An illustrated history of the state of Montana, containing biographical mention of its pioneers and prominent citizens, Part 69

Author: Miller, Joaquin, 1837-1913. cn
Publication date: 1894
Publisher: Chicago, The Lewis pub. co.
Number of Pages: 1216

USA > Montana > An illustrated history of the state of Montana, containing biographical mention of its pioneers and prominent citizens > Part 69

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In the spring of 1893, he was candidate for Mayor of the city of Butte, and was elected by a very large major- ity. While in this office the enterprise of the city public library was pushed forward, the plans for the buildings devised and the contracts let. In May, 1892, he was made temporary chairman of the State convention, held at Mis- soula, to send delegates to the National Republican con- vention, at Minneapolis. In the fall of 1892, Mr. Mantle was made permanent chairman of the Republican State convention held at Great Falls to nominate State officers. At the same time he was made chairman of the Republi- ban State Central Committee; and this committee se- cured the election of Governor Rickards and Republican supremacy in the State. In 1893 the Republicans in the State Legislature were in a minority, and at the first cau- cus of the party Senator Sanders and Mr. Mantle were candidates for the caucus nomination for the United States Senate, the former receiving the nomination by one vote. He was voted upon for three weeks in the Legis- lature without being elected, and finally Mr. Mantle was made the caucus nominee, and received the vote of his party until the Legislature adjourned without an elec- tion. When Senator Sanders' term expired, Governor Rickards promptly appointed Mr. Mantle to fill the va- cancy; but the United States Senate refused Mr. Mantle his seat, nominally on constitutional grounds, yet it was

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ing. We told them that this act of self-denial on their part was peculiarly grateful to the white men, and by it they would secure our permanent residence among them, and in return for their furs be always furnished with guns and ammunition sufficient to repel the attacks of their old enemies, and preserve their rela- tions from being made prisoners. This decided the doubtful, and the chief promised faithfully that no more tortures should be inflicted on the prisoners, which I believed was rigidly adhered to, at least during the winter of 1813."

Enough! This one bloody picture from a rare book of nearly 1,000 pages in the same line is not, believe me, given for the sake of

generally believed that two other reasons largely actnated the Senate; the one being that Mr. Mantle was a strong free-silver man, and the other, that if he were not seated an extra session of the Legislature would be called and a Democrat elected. Seeing through the design, the Gov- ernor declined to call an extra session, and the office was therefore vacant for nearly two years.

In 1894, Mr. Mantle was again unanimously made chair- man of the State Republican Central Committee, the election resulting in an overwhelming Republican victory for the State.

Since coming to Montana, Mr. Mantle has been very successful in all his business ventures. For nine years he and Charles S. Warren were partners in real estate and mining, and had a large business and possessed many vast interests in nearly every part of the State. Mr. Mantle's newspaper, mining, real-estate and insurance busin ss, connected with his exceedingly active political career, has kept him very busy, his success in all demonstrating him to be a superior man. He built the magnificent Inter Mountain Block, and various other valuable blocks, and has never lost an opportunity to advance the interests of Butte City or of the State of his adoption. He is the owner of the Birchdale stock farm, consisting of 2,500 acres, where be has many thoroughbred and trotting horses, and has taken a great deal of interest in the im- provement of live stock throughout the State.

Mr. Mantle is a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, of the Elks, and of the Knights of Pythias. Of the last he was the first Granel Chancellor for Montana, and since its organization he has done all within his power to promote its prosperity.

Thus we have endeavored briefly to outline the prog- ress of the poor, uneducated, fatherless boy, from his small and humble beginnings to his present high position of honor and comparative affluence, believing that it may be an incentive to other poor lads to emulate his efforts

blood, but because it is history with duty be. hind it. If this most gentle and docile tribe positively did these things, reflect what Mon- tana must have endured with half a dozen still more cruel tribes in her midst; and reflect, also, what these mild people had to overcome in their own hearts, and what our duty is in helping them to do it. Although, as Howard says, and I think truly, even the most civilized will fol- low their dreams if we allow it.

To follow the long and almost continuons war-path of the Montana Indians for the past quarter of a century would be to follow a tortu- ous and most bloody path, and to little profit.

The Indian had much ground here. He not to " get there " Early in his boyhood he became the sup- port of his mother, and for ber he has constantly cared ; and now the venerable lady, in the eighty-third year of her age, resides with her beloved son in the beautiful home which he has built for her in Butte City. He is still a single man and comparatively young; and the writer of this sketch believes that there will be other and brighter chapters in his career for future historians, as he is evidently in every way worthy of such promotion, worthy of the highest honors that can be bestowed upon him by his fellow citizens.

