The Thrilling Mission of Commissioner Joseph C. Eldridge to the Wild Tribes in 1843, by Authority of President Houston -- Hamilton P. Bee, Thomas Torrey --- the three Delawares, Jim Shaw, John Connor and Jim Second Eye --- The Treaty. (Part 2b of 2b) Succeeding this last scene they were informed that the council had refused to send delegates to the proposed council. Payhayuco favored the measure, but was overruled by the majority. within an hour after the announcement (August 11th 1843) our friends mounted and started on their long journey home -- fully five hundred miles, through a trackless wilderness. I pass over some exciting incidents occurring at the moment of their departure tetween a newly arrived party of Delaware traders having no connection with Eldridge, and a portion of the Comanches, in regard to a Choctaw negro prisoner bought from the Comanches by the traders. It was dreaded by our friends as a new danger but was settled without bloodshed by the payment of a larger ransom to the avaricious Comanches. Without remarkable incident and in due time, our friends arrived again at the principal Wichita village (at or near the present Fort Sill) and were again kindly received. The day fixed for the treaty having passed, Eldridge knew the President would be disappointed and impatient; so, after conclusion, it was agreed that Torrey, with Jim Shaw, John Connor and the other Indian attaches, still with them, should return on the route they had gone out, gather up the tribes first mentioned in this narrative, and conduct them to Bird's Fort; while Eldridge, Bee and their most trusted Delaware hunter, with Jim Second Eye as guide, would proceed directly to the fort. Thus they separated, each party on its mission, and to Eldridge and Bee it was a perilous one. I shall follow them. On the second day, at 3 p.m., they halted in a pretty grove, on a beautiful stream, to cook their last food, a little Wichita green corn. This enraged Second Eye, who seized the hunter's gun, and galloped away, leaving them with only holster pistols. The Delaware hunter was a stranger in the country and could only communicate by signs. For three days he kept a bee line for Warren's trading house on Red river, as safer than going directly to Bird's Fort, guided by the information he had casually picked up from his brothers on the trip, for neither of the white men knew the country. On the third day they entered the Cross Timbers where brush and briers retarded their progress, and camped near night on a pretty creek. The Delaware climbed a high tree and soon began joyful gesticulations. Descending he indicated that Eldridge should accompany him, leaving Bee in camp. He did so and they were gone two or three hours, but finally returned with a good supply of fresh corn bread a grateful repast to men who had been without an ounce of food for three days and nights. The camp visited proved to be that of a party of men cutting hay for Fort Arbuckle, on the Washita, who cooked and gave them the bread and other provisions, with directions to find the trading house and the information that they could reach it next day. With full stomachs they slept soundly; started early in the morning and about 2 p.m. rode up to Warren's trading house. The first man seen was Jim Second Eye, the treacherous scoundrel who had left them at the mercy of any straggling party of hostile or thieving savages. He hastened forward with extended hand, exclaiming: "How are you, Joe? How are you, Ham? Glad to see you!" The always courteus Eldridge, usually gentle and never given to profane language, sprang from his horse and showered upon him such a torrent of denunciatory expletives as to exhaust himself; then, recovering, presented himself and Mr. Bee to Mr. Warren, with an explanatory apology for his violent language, justified, as he thought, towards the base wretch to whom it was addressed. Quite a crowd of Indians and a few white men were present. Mr. Warren received and entertained them most kindly. They never more beheld Jim Second Eye. After a rest of two days Eldridge and Bee, with their faithful Delaware, left for Bird's Fort, and, without special incident, arrived there about the middle of September, to be welcomed by the commissioners, Messrs. George. W. Terrell and E. H. Tarrant, who had given them up as lost. The President had remaind at the fort for a month, when, chargrined and greatly disappointed, he had left for the seat of government. Capt. Eldridge, anxious to report to the President, tarried not at the fort, but with Bee and the still faithful Delaware, continued on. On the way Mr. Bee was seized with chills and fever of violent type, insomuch that, at Fort Milam, Eldridge left him and hurried on. Mr. Bee finally reached the hospitable house of his friend, Col. Josiah Crosby, seven miles above Washington, and there remained till in the winter, before recovering his health. Capt. Eldridge, after some delay, met and reported to the President, but was not received with the cordiality he thought due his services. Jim Shaw and John Connor had preceded him and misstated various matters to the prejudice of Eldridge, and to the amazement of many who knew his great merit and his tried fidelity to President Houston, he was dismissed from office. Very soon, however, the old hero became convinced of his error; had Eldridge appointed chief cler of the State Department under Anson Jones, and immediately after annexation in 1846, secured his appointment by President Polk, as Paymaster in the United States Navy, a position he held till hos death in his long-time home in Brooklyn, New York, in 1881. Excepting only the incident referred to - deeply lamented by mutual friends -- the friendship between him and President Houston, from their first acquaintance in 1837, remained steadfast while both lived. Indeed Capt. Eldridge subsequently named a