USA > Colorado > History of the State of Colorado, Volume II > Part 21
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" Witness my official hand an' seal, JIM BARKER, J. P. in Blue Lizard Gulch, El Paso County in the Territory."
The upright warden, after informing the constable that he could not receive the prisoner on that kind of a commitment, explained to him that Zimri should have given a bond in the sum of about $300 to appear at the District Court. Accordingly, Mike withdrew with his prisoner, when it was agreed between them that Zim should give the constable his bond for the amount mentioned by the warden. This was done by Zimri's signing his name to an old replevin bond calling for three hundred dollars, found among the papers handed down to the officer by his predecessor. Then, as Mike intended returning to
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Blue Lizard Gulch, by way of Piñon Mountain, to examine a bear den where he had seen a couple of cubs playing the previous spring, he gave the bond to Zim to take back to the Justice. But Zim on his return traded the $300 bond to a mountain squatter just in from Missouri, for a horse, saddle and bridle, and then broke out for parts unknown.
While the foregoing incident may appear extravagant and wholly imaginary, it is nevertheless true that the records of some of the earlier justice's courts contain opinions and judgments that are even more ludicrous, some of which will appear in due course. Many, indeed most of such courts, were conducted by men densely ignorant of even the simplest forms of jurisprudence, and when called to sit in judgment, formed their conclusions rather with regard to the right of the matters before them as between man and man, than from the precepts of statutes which they were utterly unable to comprehend. Their principal busi- ness was to reach the truth, regardless of technicalities or the pleadings of counsel, consequently their rulings were frequently original and unique. If a prisoner were shown to be guilty of murder or theft, the main idea was to punish him then and there, and not permit the case to drag along for years. Whatever penalty was decreed it was made the business of the hour, and promptly executed. If a civil cause, it was adjusted without appeal. Though their ways were rugged, they were rarely unjust.
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CHAPTER XII.
REMINISCENCES CONTINUED-FRENCH EXPLORATIONS OF COLORADO AND NEW MEXICO IN 1739-40-LIVES AND CHARACTERS OF COL. A. G. BOONE, AND COL. JOHN M. FRANCISCO-TOM TOBEN'S SLAUGHTER OF THE MURDEROUS ESPINOSAS-SOME RECOLLECTIONS OF OLD ZAN HICKLIN AND THE REBELLION OF MACE'S HOLE.
I am indebted to Capt. Edward L. Berthoud of Golden, Colorado, for the translation from an old French publication, of the incidents sub- joined, extracted from a journal kept by the Mallett Brothers, who made an exploration of the western part of Louisiana in 1739-'40 from the Panimabas River (probably Loup Fork) to Santa Fé, New Mexico, which states that the company, all French and Canadians, started from the point named above, May 29th, 1739. Up to that time every one supposed New Mexico would be reached and found at the head of the Missouri River. Imbued with this idea, some had gone up .the Missouri to the Ricaree villages, one hundred and fifty leagues above the Panis (French for Pawnees) villages. The Malletts, however, and their companions, on the advice of some Indians, took an entirely con- trary route, the journey beginning in a course nearly parallel with the Missouri River.
"Leaving on the 29th of May, on June 2d they arrived at a river which they named 'River Platte.' Here discovering that it seemed not to deviate from the route selected, they followed it. Passing west- ward about seventy-two miles, they found it forked, being joined by the Padouca Fork (South Platte). Crossing the latter, they passed over to the Republican. On the 20th of June they came to the Smoky Hill. June 30th they reached a river, probably the Arkansas, above the Purg- atoire, where they discovered signs of recent visits by Spaniards. Es-
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timating at this place that they had traveled about 400 miles, they con- cluded that this stream must be a branch of the 'Arkansah' River. Following the left bank, on July 5th they came to a village of Iatan (Comanche) Indians, from whom they obtained some deer. Leaving the river, on the 10th of July they saw the Spanish Peaks. On the 12th they reached the foothills; on the 14th came to a stream which they called Red River, but which they concluded must be a branch of the Arkansah-probably one of the branches of the Canadian in Colfax County, New Mexico. About twenty-one leagues further (fifty-four miles) they reached the first Spanish post, a mission called Picuris. On the 15th they had given three Indians a letter to the Commander of Taos, who had sent to them some mutton and excellent bread. One league before reaching Picuris they were met by a priest, the Com- mander and a crowd of people, who treated them capitally, ringing bells and rejoicing. On the 21st they started from Picuris for Santa Fé, where they arrived on the 22d, by their count 265 leagues-about 680 miles from the Panimabas. Here they were well treated, but detained nine months, to hear what the Viceroy of Mexico might determine should be done for them, a caravan and dispatches being sent yearly to old Mexico. In the meantime, the French remaining in Santa Fé, were hospitably entertained, and examined by the French commander.
