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The Last Notes from Clearwater

07-01-07

The Last Notes from Clearwater:
An underground story from a city not somewhere else
[Part of an anthology: “Underground Stories from a City Not Somewhere Else”]

Preface: A city not somewhere else

It may take a decade, a century or even longer for a city to become a persistent entity that defines it, gives it an identity; even if historically and culturally that city is but an amalgam of neighborhoods with worlds apart differences, as it’s the case with Paris or New York. This rule of civic identity applies to great cities, lesser cities, and just run-of-the-mill urban centers that give us an origin, a place to be from.

And then, on occasion, we come across places that we prefer to keep silent about; cities that for some obvious, or perhaps inexplicable, reasons never acquired an identity; or, if they did, it was short-lived. I happen to reside in one of those places.

A few years back a visiting Canadian friend asked me how it felt living in exile without leaving home, offering me with a smile a subtle form of condolences; just a rhetorical question from a man who called Vancouver – the other Vancouver – his home.

Can people lose their communal identity simply by crossing a river… or by driving across a county line? Well, if you hail from this Southwest Washington city, you sure can. To our perturbation, it happens time and again as we try to answer what should never be a dreaded question of “where are you from,” condemned to give an answer that makes people think we are from a city located “somewhere else.”

Now, if you wish to visit our fair city, whatever your reason, and hope to do it in a timely and unembarrassed fashion, you may opt to heed some advice. If “our Vancouver” is your destination, be warned! You just don’t get here by clicking your heels just like Dorothy did exiting Oz; and, at times, not even by relying on a trusted travel agent. Not to this Vancouver, latitude 45.63N and longitude 122.60W, in the US of A. Believe me; you could very easily end up 250 miles out of your way. I’ve been witness to several people who have, and there are countless others who have equally believable claims.

For starters, assuming flying is your choice for travel; your initial destination should be Portland, since our Vancouver lacks a commercial airport. Once again, be careful; for the Portland you are after is in Oregon, not Maine. Your luggage tags should read PDX; the Portland where precipitation barely registers snow, but offers plenty of rain.

When landing at PDX, the Vancouver you’re after is just a stone’s throw away; as it follows the compass’ needle, across a Columbia River flowing east-west, parallel to the landing strip. Just go North across either of two bridges, one to your right, one to your left, and you will be setting foot on this orphaned-city its oft-elected mayor proudly calls, America’s Vancouver. Apparently no one has told this popular official, least convince him of it, that to most people on this planet there is more geography to America than the United States; and that Vancouver, to them, is simply a city somewhere else. Be that as it may, while Vancouverites from Canada display their British Columbia provincial colors well, Vancouverites from Southwest Washington must be content to show their provincial ways in a radius that extends not much beyond the sounds from the glockenspiel tower in Esther Short Park… on a quiet Sunday morn.

Cultural or historical identity do not seem to take center stage in this community, now in excess of 150,000 souls, who for the most part hail from other somewhere else’s. But even three decades ago, prior to annexations and northward bound colonizers, the then city of one-third of today’s population could not collectively agree to return to its roots, the name originally given the first settlement (1825) and headquarters of the Hudson’s Bay Company for Oregon Country: Fort Vancouver. A then spirited voice to rename the city by identity-hungry folks was unceremoniously silenced by entrenched business powers in the community, resulting in thumbs down vote.

Can anyone think of a more apropos and distinct name for a community that became by far the largest non-native settlement of its time, the ignition for the Europeanization of the Pacific Northwest? What better name to identify a community than by its roots? After Lewis and Clark, and that captain from the English Admiralty who never set foot on these shores… came this outpost of Anglo-American transition, then hub of activity in the Pacific Northwest. An identity so strong, so unique, that no other community would have had reason to adopt it and make it its own!

This not-in-Canada Vancouver will always be Ft. Vancouver to a great many of us, even if we are dabbed as a nostalgic bunch living in the past, constantly trekking through our rich, pioneer history, unwilling to settle down as an unaffiliated minor league team for the city up North. Our community has been at the crossroads of much history to be confused, disregarded and even disdained. A visit to the rebuilt fort; or the barracks of old; or a stroll through officers’ row, which housed not just leaders of men, but beyond; will attest to the pride we have in claiming this northern bank of the Columbia River to be known as Ft. Vancouver, the cradle of the Pacific Northwest.

