The Daily Dispatch: March 23, 1861., [Electronic resource]

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A young Hero.

--As Lieut. Mowry and a companion were approaching Gila Bend, they met with a surprise of a novel character. At some hundreds of feet from the station, quite near the road was suspended from a tree the corpse of an Indian. It appears that one month since Gila Bend was inhabited only by a single family — an aged American, and his two sons; of whom the eldest was hardly fifteen years old, and a servant. On a certain night the inhabitants of the station were awakened by the well known war cry of the Apaches, and soon discovered that the house was surrounded. The establishment being simply constructed of the branches and leaves of trees like Gila City itself and the majority of the other stations, the dangers environed the inhabitants, now attacked by some five hundred yelling and frantic savages, may be imagined. Not hoping to escape, the men and boys armed themselves and awaited the attack. They were saved in the moment of extermination by a dead shot from the rifle of the eldest boy, which cut short the life of the chief — upon which the whole turned and took to flight. The corpse was suspended to an adjacent tree, and the spoils of war, the arrows, head-dress, and other personal property of the deceased warrior, were preserved by the brave little fellow as memorials of the fight.