" At length the answer of the viceroy came, and according to the Canadians' report, was desirous of engaging with the Canadians to remain in the country, with the idea of employing them to explore a country to the west, three months' journey in distance, where men clothed in silk dwelt in cities on the shores of the sea. Although the offer was good, our explorers much preferred to return home, which they were allowed to do.
"The Canadians report that Santa Fé is built of mud, has no fortifi- cations, and is inhabited by 800 Spanish and half-breed natives. There are many Indian villages, each with a padre. Eighty soldiers, badly drilled and armed, form the garrison. There are many mines around Santa Fé, but they are not worked. Other mines in the province of
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New Mexico are now exploited for the King of Spain, the silver being sent every year by caravan to Old Mexico. The Governor takes pos- session of all the merchandise brought to the country, and in that way monopolizes trade, while the poor priests and others would like to par- ticipate in this trade.
"On the Ist of May, 1740, the party, seven in number, left Santa Fé intending to find the Mississippi River and go down to New Orleans. On the 13th three of them separated from the others and went to the Illinois River. The remainder persisted in their intention to find New Orleans, which they finally reached in safety."
Capt. Berthoud, in commenting upon this expedition, says : "This discovery of a route from Nebraska across our present Colorado into New Mexico, and the return of the seven men to the Illinois River and to New Orleans, explored a vast scope of country, and animated the French government of Louisiana to open by Red River, the Canadian or the Arkansas, a new trading route to Santa Fe and the Western Ocean."
"In 1741 the Sieur Fabry de la Bruyere was sent with fifteen men on a mission westward. He started with the Mallett Brothers, Peter and Paul, two Canadians and some soldiers, ascending the Arkansas to the Canadian, thence up the Canadian on the route to Santa Fe. Water failing them on the Upper Canadian, the party divided and set out to reach Santa Fé by land. After a series of disasters and mis- understandings between Fabry and the Malletts, the expedition failed of success, and the different members under Fabry, Champort, a ser- geant of the army, and the Mallett Brothers, returned to Louisiana without having accomplished their object.
" A French official in Louisiana, the Sieur Hebert, remarks in a memoir sent to the Navy Council in France, October, 1717, that the richest mines are to be found only in the highest mountains of Lou- isiana; that the mines of New Mexico prove this, and that by ascending the Missouri River to its sources, as good as the Spanish mines will be found The discovery of the rich and extensive mines of Montana
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seems to be a curious confirmation of Hebert's theory, formed in the early part of the eighteenth century.
" Again, Diron d' Artaguelle, a French officer who had served in America, unequivocally states in a memoir on Louisiana and its situ- ation, written at Bayonne, France, May 12, 1712, that the Arkansah River was already then known to its head waters, information which ante-dated the report of Lieut. Pike by ninety-four years."
Colonel Albert Gallatin Boone .- Napoleon Boone, son of Maj. Daniel Morgan Boone, and direct grandson of the great Kentucky pioneer, was the first white child born in the Territory of Kansas, August 22d, 1828, his father having been appointed "Farmer" for the Kaw Indians early in 1827.