son for him -- his two sons being Charles and Houston Eldridge. A TREATY MADE. On the 29th of September 1843, a few days after Eldridge and Bee left, a treaty was concluded by Messrs. Tarrant and Terrell, with the following tribes, viz.: Tehuscanos, Keechis, Wacos, Caddos, Anadarcos, Ionics, Boluxies, Delawares, and thirty isolated Cherokees. The Wichitas and Towdashers were deterred from coming in by the lies of some of the Creeks. Estecayucatubba, principal chief of rhe Chickasaws, signed the treatey merely for its effect on the wild tibes. Leonard Williams and Luis Sanchez of Nacogdoches, were present and aided in collecting tribes, who failed to assemble on the 10th of august, because of the non-return of Eldridge and his party. Roasting Ear, S. Lewis and McCulloch, Delaware chiefs, wre present at the signing and rendered service in favor of the treaty. The most potent chief in the council to whom the wide tribes looked as a leader, was Kechikoroqus, the head of the Tehuscanos; who at first refused to treat any one but the President; but finally yielded, after understaind the powers of the commissioners. A line of demarcation was agreed upon between the whites and Indians, along which, at proper intervals, trading house, were to be established. Three points for such houses were selected, which indicate the general line chosen, viz.: one at the Junctionof the West and Clear Forks of the Trinity; one at the Comance Peak; and one at the old San Saba Mission. Fron undoubted data this narrative has been prepared, the first ever published ot this most thrilling succession of events in our Indian history. It reflects the highest credit on the three courageous young men who assumed and trimphed over its hazards, though sadly followed by the death of the heroic and much loved Thomas Torrey. (1*) Joseph C. Eldridge was a native of Connecticut, and of an ancient and honorable family. Of him Gen. Bee writes me: "He was an admirable character, brave, cool, determined in danger, faithful to public trusts and loving in his friendships. He did more than his duty on this trip. He served as Paymaster in the United States navy from 1846, and died the senioir oficer of that corps in 1881, at his home in Brooklyn, New York. His stern sesnse of duty was displayed on our way out, when, north of Red river, we met and camped all night with a company of men under Capt. S. P. Ross, returning from the ill-fated Snively expedition. They urged us to return home, as the Indians on the plains were all hostile -- our trip would be fruitless, and the hazards wre too great for such a handful. Only Eldridge's courage and high sense of duty caused him to reject the advice and proceed; but pending our trial in the Comanche council we all regretted not having yielded to the warnings of Capt. Ross. Capt. Eldridge died of softening of the brain. He had a son, Houston Eldridge, named for the President after their temporary unplesantness, a most promising young officer of the navy, who died not long after his father. John C. Eldridge, a cousin of Joseph C., also figured honorably in Texas for a number of years, and their names were sometimes confounded. Charles W. Eldridge, another cousin, deceased in Hartford,Connecticut, was a brother-in-law to the writer of this history. (2*)' There were four of the Torrey brothers, all from Ashford, Connecticut, the younger following the elder to Texas 1836 to 1840. David was the head of Torrey's Trading House. He was the third one in the order of death, being killed by Indians on the Brazos frontier, not far from the time of annexation. James, a gallant and estimable young man, kindly remembered by the writer of this for his social and soldierly virtuses, was one of the seventeen justly celebrated Mier prisioners who drew black beans at the hacienda of Salado, Mexico and were shot to death by order of Santa Anna, on the 19th of March, 1843. Thomas, the companion of Eldridge and Bee on this hazardous mission, a worthy brother of such men as David and James, was a Santa Fe prisoner in 1841-42, marched in chains twelve hundered miles, from Santa Fe tot he city of Mexico, and was there imprisioned with his fellows. He passed the terrible ordeal narrated in this chapter, as occuring in the council of Payhayuco -- separated from Eldridge and Bee at the Wichita villae, successfully reached Bird's Fort, with detachments of the wild tribes, there to sicken and die, as success largely crowned their efforts to bring about a general treaty. John F. Torrey, the only survivor of the four brothers, the personification of enterprise, built and ran cotton and woolen factories at New Braunfels. Floods twice swept them and his wealth away. At a goodly age he lives on his own farm on Comanche Peak, Hood County. Honored be the name of Torrey among the children of Texas! (3*) Hamilton P. Bee is a native of Charleston, South Carolina, favorably and intimately known to the writer for half a century as an honor to his country in all that consitutes a true and patriot citizen -- a son of the Hon. Barnard E. Bee, who early tendered his sword and services to struggling Texas, and a brother of Gen. Barnard E. Bee, who fell at Manassas, the first General to yield his life to the Confederate cause. Hamilton P. Bee was Secretary to the United States and Texas Boundary Commission, 1839-40; Secretary of the first State Senate in 1846; a gallant soldier in the Mexican war; eight years a member of the Legislature from the Rio Grande, and speaker of the House in 1855-56; a Brigadier-General in the Confederate army, losing a handsome estate by the war, and later served as Commissioner of Insurance, Statistics and History of the State of Texas. Source: "Indian Wars and Pioneers of Texas" by John Henry Brown. L.E. Daniell, Publisher, Austin, Texas. Pages 93-100 (Note: There are 3 parts posted for this article - Part 1, 2a, & 2b)