Three years after the Oregon Treaty set the US-Canadian border; Ft. Vancouver began to share its history with the newly established US Army setup: Columbia Barracks, later to become Vancouver Barracks. It was not until eight years later (1857) that Vancouver was incorporated as a city, almost three decades before its northern neighbors decided to name their community Vancouver, just like the island it was across from. The Canadian claim of its rights to the name left the city by the Columbia without identity, without civic soul.

Yet, one needs but to visit Vancouver Barracks Cemetery to become aware that this city is very much here, not somewhere else… with countless stories reenacting underground time and again ready to pop out from the gravestones eroded by the rain. These stories, however, must carry the imprimatur of a sentry that guards the cemetery and all its secrets from his own sentry-stone. A gravestone located at the north-most end, properly numbered 01; a marker belonging to Friedrich Leonhardt (1900-1945), once a prisoner of war… now a prisoner of time, unofficial gatekeeper and raconteur.

Whatever the argument as to the identity of this community by the Columbia River, you may be certain that the underground stories you’ll hear from Herr Leonhardt decidedly took place here, not somewhere else.

Ben Tanosborn


The last notes from Clearwater


A good thing Matthew is traveling by train in a near-empty car rather than in a crowded plane. Indulging in self-conversation might be construed by those nearby as a sign of galloping aging, or worse… most embarrassing for a young man who has just turned thirty-one. This business of talking out loud without the benefit of an apparent conversation is a “pet” he had adopted in Iraq; post-embedment-trauma, pet for short, was the nicknamed condition given by a fellow journalist, while waiting for the final health-coining by physicians.

Let’s face it. Volunteered honesty is not something asked of us every second of our lives, not when total transparency proves hurtful or becomes painfully inconvenient. Not that providing sound to Matthew’s mental divagations would mean much to anyone within earshot.

Two years out of a journalistic tour of duty in Occupied Iraq for a news agency; one year out of a second masters, in History this time; and just a few days out of completing his freshman year as instructor in a Southern California junior college. Matthew is happy to have buried any and all promising prospects in what he feels has become “conformational journalism,” his spiritual rebirth now opening new horizons. At least History seems like a field-of-hope where truth has a better chance of survival… although at times it projects as a re-run of how he felt about Journalism a decade earlier while at UCLA.

Studying Journalism had been a “Spanish Adam” thing for Matthew. Adam had stood as his inspiration; that twice-great grandfather who working as a newspaperman had disappeared thirteen decades earlier while covering the Indian Wars in the Pacific Northwest. Little question that the desire to be a journalist had germinated from the family’s mythical attributions to this adventurous ancestor; desire that came wrapped in some journals delivered, together with a two-year old infant, by Nez Perce Eve – or Red Grandma, as she was sometimes called.

That mixture of Castilian and Nez Perce bloodlines was part of his mystical background, although now four generations and a last name removed from Spanish Adam; and a culture removed from Nez Perce Eve. But his world started there, literally, with Adam and Eve, in the diaspora of a principled noble people led by Chief Joseph. Well, if not his world, his great-grandfather’s world born into exile in Oklahoma.

Pulling away from the station at Eugene, Matthew senses that he is in terra firma… that he has reached the Pacific Northwest. And as a celebration, a toast to four generations past, he pulls out of a briefcase a folder containing a copy of Adam Pasiego’s journals dating from late June in 1877 to the afternoon of July 11 of that same year. Journal notes from which Adam had composed articles later telegraphed to The California Herald-Dispatch in Los Angeles.

After coming back from Iraq, and severing relations with International Press Syndicate, these journals from Adam had taken a new meaning for Matthew, and he had brought them to life by reading the micro-fiche records of the century-defunct newspaper, and digesting everything which had an Adam Pasiego byline… comparing the notes with the printed articles. He even thought of making the Indian Wars of the Pacific Northwest territories his master’s thesis, but was turned down and had to opt for a less personal topic dealing with balkanization.

