The competition is named for an officer who launched a night attack into Mexico on 4-5 May 1916 during the Punitive Expedition against Poncho Villa. Major Howze and his unit of 332 officers and men covered the last 20 miles to the objective area in 2hours and 45 minutes, in the dark, over a spur of the Sierra Madre Mountains, at the trot and then launched an immediate, surprise, dawn mounted pistol charge on the Mexicans.
We had only six riders for this event but we had arranged in advance for a couple of 11 ACR troopers from Fort Irwin to join our team. We have joined forces with these guys in the past as they are a smaller unit like us and we get along well with them. Ironically, Major Howze had been with the 11th Cavalry.
The course that had been laid out for us was 6.2 miles long. The course involved passing through gates, streams, forested areas, steep terrain (I mean really steep), and over logs. It was awesome.
We decided to put our two best trotting horses up front, Monte and Charlie. They set a good pace and were tireless. Our leader, Bill, would use hand signals to change our formation from a column of twos to single file depending on the terrain. Our guide, former NCC Champion Dan McClusky, led us through this unbelievable course telling us where to go and when to rest. Dan is a man of good humor and riding along with him was a treat in itself.
Apache the Wonder Horse and I were in the second file riding next to Rod and Journey. Both Rod and I had trouble keeping our mounts at a trot as both wanted to proceed at the gallop. I soon realized that I would have to run Wonder Horse up behind Monte or Charlie to slow him down to a trot. I also noticed that Rod had a picket pin attached to his saddle for the Authenticity Competition and that this thing was jabbing me in the leg when we were riding in a column of twos. As a result we switched sides.
At the mid point Dan had us stop and rest for five minutes. We used the time to check our mounts and adjust our tack. Apache was well lathered as was one of the Irwin horses. However, neither had excessively high respiration rates so the sweating had to to do more with excitement than fatigue. Once we were mounted again we took off at the same blistering pace.
Eventually, we came to our first stream crossing. Our horses are fairly used to seeing water but the Fort Irwin horses had never crossed a running stream in their lives. There isn't much water near Fort Irwin and these horses didn't know what they were seeing. These were the same horses that had the problem during the staff ride. Unfortunately, the Wonder Horse takes his cue from other horses. If he sees another horse reacting badly to something he assumes he must have a reason to react badly also. He went across the stream okay but decided to jump it instead of striding through. Unfortunately, there was a low hanging branch over the ford and as I leaned over the saddle to avoid the branch Apache jumped up driving the pommel shield into my rib cage. I may have used some unlady-like language at this point.
One of the two Irwin horses made it across but there was still one holdout that was costing us some serious time. I think once all the other horses had crossed, the trooper dismounted and just let the horse cross on his own. Herd instinct is strong and will compel a scared horse to brave just about anything I guess.
Mounting up again, on we rode, picking up the pace to make up the lost time. After entering a deep ravine that was more of a slide than a trail we came up the opposite side which was covered in fallen logs. We were moving so fast I hardly had time to be concerned about them. Somehow we negotiated this mess without losing a horse or a man. And then, another stream.
Fortunately, we got a reprieve. The team that had gone before us (the same group that had a rider get kicked during the trail ride and had a horse wreck during the opening ceremonies) lost a rider during the saber attack. We were held in place by Dan while they summoned an ambulance to take the trooper to the hospital. This gave us a chance to rest our horses and figure out how to get the Irwin horses across the stream. By now, our horses were becoming afraid of the water too because of the reaction of the Irwin horses. We eventually got them all across but one of the Irwin horses actually levitated itself off the ground to get across the stream. Its hooves never touched the water.
On we rode but now we could see Fort Robinson off in the distance and knew we were almost done. We saw the enemy targets lined up in nice little double rows. The targets were paper bags over cardboard and mounted on wooden posts. A little heart was drawn on the center of the bag. Our guide bid us farewell and we spread out for the attack, picking our lanes. Drawing sabers we started out at a walk, then a trot, then gallop...charge! As I guided the Wonder Horse to my set of targets I felt my stampede string snap and away went my hat. I hit the first target dead-on and lined up for the second. My saber passed through the heart and hit...solid wood! My blade shivered under the impact and felt the impact traveling up my arm to my shoulder. Dang near lost the saber. I also picked up a souvenir on the way. I had a nice big piece of cardboard stuck on my saber.
After passing through the targets we formed up and accounted for all men and horses. No casualties. Bill reported in to the judges and we were done.
I think every part of my body was in pain from that ride but it was so fun that it didn't matter. We found out later that we had taken first place in the event. We had the best time and the highest target kill ratio. We also learned that night that we had earned some ribbons in the earlier events. To my astonishment, the Wonder Horse and I had taken 2nd Place in the Level 2 horsemanship event and 5th in mounted pistol. One of my fellow troopers, Ken, had taken 3rd in Level 2 horsemanship. Bill, our commander, had taken 3rd in Level 2 mounted pistol. It had been a good day.
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