Colonel A. G. Boone was born at Greensburg, Kentucky, April 17th, 1806. He also was a grandson of Daniel Boone. His parents having moved to Missouri, at the age of sixteen he was engaged as clerk to an Indian trading firm among the Osages of Southwestern Missouri. In 1824, he became secretary and bookkeeper for Gen. William Ash- ley's trading expedition to the Rocky Mountains, and with others encamped on the present site of West Denver. The company comprised three hundred men. They came up the Platte River. Col. Louis Vas- quez, who afterward established a trading post at the mouth of Vasquez Fork (now Clear Creek), as set forth in our first volume, was a member of the expedition. They passed the winter of 1824-'25 hunting and trapping in the Middle Park and many parts of the mountains of Col- orado and Wyoming, subsequently passing westward through the Salt Lake Valley and the mountains thereabouts, and finally to Puget Sound. In the Wahsatch Range near the present site of Salt Lake City, Ashley's party encountered under the command of a British Major named Ogden, a company of trappers in the interest of the Hudson's Bay Company. The Americans promptly relieved them of their furs and ordered them off United States territory, back to the British Possessions where they belonged. In due course Ashley's hunters and trappers returned to St. Louis with the vast quantities of furs they had gathered.
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Col. Boone afterward made several journeys to the Rocky Mount- ains. He had acquired a pretty thorough knowledge of most of the Indian tongues; was employed by Gen. Lewis Cass, then Governor of Michigan and the Indian Territory, in which was included what is now the State of Wisconsin, in government service among the Indians, where he remained until 1833. In 1831, he served on the staff of Gen. Henry Dodge in the Menominee War, and also in the Black Hawk War of 1832-'33. In 1849, and until 1855, he had a trading post among the Osages in Kansas, and built the first warehouse at Westport Landing, where Kansas City now stands.
In 1860, he came to Denver and established a store on Blake street between F and G (now Fifteenth and Sixteenth) streets. A short time afterward he was appointed Special Commissioner to negotiate a treaty with the Cheyenne and Arapahoe Indians, which he successfully con- cluded at Bent's Fort, in 1861. This was known as " Boone's Treaty," and secured the relinquishment of the Indian title to the lands lying east of the mountains, for which he was promised by the officers of the federal government, proper compensation, but it was never paid. Subse- quently he moved to a point on the Arkansas River now known as Booneville, twenty miles below Pueblo, where he established his home and served as postmaster for some years. In 1865 he took a contract from the government to put up seven hundred tons of hay for the mili- tary posts, but the officers cut him down to two hundred. He prosecuted the case, but the claim was never paid.
Col. Boone died in Denver, July 14th, 1884, at the residence of his son-in-law, Mr. B. D. Spencer, 343 California street, aged seventy-eight, the last of a noble race, and a fit descendant of famous ancestors. He left five daughters,-Mrs. H. W. Jones, then residing in Pueblo, Mrs. John Barnes of La Veta, Mrs. Col. Elmer Otis, whose husband was then commanding the post at San Antonio, Texas, Mrs. B. D. Spencer of Denver, and Mrs. Capt. Charles Hobart, whose husband was then stationed in Montana. On the last day of his life he was visited by Jim Baker, the aged mountaineer.
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Perhaps no higher tribute could be paid in few words to the life and character of Col. Boone than that written by his old friend and admirer, Gen. Bela M. Hughes, who said : "He has been in the service of the United States in various positions of responsibility on the frontier for fully half a century, intrusted with important duties as an Indian agent, com- missioner to treat with the wild tribes on the plains, and as a disbursing officer of the government, in all of which stations he was distinguished for his intelligence, fidelity and rare ability as an officer. Col. Boone possessed all the simplicity of character and manners which marked his honored grandsire, mingled with unsurpassed courage in danger, and manly integrity in all his transactions with the government and his fel- low men. No man in the West was more beloved for his noble qualities than Col. Boone; and indeed, it may well be said of him, that true as he has ever been to his duty as a citizen and a public servant, and in all the relations of his private life, he stood out as a model for the rising generation, a man without stain or blemish, without fear and without reproach."
Col. John M. Francisco* is a prototype of the old school of Southern gentlemen, who were the lords of the land in the early part of the present century, and of whom only a few survive. He was born in the county of Bath, Virginia, near the celebrated Warm Springs, and emigrated to Missouri in 1836. It is a fact worthy of note in passing, that most of the pioneers of the West who have been renowned in his- tory, romance, song and story for the perils they have encountered, for the battles fought and won, for the trails they made and the expeditions they guided, were natives of Virginia or Kentucky, and that the road to their exploits began upon the borders of Missouri. It may be ascribed to the fact that that State was the seat of the larger fur companies, where American, Canadian French and Creole voyageurs congregated, and whence the Chouteaus, Ashley and others who traded with the Indians of the plains sent out expeditions, and built a cordon of outposts extending from the Mississippi to the Rocky Mountains of the north
* See Portrait, Vol. I, page 512.