Looking out the window from a now almost half-full car, he contemplates the Willamette River running parallel and marching in the same direction as the Amtrak train… northward to Portland; and its confluence with the mighty Columbia. In less than four hours, the train will be crossing the Columbia, landing him in Vancouver USA, Matthew estimates, but it will take the water now flowing in the middle of the channel two to three days to reach the same destination, and by then he’ll be in Seattle visiting some friends for two days. And by the time that same water reaches the Pacific, he’ll be settled for the summer in Port Townsend. Is it really the same world we all live in, he ponders, when everything in it travels at its own speed?

Matthew takes out a few papers from the folder, handling them as a librarian from Alexandria might have done two millennia before, as if these plain copies were great wisdom-brushed papyri. And to him they were; lithographs of Adam’s brushstrokes dealing with morals, ethics, the savory victories and the painful defeats that come to each of us. He would be reading Adam’s summer1877 journals for the umpteenth time… plus one.

“June 21, Thursday: Arrived in Vancouver yesterday afternoon after six days travel from San Francisco. A lot of activity is evidenced along the Columbia, and on my arrival to Portland was shown with much pride an almost completed paddle steamer which measured in almost 240 feet. Little evidence of Indians here, friendly or unfriendly, but one guesses the white colonizers have made sure the Indians stay on lands reserved for them.

“This morning I met with Byron Daniels, editor and proprietor of The Vancouver Independent, also an attorney – apparently a very influential person locally although only my age. He was very attentive and, being in the same profession, offered his help in any form I might require to achieve my mission; by introducing me to Fort Vancouver military personnel who are well informed on the situation with the Nez Perce hostiles; also, he knows General Howard’s adjutant, but to meet him we will have to go to Portland – he suggested Saturday. I interpret his deferential treatment as part of a genteel upbringing and in good measure to his curiosity, after I related to him how I covered the final stage of the Third Carlist War in Spain last year as correspondent for a London newspaper – after completing studies at Oxford. He volunteered his entire day tomorrow to put me in touch with the area in exchange, he said, for some sincere philosophical discussions. I hope to discover, without asking, what he means by sincere.”

“June 22, Friday: Byron proved to be of much help. I was given the treatment usually reserved for royal emissaries and not a correspondent for a newspaper. He introduced me to people at the Post who are knowledgeable of everything that is happening with the insurgent Indians – mostly transmitted by telegraph, but I had a first hand account from someone just back from Fort Lapai.

“Byron’s invitation to his family home for dinner obliged me to become an after-dinner raconteur of sorts for the many people he had invited for the occasion; a light fare conversation that left no room for philosophical discussions. Tomorrow, very early, we are off to Portland.”

“June 23, Saturday: Found Major Henry Wood, General Howard’s adjutant, to be very personable but empty-headed or possibly empty-hearted… more of a scribe and administrator than a soldier. A pleasant and affable person, but I don’t feel that the information he provides can be trusted. He appears as believable as Baron Munchausen.

“Portland appears as a bustling place of commerce, and activity goes about at a high pace everywhere you look. Little sense to me, however, why they have named this city Portland with so many appropriate local names to choose from; names like Multnomah, Wallowa or even Columbia City. I guess it’s much about commerce and little about history or cultural identity.

“It probably won’t be long before the state of Oregon is linked to the Washington Territory, and this great river is bridged.

“Byron continues to be very gracious, and Mrs. Daniels, his mother, a great hostess; he invited me for a feast of baked salmon – he calls it chenook or chinook. He personally cooked the fish in a pit in the garden area of his house. It was after honoring the succulent salmon, found to be of comparable quality in taste and texture to the best Cantabria salmon, and a bottle of a worthy California wine, that Byron seemed prepared to confront me with his proposal for an Indian policy much at odds with the one being advocated by the government Back East.

“For Byron, and he claims his thinking represents that of every citizen in both Washington and Idaho territories, the federal government is following what he calls a Quaker plan that is a fraud, using a humanitarian approach that is pure bosh.

