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761
I hired to Wash Grey to bring a herd of cattle to Goliad county, delivering them to his brother, Bob Grey. I remained in Goliad county and worked as a freighter again, hauling supplies from Old Indianola to Goliad and Sutherland Springs. The ox teams we had to drive were too slow for a boy of my age, and I longed to get back on a ranch chasing mavericks. For the next four years, I worked for H. A. Lane, near my present home, twelve miles west of Goliad. Here I received $20.00 per month, breaking broncos, gathering and branding cattle, etc.
At the age of twenty-one years I left Goliad with a herd of mixed cattle for H. A. Lane and J. Gus Patton, and drove these cattle over the Old Chisholm Trail to Dodge City, Kansas, with only two stampedes on the entire trip.
One year later I again went up the trail with a herd of mixed cattle of over 3,000 head for J. Gus Patton, who is now our county attorney, and one of the truest friends I have ever known. On this trip we had Patton for boss, and Sidney Chivers, Uncle Billie Menafee and Will Peck as cowboys. Returning from this trip, I gathered wild horses in Goliad, Victoria, Refugio, Bee, Live Oak and Karnes counties, gathering several thousand head for the various ranches.
In 1876 I again went up the trail with 4,500 head of aged steers for Dillard Fant, with Charley Boyce as herd boss. On this trip we had the worst weather I ever experienced, losing cattle in blizzards with the most vivid electrical displays imaginable. We had seven stampedes on this trip.
In the winter of 1871 and 1872, I helped skin dead cattle on the prairies in Goliad, Victoria and Refugio counties, as the cattle were starving to death by the thousands, and very few grown cattle lived through this terrible winter. I have seen as many as a thousand head of dead cattle in one day's ride on the prairie near Lamar. Horses, cattle, deer and sheep suffered awfully during