JAMES A. TALBOTT, vice-president of the First National Bank of Butte City, Montana, is a Montana pioneer of 1863, and has been a mining man during nearly the whole of his life.

Mr. Talbott began his mining career in California in 1857, and made considerable money there, but at Virginia City, Nevada, lost all he had made. From the latter place he came in 1863 to Bannack, Montana, to retrieve his fortune and began working for wages in the mines. When gold was struck at Alder Gulch, he was among the first to arrive at that place, and he mine I there success- fully until 1863. From 1865 up to the present the he has been a resident of Deer Lodge and Silver Bow e ant ties, and has made his money in what is known as tor Silver Bow group of mines. By strict attention to busi ness and by honorable and upright dealings he has ac cumulated a large property and has also made what is far better a good name.

Mr. Talbott's parents were carly settlers and respected farmers of Ohio. His father, Joshua O. Talbott, is of Irish descent, and is still living, having attained the age of eighty six years; the mother, nee Adaline L. William -. was of English descent and died in her eighty -third year. Their son, James A., was born in Ohio in 1988. He was married in 1875, to Miss Jose L. Ransdell, daughter of Joseph Ransdell, and they have had seven children, of

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only lost, deservedly lost, his hunting grounds to a great extent, but he lost his place in his- tory and in the hearts of the people as a pict- uresque and a wronged man. Up to the time of his treacheries and butcheries in Montana, he had been looked upon as a man who was only defending his own. We defended and excused his barbarous deeds as best we could, because he was only a poor barbarian who battled as best he knew. But we seek in vain for any sort of exeuse for his condnet here. A singular condi- tion of things in this saddle of the Rocky moun- tains revealed his true nature as it had never been revealed before. Now mark this. Our

whom four are living, Mary, Mand, Jose R. and Claris. Mr. Talbott built the comfortable and attractive residence in Butte City, where he and his family live, in 1886.

He has had many interesting experiences in Montana and other parts of the West, but is somewhat reluctant to give his history. It is enough, however, to say that he is a splendid representative of Montana's mining men, and as vice-president of the bank he gives evidence of excel- lent financial ability. His many estimable traits of charac- ter and his cordial and genial manner have gained for him hosts of warm friends here in Montana.

JUDGE GEORGE ROSZELLE MILBURN, Judge of the Seventh Judicial District, comprising the counties of Dawson, Custer and Yellowstone, Montana, is a resid-nt of Miles City. He was first elected to his present posi- tion in October, 1889, and re-elected in 1892, having been nominated by a Democratic convention, the district being largely Republican. He humorously claims to have been elected " by the grace of God and the help of the Repub- lican party !"

Ile was born in the District of Columbia, in 1850, a son of Benedict and Martha (Page) Milburn. His father was of a well-known family in St. Mary's county, Maryland. His mother was closely related to the old Revolutionary families of the Pages of Virginia and Maryland. His father was a strong Union man during the late war be- tween the States.

Our subject, when a youth, took a preparatory course at Rittenhouse Academy, Washington, District of Colum- bia, and finally graduated at Yale College in the class of 1872. In May, 1873, Mr. Milburn engaged in the real-es- tate business in Washington city, and lost all his invest- ment, after which, in 1877, he passed a civil-service examination, ranking third in a line of 139 applicants. That was at one of the first civil-service examinations held, which was when Mr. Hayes was President and Mr. Carl Schurz Secretary of the Interior. Mr. Milburn was appointed Examiner of Pension Claims at Washington;

first explorers traveled for days and days up the unnamed rivers of Montana, seeking everywhere they could for Indians or sign of Indians, and when at last they found some from which to purchase horses so as to proceed on their way down the waters of the Columbia, they tell us that the Shoshonees numbered only about one hundred. The truth is the top of the Rocky mountains, here where the rich mines were found and where the Indians murdered and plundered and did all sorts of devilment as long as they could, was neutral country. It did not belong to the Crow, the Sioux, the Shoshonee, the Ban- nack, the Blackfoot, or any one else, but was a

hut close confinement so impaired his health that he had to seek another climate and another vocation. Accord- ingly he went to New Mexico, as clerk to the Pueblo In- dian agency. lle had previously graduated in law, however, at the National University, at Washington city, and received his diploma at the hands of President Hayes, who was then chancellor ex-officio of the univer- sity. In this institution Mr. Milburn ranked second in a class of seventeen.