“He thinks that Easterners, feeling safe and secure in their homes – not susceptible to the killing and pillaging that occurs here – can afford to live by pow-wow politics of buying friendship and peace. He is quick to point out a government cannot claim dominion over the territories and continue treating these bands of lazy, dirty, vagabond Indians as nations. Also claims that you cannot make treaties with this low form of humanity, and that the idea of a ‘noble red man’ is a fraud and a myth, only a made-up reason to shilly-shally dilly-dally policy. What the ‘noble red man’ needs – what he is aching for – according to Byron, is a good strong ‘buldosing’ policy.

“Further, he feels that it’s preposterous to make this fanatical attempt to civilize and christianize these Indian tribes, and that it’s about time to stop this foolishness of giving them guns and gospel – rifles and religion.

“After his uninterrupted angry monologue that he delivered with conviction, he asked for my impressions after having lived for three years in Civilized Europe. He added for me to be sincere. Finally! Now I know what he meant before by a sincere philosophical discussion. He wanted me to agree or disagree with this heightened state of anger… maybe hate.

“I told my host that the word sincere seemed as unnecessary duplicity among gentlemen like us who are expected to be honest. And that since I viewed Indians in a very different light than he did, as a humanist – which in this case was much the same as a Quaker except for any reference to Christianity – I preferred our new found friendship to remain intact, which probably required we settle any anticipated argument at the ideal time: before its very start.

“I suggested that instead of debating the humanity of the Indians we talk about the future of the Washington Territory, its growth, and the possibility of it becoming a state soon, just like Oregon had eighteen years before. We also talked about the possibility of convincing Senator Morton of Oregon to give a speech by connected telephone to the citizens of both Yamhill and Vancouver on the Fourth of July since he was in a quandary as to which community to visit.

“Probably lost stature with Byron because of the way I feel about Indians, and also women and their right to vote; and also the idea that I may not be an avowed believer. He did suggest, if I was interested in attending Sunday Christian services, a Reverend Stubbs of the M.E. church who was acclaimed in the community as an excellent orator. I am glad that I held many of my sentiments about the Indians to myself, not telling him that in many respects I considered the Indians not just the equals of white men, but morally superior, certainly when it comes to honesty, avarice and reverence for the land.

“I’m very tired and likely to sleep until late tomorrow. I’ll probably miss Stubbs’ sermon, although I have the premonition that it will not be about love for our fellow man, not if the other man is an Indian. Lincoln was right about the hypocrisy of Christians and their Bible; yet, he also denied equality among men, fighting to free Negroes from slavery but never accepting them to be the equals of white men.”

“June 24, Sunday: I had intended to stay two days longer in Vancouver but after finding out Friday that all fighting units had already departed, I decided to board a steamer this afternoon up the Columbia hoping to meet with Captain Miller since I’ve been assigned under his command.

“Before I reach General Howard’s forces, I hope to meet with Indians, friendly or hostile, that can give me a different perspective of the conflict than the one I’ve been getting from both the military and homesteaders. I am traveling with a sixteen-year-old, Grant, who has an Indian mother living in the reservation. He says his white father is a drunkard. Also claims to know Chief Joseph and Chief Red Heart.”

“June 26, Tuesday: This afternoon we stepped off the boat and were greeted by a band of friendly Indians who are camping close by, just a day’s walk from the reservation. Grant knows almost everyone, and he introduced me to Chief Red Heart who was running the camp of fewer than half-hundred people, which includes some women and children.

“Before long I was in awe of the moral stature of this Indian leader that his people call Temme Ilppilp. He has the presence of dignity and nobility one expects of European blue-bloods. But even Don Carlos, the Spanish pretender I met last year in San Sebastian, does not seem as serene as this Red Man who appears to walk and talk as if carrying the Great Spirit in his heart. He gave me what he said to be an especial double-necklace with talking beads of love and peace. I gave him a stylographic ink pen that I had bought in England.

“Tomorrow I will be off to meet with Captain Miller’s troops said to be less than two days from here on a fresh appaloosa. Grant will accompany me, and then bring back the horses.”

