lowering his head. He began to quietly sob. His strong, wiry body continued to shake. He felt defeated. Katy knelt beside him and put her arm around his shoulders. “They’re gone,” said Ab, in a strained voice. “Right now they are reaching out to us, probably screaming for help, for help from us, but we can’t help them. They’re gone. Gone, gone, gone.” He felt more weakness and sank further onto his haunches. “Yes, I know,” responded Katy. She had tears flowing down her cheeks. It was nearly impossible for them to understand that in a few short moments their four children had been whisked away, in a lightning-swift raid, taken away to God knows where. “We’ve got to protect little Edward here,” she continued, cradling her baby, just a year old but still nursing. “He’s our whole family now.” Almost rescued: In early October, the two boys were helping wash down some horses in the nearby stream and when they looked up there was a British soldier on horseback watching them. He was soon joined by several other soldiers. They wore bright red coats with gold buttons. They were giving their horses a drink. “Hello, there,” said one of the soldiers. “Whose horse is that?” “It’s Broken Feather’s horse,” answered Ab. “Well,” said the soldier. “You speak English very well. You sound like you are English. Which are you, Indian or English?” “We’re not Indian,” answered Ab. At six years of age, he wasn’t sure if he was English or what. He’d never been asked that before. “What are you doing, working for the Indians?” asked the soldier. “I’m just doing what I was told to do,” said Ab. Just then, May Moon ran up and told the soldiers that chief White Eagle wanted to speak to them. It was a ruse to break up the conversation. As soon as the soldiers wheeled their horses and trotted away to the chief’s tepee, May Moon led the boys to her cousin’s tepee at the far edge of the camp. She told her cousin to keep them hidden away until the soldiers left. Later in the afternoon, the soldiers left camp without seeing the boys again.
Finally, several years later: The boys were always alert to any chance to flee, to leave this terrible servitude. At times, they had seen a minister who came to the Indian village to speak about Christianity. They wanted to talk to him and see if he could help them. Ab felt that the minister could rescue them. They had been servants for Snowflower for a month before they got a chance to speak to the minister. He brought his horse to the stream to water him. The boys were doing laundry, washing it in the stream. Snowflower was nowhere in sight. “Sir,” said Ab, wading through the water to get closer to the minister. “Can I ask you a question?” “Certainly, son,” answered the minister, “what is it?” “Do we look like Indians?” asked Ab. “Yes, oh, oh, let me look a little closer,” answered John Holtz, the minister, “By gum, you’re not Indians, are you?” “No, sir,” said Ab. He washed his dirty face in the water, and then looked up at John. “My Goodness, you’re white boys!” exclaimed the preacher. “You sure had me fooled for a minute there. Why are you living here?” They told him their story and a little of their capture, but Snowflower came and pushed them away. She turned her back on the preacher and herded the boys back to her tepee. But John knew the boys were being misused by the Indians. He led his horse back up the bank and went in to see the chief, White Eagle. After the preliminary greetings, John spoke to White Eagle: “I understand that you have two white boys in your village,” said John. “Are they from some nearby settlement or where did they come from? How old are they?” Suddenly White Eagle was faced with the inquiry that he knew would come some day about the two boys. He scrambled for a satisfactory response to John’s question. “Yes, we found them some years ago when our tribe was near the Long Lakes,” replied White Eagle, referring to the Finger Lakes area of New York state. He was inventing his story as he went along, using part of the same tale that was used when the two girls were turned over to the French priest. John and White Eagle talked for nearly an hour, with White Eagle emphasizing how much care the Indians had given to the two boys. “Let’s bring them in and talk to them,” said John, dismissing the chief’s statements, knowing that what the chief was saying was untrue. “Yes,” said White Eagle.
|