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and west. It was the center of such traffic and its representatives of every grade. The commerce of the prairies had its inception there ; Pike's, Long's, all of Fremont's, Lewis and Clarke's and the Gunnison expeditions began in St. Louis, where was the home of the immortal Benton, who steadfastly aided and encouraged them, and who, pointing to the West across the plains and mountains, to the occident, declared in tones that electrified the nation, "There is the East, there is India !" In Missouri originated the substantial influence which proclaimed the necessity of a Pacific railroad, and hammered away at the proposition with unfaltering energy until it was adopted by Congress, and all but one of the roads since built have their initial stations within her borders. The first transcontinental stage lines, and the famous Pony Express originated there.
In May, 1839, Col. Francisco became interested with three others in an extensive merchandise train laden with goods for Santa Fé. There were twenty-five teamsters with the train. They pursued the established trail, and after numerous harassments from Indians en route, who frequently attacked them, they arrived in Santa Fé in the early part of August. The road being comparatively new, they met with many obstacles, but the exercise of constant vigilance and care took them through without loss. Francisco returned to Missouri the same year, where he remained until 1845, when he went to Wisconsin for a short time. In May, 1848, he started on a second excursion to New Mexico, this time with a larger party than before. They experienced some difficulty in repelling bands of hostile aborigines, but accomplished the distance in sixty days. From Santa Fe he went to Chihuahua, Old Mexico. Returning in October of the same year, he carried on various business operations in the northern part of New Mexico.
In 1851 he became sutler to the military station known as Fort Massachusetts, in the San Luis Valley, where, and at Fort Garland, its successor, he remained until 1862. His last abiding place was in a beautiful spot near the head of Cucharas Creek, where he built a fort, now the center and nucleus of the pretty town of La Veta, a landmark
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which he still occupies, and where his friends find welcome. Among his old and trusted companions, were Ceran St. Vrain, Lucien Maxwell, Dick Wootten, Thomas Boggs, Tom Toben, R. B. Willis, Kit Carson, in short, all the old cohort of pioneers. Of Carson he speaks in the most exalted terms, saying he was "the most remarkable man, and doubtless the best frontiersman that America has produced. From him, in his councils with the Indians, and my frequent travels with him, I obtained the knowledge of Indian character which was extremely useful to me on many occasions, in my lonely trips by day and night in those early and perilous times." Of Tom Toben, "the slayer of the last of the murderous Espinosas, and who stood side by side with Carson in many hotly contested engagements with Indians," he speaks with unqualified praise.
Col. Francisco was nominated for delegate to Congress from Colo- rado by the Democrats in 1862, but was unsuccessful, and has not since engaged actively in politics. When the Denver & Rio Grande Railway was pushed on to the foot of Veta Pass, the engineers and the builders found him there, a lonely but satisfied settler in the wilderness, and who did not fully relish the idea of having his peaceful and beautiful soli- tude invaded by iron rails and snorting steam horses. But they soon built up around his comfortable fortress one of the loveliest hamlets in the State, to which he has now become fully reconciled.
In the fifty years he has passed upon the frontier, battling with all the rude conditions of such a life, he has lost nothing of the courtliness of speech and manners which distinguished his progenitors, and which has distinguished him in a marked degree through all his intercourse with men. While leading the life of a recluse and a wanderer, apart from all the refinements of society in which he was born and bred, and which so many have forgotten, he has never for an instant abandoned the course and habits of the true gentleman. His home is the center of bountiful hospitality to all who enter it. His name is as familiar as household words to every old settler, and thousands of the later gener- ation. It has been written that character creates confidence in all the
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relations of life. By the excellencies of his character this man has won the confidence of all men. While he has not achieved remarkable suc- cesses, he has at least achieved a name that is loved and respected throughout the land.