For Matthew, reading Spanish Adam’s journals or the collection of letters he had written to the family during the three years he was in England and Spain, is a challenge of discovery with new paths constantly appearing… as if things were being explained by a man walking this earth long before his time, providing clues here and there to answers with uncommon wisdom.

The letters from Europe had come as monthly episodes of discoveries that he wanted to pass on to his family in California. Every one of them unique, an adventure of sorts, a journey into the minds of those interesting people he met, and at times a peek into their very souls. Some of the letters were purposeful in that they affected us all… even in generations to come.

Like the epistle where he had traveled to the mountains of Cantabria in Spain, trying to find his roots; the caseríos in Vega de Pas from where his grandfather had departed to find fortune in America back in Napoleonic times. Adam colorfully explains in his letter how he went in search of anyone who might be related, but there was no one with the last name Pasiego… yet everyone claimed to be Pasiego, for a Pasiego is simply an inhabitant of that region. His last name probably had been González, or Fernández, or Gutíerrez or any of many Castilian names… but he was unable to determine what the name might have been since so many Pasiegos had emigrated from those hamlets during that particular decade. But now Adam knew how his last name had come about. Because of the new, strange language, his grandfather had probably given a what-answer to a who-question. So he became Joseph Pasiego, instead of José González, or José Who-Knows. The entire letter was a jewel reflecting familial and historical brilliant tones.

But it was these journals of barely three weeks that had always been hallowed writing to the four generations that followed. They had been brought to the Pasiego hacienda in the San Fernando Valley, that summer of 1880, by a fragile Indian woman holding an infant and a large leather pouch. Adam’s bride and child had come for their legitimate claims to their Pasiego heritage, something to enrich their Nez Perce pride. Wewexp (spring in Nee-Mee-Poo or Nez Perce) did honor with her beauty and freshness her name, but to the family and everyone else she became Eve. And she had delivered to the family Adam’s progeny, a Joseph honoring with his name Cantabrian and Nez Perce bloodlines. Adam, Wewexp told the family, had died from complications to the wounds he received in Clearwater and the hardships experienced by her people, led by Chief Joseph, in trying to reach Canada. Adam had died and was buried just forty miles from the Canadian border… early in October 1877. She had married him in late August while in flight, and was a month pregnant when the surviving 600 Nez Perce were marched, after the surrender, to Eastern Kansas first, and then a reservation in Oklahoma where little Joseph was born under the protection of Chief Joseph.

A year after little Joseph was born, according to Nez Perce Eve, Chief Joseph was allowed to travel to Washington, D.C. to meet with President Hayes and plead with him the return of his people to the Pacific Northwest as had been promised by generals Miles and Howard; and also to allow her and the child to visit the Pasiego family in California. A year later, she had been allowed to leave the reservation with little Joseph. But she was sad and lonely and, most of all, she wanted to be with Adam, now that their child was in the care of his loving family. So she died that winter in California. Wewexp couldn’t wait until spring to reunite with Adam.

So much, there was so much that Matthew had read about Chief Joseph, his bravery and skills under the most adverse conditions, his braves usually outnumbered three to five-fold! History, not legend or fiction, as if it were a true reverse of the cavalry coming to the rescue. And all the while the white man always lying, always breaking his word. Yet peace, even when imposed, can be welcomed by the soul. Chief Joseph, how was he related to Eve? And Adam, how did he end up joining 800 Nez Perce in their flight to Canada? And why did he stop writing journal entries past the afternoon of July eleventh?

Matthew skips several pages until he reaches the journals of the last three days:

“July 9, Monday: This morning I gave the regular courier from the 21st Infantry my message to be telegraphed, together with others from correspondents and military officers, from Walla-Walla. It’s a long about way from here, probably a full day without changing horses. I hope he doesn’t meet with any hostile Indians since Capt. Babbit will not consent to sending three-men teams.

“I just found out that Chief Red Heart and his band have been taken prisoners four days after I left their camp. No opposition in their part. I hope they escort them to the reservation for they are people of peace, but men and officers here don’t trust any Indians unless they are shackled.

