10083. E.T.W. Joseph Pomeroy Widney, A.M., M.D., D.D, LL.D., San Francisco, Reprint from California and Western Medicine April, May and June, 1936

E. T. W. Joseph Pomeroy Widney, A.M., M.D., D. D. , LL.D. San Francisco: Reprint From California and Western Medicine April, May and June, 1936. Volume 44, Numbers 4, 5, 6- pp. 1. Service In The United States Army: Surgeon At Drum Barracks, Wilmington, And In The Arizona—Apache Campaign . Returning to _ military duty in the United States Army, when General David McMurtree Gregg , commanding the Department of the Pacific, came down the Coast from San Francisco with recruits on the old side—wheeler, the steamer Orizaba, Doctor Widney, after a month at Drum Barracks , in Wilmington , started for Arizona in charge of some hundreds of recruits and saw two years of arduous service in Arizona in the campaigns of 1867 and 1868 against the Apaches . The unadorned narratives of his adventures during the rough formative periods of that corner of the Southwest might well afford fireside entertainment. " Leaving Drum Barracks and San Pedro, " he says , "we started out for Arizona through San Gorgon io Pass— I on horse, but most of the recruits on foot. From there we crossed the Colorado Desert , and went into camp somewhere below Palm Springs. By the eighth of March we were crossing the desert, and such was the sudden change that two men dropped in -their tracks, overcome by the heat. Then we started to climb Granite Wash, some sixteen miles of upgrade , and when we were about half way, a thunder storm broke in the mountains. Lieutenant McConihe brought the troops to a halt, and gave orders to pitch camp. I immediately objected to the site , considering it unsafe; but the lieutenant replied that, as the wagonmaster had made the selection, the decision would stand. A short time, however, after the men had unhitched the wagons, we heard a roaring in the mountains, and I at once knew what it portended; and in a moment, seeing the waters rushing down, with a ten—foot head, I shouted to the men to jump for the rocks as quickly as they could and save their lives. The water actually seemed to leap from rock to rock, bounding and rebounding eight to ten feet high before hitting the earth again. About half of our wagon—train was swept away, a severe loss since many of the wagons were loaded with barley, which, scattered by the flood, caused a sixteen—mile field of barley to spring up. Moving on to the territory due north, I helped reéstablish Date Creek Post. I was next, for some months, on duty scouting over the northern part of the territory. "I then received orders to take charge as surgeon at Apache Pass in the southern part of the territory. In company with a small band of officers likewise ordered to the south , and with an escort of soldiers for greater safety in the Indian country, we crossed fifty miles of desert without water, traveling all night because of the heat. Passing on through Tucson, I went to my own post at Apache Pass, over a hundred miles east of that town. "