7 "The Siege"

I had my compound built just a little bit off the foothill so it'd be easier for access and we won't be flooded in the spring or summer rains. It occupies about a three acre area, elongated and sits in a North-South direction with mud walls about five feet tall encircling it. My house sits the highest point and obviously the furthest back in the compound. To its right or East I plan to have the land cleared and make it our food plot for the spring and for extra room to expand the compound when needed. To the left or North sits my kilns.

My sentries' blow of the horn woke me up with Aylen and Oota by my side. I have given up fighting to push them off in the middle of the night. The cuddling has kept us all warm at night and we are after all a real family by now. Plus with the open floor plan it'd be odd to set up two beds across the room from each other. With my eighteen year old body and two young flesh next to me I'd have to admit it was a torture at the beginning. I couldn't do anything with Aylen because it would be against everything I know. But with her next to me there was very little I could do with Oota either in the same bed and open room. Soon I would have to figure out a way to address my personal needs. I have to say the life of a Peace Corp. volunteer can be hard sometimes.

The approaching clipped howling quickened with the beatings of the drum signaled it was an organized attack. No word uttered among us as we dressed ourselves in a hurry. As I came out with Aylen and Oota just behind me, everyone in the compound has come out, men, women and children. I could see fear and tension behind their determined faces. With all their expecting eyes on me I never felt more determined that at that moment. I had to show them I was in control, collected and in charge.

"Company...formation...arms ready!" I shouted with my command.

"Oota, go get the children inside and the women ready to care for the wounded." I I told Oota and Aylen.

As my men were getting armed and getting into formation I climbed up one sentry post located in the middle section of the side compound wall. I had a post built one on each side. The attacking tribe came from the South to our front entrance then quickly divided to surround the compound on both sides. There must be at least two hundred of them, some armed with stone hammers, some with sticks and others with bows and arrows. The snow made them quite visible in the predawn shadow. Looking behind to the rear of the compound there was yet any signs of attackers.

"First Platoon and Second Platoon, position at the gate. Third Platoon to left wall and Fourth Platoon to the right. Every platoon spread out by sections. Fifth Platoon stand by and follow me." I gave my orders as loud and clam as possible. I have organized my men into five platoons and have discussed and agreed on a plan for possible attach scenarios. Hopefully every one should know what to do.

Most of the attack happened at the front entrance. I still haven't had time to build a double sided swivel door for the gate. The problem was there was no effective tools to build the hinges or anything strong enough to hold each door panel together. So I ended up building a cross-standing spiked wooden fence about six feet tall instead and it was holding up for now.

"Chief, the attackers are the Senecas." The sentry told me.

The Senecas lived in the American Northeast in the Upstate New York region. Around 1450 the Seneca (People of the Great Hill) to the West, the Cayuga (People of the Great Swamp) next to them to the East, the Mohawk (People of the Flint), the Oneida (People of the Standing Stone) and the Onondaga (People of the Hill) to the far East, five tribes formed the Iroquois League (People of the Long House). As an Algonquian Indian I share the same language with all of them and after my arrival I have done nothing to alienate or irk anyone. So why would they attack me, just because I have and they don't? I started to see the dilemma the early settlers faced.

The compound held up. Attackers who were able to climb over the wall fell to the arrows and swards of my men. The battle lasted until sunrise. The Siege turned out to be a one-sided slaughter. Blood bathed under the Sun evaporated with the typical odor that comes with a slaughtering house that cannot be washed away, be it for animals or humans. Attackers who were able to come in never got up again. A simple castled wall had separated my people from their same of the Stone Age. Yet the wall still can not hold for long, not against guns and cannons to come.

Looking through the spiked fence I saw there were still about close to one hundred of them outside, but many of them teenagers looking dumbfounded without a leader to tell them what to do. They stood there, still and silent, like lams or doe without their mothers, almost eager for me to decide their fate for them. Their fighting had never come with any belief. It was only driven by the need for food and survival through the only way they knew.

Throughout its history, the Chinese emperors speak of the masses as the deer, the subject to be chased and controlled, with a mandate from heaven of course. The Western societies control them by a system of law and order with a promise of democracy, but a democracy that is still controlled by the riches with the masses surviving as worker bees and the ideal eluding them. How free does an individual have to be in order to be truly free? The New Testament never speaks of freedom as an ideal or virtue to be pursued. If the church and state have to be separated because of the Bible's silence on the ideal of freedom, then its promotion has to be a human creation for the modern ages, but for whom and to what end? To encourage individual creation for the advancement of society? If so, it would still be a handed down approach for the masses. Its flaw lies in it leaves to chance and the presumption that human creations can better societies. But not all of them do and morality has been either left out of this social progress and or morality would have to evolve to accommodate the progress to the point beyond our recognition. Should morality play a more assertive role in directing social progress who is to choose and what set of moralities should we adopt?

"Arms Up! Surrender and you shall have food!" Enough with the thinking I have to deal with the situation at hand. I think they understood arms up and food so the next thing I saw was the kids raising their arms one faster than another with sticks and stones dropping to the ground.

My Fifth Platoon was the reserved force. I called on them to take the prisoners and be in charge of clearing the battle field.

In total I lost no more than a dozen men and took in another one hundred twenty five prisoners including those who climbed in, captured and the slightly wounded. Because most of the prisoners were kids and I have no resources or need to build a separate camp for them I divided them up evenly and have them supplemented my five platoons. To distinguish them from my original company men I had them each wear an arm band made of birch bark and told them it would only through special contributions they'd be able to take these off. For my men who sacrificed their lives for the battle I could only have a mass grave dug for them but topped with a stone piled monument. I told my people that coming in the spring we would build a house of worship with each of their individual names forever kept there. Because their ultimate sacrifice we were able to live another day. For those who had families left behind, I promised the families that each would have a ceramic plate mounted on front of their house and each would be my family and our family to take care of.

After seeing to it that all the new men were fed and housed with their new platoons it was already dark. It was a long day. I told my company to keep the guard up and it was not time to celebrate yet. Plus there was no alcohol. Yes, alcohol, would have to be something I could experiment and make before winter would be over. As I was lying in bed with arms hugged on each side by Aylen and Oota and seeing the added admiration in their eyes I was already in hog heaven. A cigar in one hand and wine in another and pretty girls next to me, Horse Face, thank you.

Winter grew and saw two more attacks with similar results. The population swelled to about five hundred by the time spring came. I had the men organized and expanded into two companies, an even three hundred of them. I also organized a women's troop with twenty five members. Aylen got her wish to become the platoon commander. With animal fat cooked into oil and yarn pulled out of the under layer of the bear pelt and soaked in the oil before it turned into lard, we had lights, one thousand points of lights literally. The kilns continued its production throughout the winter. The military training also continued with hunting organized for both training and food. The entries were posted in four directions a mile away from the compound. Before winter was over, my men were also able to put on their brand new uniform, made of leather and still more leather with fur on them of course. The cave men look belongs to the museum not at my camp.

Without iron or steel I made a needle out of bones and had the men made about a hundred of them. They became quite popular and actually fetched a small fortune for us. I organized a lady's sewing circle and became their leader. We had each man sized, then tailored and sewed the leather and fur together with still more strips of leather. From section sergeant to platoon lieutenant to company commanders I had the leather turned backward and sewed the square on the front of their uniform. Ranks have to come with privileges and they wore them with proud.

Something still seems missing. I will still need a flag for my army, a name for my people and our camp, and an ideal to live for.