“Both horses and soldiers do not look very healthy; some soldiers appear as if they have been on bread and water rations for days. Some officers blame the Democratic Congress for not appropriating enough money, but the officers seem well fed. Perhaps lack of food plays a part in the lukewarm morale of the men. That may answer the conundrum I’ve been hearing for the better part of two weeks: ‘If the regulars do no fighting, how is it that so many of them are killed? Again – if the volunteers do all the fighting, how is it that so few of them are killed?’ My answer: All the volunteers I have come across have a stake in fighting the Indians since most are from families owning large homesteads, with silver in their pockets and food to spare; and there are those who claim volunteers also get two $20 gold coins for every Indian they kill when defending the homesteaders. The volunteer is pecuniary motivated, the soldier is not.

“I prefer to spend my time with the men in Company I where I’ve made many friends. Some of them are from Europe, and a few barely know enough English to follow orders. Most appear as gentle people, certainly not mercenaries or men of war. Among them are three trumpeters – Carlin, Clark and Doyle – and a drummer, Johnny Heinemann. These musicians are battle elite that seem out of place in the age of the repeating rifle and the Gatling gun. They appear as if targets – human magnets for bullets destined for the officer ranks.”

“July 10, Tuesday: A dispatch sent by Colonel McConville with a rider states that the Nez Perce have established a camp on the South Fork of the Clearwater River. It’s estimated that there are between 700 and 800 men, women and children who appear poised to move east across the Bitterroot Mountains with their animals. They have counted 72 teepees and over 150 horses.

“General Howard has been trying to contact McConville who’s fighting the Indian warriors with both troops and volunteers from Mount Idaho. Things are not going well at Misery Hill, where they remain fortified on the hilltop best they can.

“Lots of rumors and indications that the coordination between Howard and his officers is lacking in military strategy, and without much confidence everyone hopes that this general renders better results in this campaign than another West Point man, Custer, did a year ago at Little Bighorn. Soldiers number five or six times the count of braves, but there’s no pretense that they can match skills or fierceness with the Nez Perce. Only chance is to overwhelm them risking many lives, since it’s questionable the Gatlings or the cannons will have an impact; also the Indians may not be as effective having to guard their women, old people and children.

“We expect total confrontation tomorrow. For the first time since my First Communion I am tempted to say a prayer, not for personal intercession but for the safety of the many friends in Company I. I probably won’t get any sleep tonight.”

“July 11, Wednesday: It is early afternoon and I am writing this entry as an obituary, epitaph or last will and testament for those of us – among the four hundred artillery, cavalry and infantry soldiers – accompanying Captain Miller, who may not survive this encounter at Clearwater. In probably no more than twenty minutes our casualties have mounted to several dozen without even reaching enemy lines. The officer staff has called a halt.

“Many of my friends are dead or wounded, and I saw the three trumpeters and Johnny, the drummer, go down in the first five minutes, playing what might have been their last notes. I am wounded, standing less than forty feet from a Gatling surrounded by braves. We should have the hospital wagons here soon to carry wounded and dead.

“War is always unjust and cruel whether fought for legitimate or illegitimate cause. Somehow it’s more unfair to some than to others, as in the case of military custom that sacrifices musicians to the gods. Why must a man be forced into martyrdom because he plays the trumpet, or beats on the drums? We are quick to acknowledge a God of the universe that we can neither see, nor understand, yet we deny respect and understanding for those of our own species, for life itself.”

That had been the end of Adam’s journal. And Matthew was left with the same questions he had always asked. How did Adam end up with Chief Joseph’s Nez Perce in a trek that would exceed fifteen hundred miles? And why hadn’t there been more journal entries during the three months before his death?

Questions, there had been so many questions that Matthew would like to have answered. Spanish Adam must have had his reasons for the silence.

Matthew places the papers back in the folder. It had been two years since his googling had led him to discover the fate of the three trumpeters and drummer. As Adam had suspected, they all died that fateful July 11 – and all four were buried at Vancouver Barracks Cemetery.

