The General and the Jaguar by Eileen Welsome

Author:Eileen Welsome [WELSOME, EILEEN]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780316069588
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
Published: 2009-02-27T16:00:00+00:00

BY APRIL 11, General Pershing and twenty members of the headquarters staff were camped in a cornfield on the outskirts of Satevó—four hundred miles south of Columbus, eighty-three miles north of Parral, and midway between his roving columns. The entourage, which consisted of four automobiles and three trucks, made a defensive square in the cornfield. Pershing ordered shallow trenches dug and inspected the small group, including the correspondents, to make sure their rifles and sidearms were in working order. The Times correspondent, Frank Elser, had lost his rifle.

“Soldiers don’t lose their rifles,” Pershing growled.

“No, sir, they don’t, soldiers,” responded Elser.

Pershing slept outside the square, on a dinky cot by himself. In the distance, he could see the flickering lights of the Carrancistas’ campfires. “The big moon, rising higher, touched everything with a luminous and breathtaking beauty. Sentries paced the hills. The coyotes yipped, a thousand of them,” wrote Elser.

Pershing could sense his troops were close to el jaguar now and wanted to be in on the kill. Driving toward Parral were Howze’s troopers, the swashbuckling Frank Tompkins, and Colonel William Brown, another magnificent officer in his sixties. A fourth detachment led by Lieutenant Colonel Henry Allen had been ordered to cut the weak men and animals from their squadron and concentrate on finding Pablo López.

On the way to Parral, Major Tompkins and his troopers had encountered an amiable Carrancista captain named Antonio Mesa who had offered to telephone ahead to arrange for a campsite and forage for the tired troopers. Given Parral’s history, it seemed highly unlikely that its inhabitants would look kindly upon the foreigners, but Captain Mesa assured Tompkins that they would be treated well. Urging their tired horses forward, the officers thought longingly of the amenities awaiting them. “We pictured the hot baths we should have, the long cool drinks, and the good food,” remembered Tompkins.

Sometime around noon on April 12, Tompkins reached the outskirts of the town. No representatives of the Carrancista government were on hand to meet him so the major left the main body of his troops outside the town and proceeded with a small group to the guardhouse, where he asked to be taken to the headquarters of the jefe de armas. When he arrived, he was introduced to General Ismael Lozano, who invited him upstairs for a private conference. Also present at the gathering was José de la Luz Herrera, Parral’s civilian mayor. The room had French windows overlooking the street and Tompkins could see his squadron down below, looking impressive and alert. The Mexican officials were agitated and alarmed by Tompkins’s presence. (“Their entrance into the city was so sudden and unexpected that it was regarded as an act of hostility,” Mayor Herrera would later explain.)

General Lozano asked Tompkins why he had come. Tompkins responded that he had been invited into the city by Captain Mesa, who was supposed to have sent a message in advance notifying the town officials of their arrival. Lozano said he had received no such message and emphasized that Tompkins and his men would have to leave immediately.

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