September 30, 1882, he resigned his position in New Mexico, having in the meantime been admitted to the bar at Santa Fe, in February, 1881. In November, 1882, he was appointed United States special Indian agent, and ordered to inspect agencies in Dakota, which he did, and came to Montana in February, 1883, and has been a resi- dent of this State almost continuously ever since. As special Indian agent he had charge of constructing the buildings at the Crow Indian Agency, in 1884, hy order of the Government. He opened his first law office and began the practice at Miles City, in January, 1886. Within the same year he was nominated on the Demo- cratic ticket for County Attorney, and was elected over his Republican opponent, William H. Ross, and also over another candidate, a bolting Democrat. In ISS8 he was defeated for re-election by Dr. W. A. Burleigh, Republi- can. The latter, however, eleven months afterward, was in turn defeated by Mr. Milburn, when he was first elected Judge of the district. He was re-elected as Dis- trict Judge, in 1892, over the most prominent Republican lawyer in Custer county. But Judge Milburn declares that he will not be a candidate for re-election to succeed ·himself on the bench. He is a stanch Union man, and on national issues is a decided Democrat so long as the party remains patriotic

December 7, 1875, Mr. Milburn married Miss Eugenie Prentiss Bliss, the daughter of Dr. D. W. Bliss, who had principal charge of President Garfield while suffering from the fatal wound inflicted by the notorious Guiteau

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sort of public highway running over this saddle in the great rocky range of mountains to the buf- falo lands.

This highway, dozens of trails side by side, worn so steep in many places, washed by rains and swept by winds, as to nearly hide horse and rider, reached from the heart of the mountains to the Dalles, Oregon, and was called, in the early '50s, the Cayuse trails, after the tribe of Indians who had their home at the head of tide- water and made annual excursions to the Yel- lowstone. When we first found the Idaho or Salmon-river mines, as I pointed out in a pub- lished letter in 1861, the Nez Perce war-chief

Her father, now deceased, had a national fame as a sur- geon. He was a prominent army surgeon during the war. Judge Milburn and wife have three sons and one daughter, viz .: Paul Willard, born Octobor 15, 1876; Eu- gene, horn October 2, 1882; Roszelle, March 9, 1892, and George, born January 8, 1804. The first two were born in Washington city.

The Judge is a member ond Past Grand of the I. O. O. F., and a member of the Knights of Pythias, and the uni- form rank of the latter order.

DAVID N. UPTON, of Butte City, a Montana pioneer of 1862, has been engaged in mining ever since coming to the Territory.

He was born in the province of New Brunswick, May 16, 1836. The Uptons from whom he descends came to America from England about the time of the Revolution and settled in New Hampshire. The first ancestor of the family in America was grandfather Aaron Upton, whose son, John, was born in Vermont in 1785, married Eliza- beth Nichols, a native of that state, and had a son and a daughter in Vermont. They removed to New Brunswick, where David N. and another child were born in the family. Their father died there in 1853, in the seventy-first year of his age, his wife surviving a number of years. In his religious views he was a Universalist, while she was an Episcopalian. They were worthy people and respected by all who knew them.

David N., their youngest child, was educated in New Brunswick, and when nineteen years old started out in the world for himself. In 1854 he sailed for California, by the way of the isthmus, arrived at San Francisco and proceeded to Nevada City, where he followed placer mining, with fair success. In March, 1862, he went to Florence, Idaho, which point was then one of the princi pal sources of the gold excitement, and on to Boise Basin, where he with four others located a claim and in 1863 cleared $60,000. Next he went to San Francisco, intend- ing to return home, but was attacked with pleurisy and wintered there.

was at that time beyond the Rocky mountains, hunting. So we see that this ground here was merely a place where the passers by battled or pillaged as they chose or couk. It results that the pretty sentimental idea of defending the homes of their fathers falls away; for their fathers had never laid claim to it, and they never came until after the white man came. Under these conditions, never before revealed in all his history, we see him in his true light,-a bad man. The Indian women were not nearly so bloody and treacherous as the men.

All through the civil war what few trained Indian fighters we had in the army. from Ta

In the spring he went again to Idaho, and in July started on the stampede for British Columbia, in company with seven others with pack animals, and mined at Will Horse ereek until the following summer, making for him- self about $2,000. Then he purchased a claim and lost his money in it.

