A Vacancy Occurred About This Time In The Quartermaster's
Department, And The Appointment Was Eagerly Sought For By Many
Lieutenants Of The Army.
President Cleveland saw fit to give the
appointment to Lieutenant Summerhayes, making him a Captain and
Quartermaster, and then, another vacancy occurring shortly after,
he appointed Lieutenant John McEwen Hyde to be also a Captain and
Quartermaster.
Lieutenant Hyde stood next in rank to my husband and had grown
grey in the old Eighth Infantry. So the regiment came in for its
honor at last, and General Kautz, when the news of the second
appointment reached him, exclaimed, "Well! well! does the
President think my regiment a nursery for the Staff?"
The Eighth Foot and the Ninth Horse at Niobrara gave the new
Captain and Quartermaster a rousing farewell, for now my husband
was leaving his old regiment forever; and, while he appreciated
fully the honor of his new staff position, he felt a sadness at
breaking off the associations of so many years - a sadness which
can scarcely be understood by the young officers of the present
day, who are promoted from one regiment to another, and rarely
remain long enough with one organization to know even the men of
their own Company.
There were many champagne suppers, dinners and card-parties given
for him, to make the good-bye something to be remembered, and at
the end of a week's festivities, he departed by a night train
from Valentine, thus eluding the hospitality of those generous
but wild frontiersmen, who were waiting to give him what they
call out there a "send-off."
For Valentine was like all frontier towns; a row of stores and
saloons.
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