Tom Toben. In Volume I, page 381, brief mention is made of the exploit whereby Toben* by his bravery and extraordinary skill in trail- ing, destroyed the last of the Mexican bandits, whose assassination of wayfarers along the isolated roads of Southern Colorado, the San Luis Valley, in Fremont, El Paso and Park counties spread greater con- sternation among the people than any other event in our annals, because of the secrecy of their fiendish operations and the impenetrable mystery which for a long time enveloped the perpetrators, and the motives which impelled them. A friend who is conversant with the facts, promised again and again to prepare them for me, but failed to do so, owing to the pressure of business engagements, hence after waiting until the last moment, I was compelled to send the volume to press without them. It was so manifestly unfair to Toben that his part in the heroic work should be left to stand in history with only the meager details presented, I applied to Col. J. M. Francisco, his confidential friend and counselor, and from him received the account related to him by Toben, imme- diately after the occurrence which forms the basis of this sketch.
Tom Toben was a noted scout, guide, Indian fighter, hunter and trapper, the greater part of his life having been spent in those pursuits. He was for some time employed by Col. William Gilpin in trailing hostile Navajos, away back in the "forties," and later by other military commanders. He possessed great skill and courage, was a dead shot with his old muzzle loading rifle ; strong, hardy, inured to every form of privation, intelligent and cunning, therefore a valuable assistant in the service to which he was so frequently called. He is an old man now, his favorite occupation wholly gone with the extinction of game and the Indians, but still hale and vigorous, passing his last years in the quiet of his home in the San Luis Valley. While he has had many daring
*Erroneously given as ' Tobins." The correct orthography is Toben.
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adventures, and been the hero of many thrilling scenes, the one which brought him greatest fame, and over which all the people rejoiced with exceeding gladness, though they failed to reward him as he deserved, was that which is now to be related :
The two Espinosa brothers, natives of Mexico, crazed by religious fanaticism, ranged along the infrequently traveled roads leading into the mountains from the southwest, killing every white person with whom they came in contact. As set forth in our first volume, the principal actor was slain by Capt. John McCannon's party, but the more agile brother- escaped, and after concealing himself for a time, reappeared with a boy, his nephew, and recommenced his career of blood. Governor Evans and the friends of his victims offered large rewards for the head of this Espinosa, which induced several parties to search for him. His whereabouts were discovered by the following circumstance : He and the boy made an attack upon a man and a woman who were traveling in a buggy drawn by mules, at a point twelve to fourteen miles from Fort Garland, near the Sangre de Cristo Pass. The man was an Amer- ican, the woman a Mexican. The Espinosas fired upon and killed the mules, evidently not intending to kill the occupants of the vehicle at that time. The man escaped and fled to the Fort. The woman was captured, but being of their own race, she was soon released and also fled to Fort Garland. When the story of the attack and the hiding place of the outlaws was told, the commanding officer immediately ordered out a detachment of troops to go in pursuit, engaging Toben as guide. On reaching the spot where the attack was made, Toben experienced great difficulty in discovering the trail, as the Espinosas were on foot, and moccasin shod, but the skill of the old hunter soon found a faint trace and followed it through the grass, bushes and fallen timber, a task which none of the party save himself could have accom- plished. Not a footprint was visible, no sign but an occasional blade of grass turned from its natural position, a bent or broken twig, had he to guide him, yet he knew the trail was there. He followed it with the keen instincts of the bloodhound for several miles, the soldiers close at
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his heels, until he discovered in the air a number of magpies hovering about a thicket, as if scenting in its depths preparations for a meal, which at once advised Toben that the camp of the murderers was close at hand. He knew the habits of the birds, and the meaning of their acts and cries. Warning the soldiers to absolute quiet, he threw him- self upon the ground, and crawling slowly and cautiously so as to give forth no sound, the soldiers behind him in the same position, he approached in this manner the thicket, and peering through, discov- ered the Espinosas in the act of cooking some meat. Turning his head he whispered back to the officer in charge of the men, "I will shoot the old man ; you and your men take care of the boy," then taking delib- erate aim at the heart of the elder Espinosa, he fired. The man leaped into the air with a shriek and instantly fell dead. The boy started to run. The soldiers fired at him, but without effect, seeing which the old hunter with marvelous celerity and skill, reloaded his rifle and instantly dropped the boy. He then rushed into the camp, whipped out his knife, cut off their heads, and with other trophies found upon the bodies, marched back to Fort Garland and presented them to the officer in command.
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