Ken

Thompson's Memoirs also speak of this. They went out of their way to get something to eat.

Thompson say's : On this night Gen shelby received permission to leave the column and turn westward to the Canadian Fork to hunt provisions. I took the lead on foot and in an hour or 5 hours, I walked into a perfect hunter's Arcadia and to us a real heaven.

Following an Indian trail, it lead me into a bend of the Canadian Fork, where the woods were filled with turkeys, the little prairie bottom in the valley had at least a hundred fat cattle and deer were nearly as plenty. The ground was covered with rushes and good grass and in an hour afterwords, the cracking of the guns represented a good fight. By the time Gen Shelby and Gov Reynolds came up there had been more than twenty beeves killed and a perfect feast began. The woods were full of Haw trees and the men eat them for bread. We remained here three days to strengthen the horses, feed the men, jerk beef for the rest of our trip. When we had prepared, we made another start and crossed a terrible steep hill, over into the valley of the river again. We found a pleasant camp at an abandoned Indian's Plantation. The next day we started on a splendid road to push to a point called Perryville, where we expected to find some bread. As soon as the column was in motion I stepped off at my Nebraska stride, and long before dark, I had reached the place, found a portion of three wagon loads of provisions for us, and soon I had several pounds of flap jacks and stick bread under my belt, when I walked back on the road to encourage the others, for now starvation was gone and hope returned.
After five more days they broke bread with chief stand Watie and reached Boggy Depot.

Elmer