So Matthew, following the steps of his ancestor, Adam Pasiego, is heading to Vancouver 129 years later. Not to be an embedded reporter like his twice-great grandfather, but to pay his respects to his musician friends; musicians that played their last notes on an unlucky 7-11 day. The last notes played by these musicians… and the last notes written by Adam. Tomorrow he’ll be placing flowers on the musicians’ graves… something Matthew knew Adam would have wanted from his twice-great grandson.

§

Matthew has walked Adam’s walk in the morning, visiting the Old Barracks, the replica Fort and its stockade – where Chief Red Heart and his band had been unjustly incarcerated – and has even taken a stroll under the magnificent oak trees that delineate Officers’ Row. Now he must pay his respects to those musicians who had played their last notes at Clearwater.

It’s almost two weeks after Memorial Day and Vancouver Barracks Cemetery has become depository for a sea of wilted flowers adorning half of the gravestones, victims of a pre-summer battle with the sun. Matthew arrives at the cemetery with a dozen red roses for each of the four musicians. The cab stays parked at the Fourth Plain entrance while he follows the address found in the Internet: Section 6 on the East side of the cemetery, 73 as its number.

It isn’t long before he reaches his destination; a tombstone erected by members of Company I, perhaps four to six times the size of the typical stone in the cemetery. It reads: “In Memory Of… Corporal Charles CARLIN, Corporal James DOYLE, Musician John G. HEINEMANN, Private Charles CLARKE, Private Alson COMPTON… Company I 21 Infantry… Killed in action at the Clearwater… I.T. July 11, 1877.” Five people were being memorialized; although it’s uncertain if their remains are interred there. Carlin, Doyle, Heinemann and Clark[e] were in Adams’ journals, but not Compton. Was he also a trumpeter, or just another fallen infantryman of Company I? Little difference, for Adam had befriended everyone in Company I.

Forty-eight roses for five friends now… is inequality following us even in death? Matthew glances over to the north, and just 50 or 60 feet away, at the northernmost point, appears this little stone as if guarding the cemetery, bare of any flowers, fresh or wilted. Now there won’t be need of a Salomon solution by plucking petals; each of the six souls in eternal repose will have eight roses of their own. After placing forty roses around the musicians’ tombstone, Matthew walks with the remaining eight in his hand towards that gravestone at the beginning, perhaps end, of the cemetery.

Eight red roses are now circling marker 01, Friedrich Leonhardt’s tombstone – a German prisoner of war, buried there for sixty-one years. Has anyone ever visited his grave, or given thought to the sadness that must have existed for a man dying alone, thousands of miles away from family and friends? Matthew abhors war… whether in Clearwater, Europe or Iraq. To him war is hell; not hell made by any gods or demons, but hell as man’s own deranged creation, the ultimate reincarnation of evil.

Matthew signals the cabbie to take him to the train station so he may catch the Coast Starlight that will have him in Seattle in four hours.

§

The train has just left Tacoma; it won’t be long before he’s in Seattle. And he’s even thinking beyond. That great getaway, Port Townsend… and Matthew dozes into pleasant thoughts of a summer like no other: peaceful, pleasant and, he hopes, inspiring.

Then Matthew’s pleasant thoughts turn into an esoteric presence: a German soldier smiling at him, signaling for him to follow towards a large tent; a tent that opens wide into the night displaying a table lit by a kerosene lamp with six people around it playing poker, drinking spirits and carrying on as if in celebration. Five of them are wearing uniforms, Civil War vintage; the other, a civilian sporting a full beard over a handsome, distinguished face – perhaps Matthew’s age and wearing a double-necklace of beads.

Matthew quickly recognizes Spanish Adam from photos at home taken during the Carlist war in Spain. And that necklace must be the one given to him by Chief Red Heart… with the “talking beads” that may have given him safe-conduct to Chief Joseph at Clearwater.

And the five soldiers… could they be the fallen soldiers from Company I?

Friedrich, the sentry from Zwickau, has found a way to thank Matthew for the eight roses by taking him on a short visit to Hades before arriving in Seattle.

Summer 2006

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