In 1865 he returned to Montana, proceeding on to Me- Clellan's Gulch in Deer Lodge county. Next he went to Blackfoot City, and on to Helena, arriving in October, 1865, where twelve including himself prepared an outfit for themselves and started Emigrant Gulch in the Yellow- stone valley, and they prospected all through that coun- try, returning in March to Confidente Guleh. Hearing of the discovery of gold at Elk creek they went there, se- cured a elaim and made a little money, romaning there four months. Then twelve of them prepared themselves with an outfit and started across the Rocky mountains northward to the head waters of Sun river, prospected there and were attacked by large number- of Pogan In- dians, being thus foreed back across the Rocky monin tains.

Mr. Upton then went to Flathead lake, then to Missoula and came on to Butte, arriving in September, 1866, after traveling and prospecting over a vast portion of the great Northwest, on horseback, carrying the blankets in which he slept with him; and it is wonderful how regardless of danger the pioneer seeks for gold, what hardships he un dergoes and fearful risks he undertakes, It is believe 1 that if all the days spent in searching for goldl were paid for at a dollar a day it would amount to more money than all the gold that has been collected!

On arrival here Mr. Upton found a number of men en gaged in placer mining. John Noyes had arrived in August, and they became partners together, located claims and engaged in placer mining until the railroads reached thi- locality. They then subdivided their land, 300 ;eres, into town lots, and the city of Butte below Gold street is situated on this land. They have sold a large portion of the property.

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coma to Duluth, importuned for a chance at the front, and at the end of the war the very few survivors were loath to return.

Congress was dilatory and indifferent. Shall we say it was because, as a rule, the legislature of Montana had not a single member in its body that was in political harmony with the ad- ministration? It might seem unpatriotic to say 80. It might, at the same time, be simply the cold, frozen truth.

The situation of Montana was as nniqne as it was desperate. Braddock had Virginia to fall back npon; St. Clair, at his defeat, had only to

Mr. Upton began quartz-mining in 1874 and was one of the locaters of the "Lookout," afterward named Ana- conda. On this claim they had an expensive lawsnit with Marcus Daly, as they knew that the property was valua- ble: it soon became worth eight or ten million dollars. It is now owned by a syndicate. Mr. Upton was also the discoverer of the "Smoke-house," and procured a patent upon it from the Government, which subsequently gave a patent upon it for a town site. This caused more litiga- tion, aud Mr. Upton sold his interest in it for $2,000. Since then it has yielded $150,000. Ile is now operating the Bozeman, a gold claim in Madison county. He and his partner have erected a number of houses in Butte, and they are counted among the early pioneers aud builders of this city. The town was platted in 1866, when it con- sisted only of Main street, Broadway, Granite and Park streets. Two years afterward, however, the town began to go down. Many left, and the few that remained took the logs from the forsaken houses for fuel. In 1875 Will- iam L. Farlin discovered the Tuvonia, a quartz mine, and from that time the growth and prosperity of Butte was assured.

Mr. Upton is a gentleman thoroughly posted on all that pertains to mining and the mines in this part of the world, having devoted his whole life to the business.

He was married November 22, 1877, to Mrs. Dillie Allen, a native of Missouri and a daughter of Sloan Lewis. By Mr. Allen she had three children, viz .: Clara Gertrude, now Mrs. Steven Vanwort; Grace Mabell, who married Frank Tate; and Zella Myrtle, deceased. Mr. Upton's children are: Annie Laura, deceased; David Lewis, de- ceased: Eulala and Aline. In her religious sympathies Mrs. Upton is an Episcopalian. Mr. Upton is a Republi- can, and has been such ever since the party was first or- ganized, but he has no taste for office. Mrs. Upton has been a member of the Episcopal Church about fourteen years. Her father was a soldier in the Mexican war, and her grandfather Lewis was in the war of 1812 and a par- ticipant in the battle of the Thames, where Tecumseh was killed.

wait for reinforcements, but Montana had no place of retreat, no reinforcements could come to her in less than half a year of time and, even then, only through the heart of the enemy.

The Sioux trails lay to the east, the Black- foot to the north, the Pierced Nose and the Pendant Ear to the west, the Bannack and the Sheep-eater on the other side; and Montana fought them all, first and last, and some of them nearly all the time. Yet Montana rarely invaded their countries; they came into the country which was found unpossessed and un- claimed, and there they remained as a rule. for

H. C. LOVELL, a prominent and wealthy farmer and stock-raiser in Yellowstone county, also in Sheridan county, Wyoming, was born in Kalamazoo county, Mich- igan, in December, 1840, a son of Enos and Eluthera Lovell, natives of Vermont. The father was a prominent farmer in Michigan.

Our subject came to the West to seek his fortune in 1859, having read much of Col. Fremont's adventures, and first went to Santa Fe, New Mexico, where he en- gaged in carrying the United States mail between that point and Independence, Missouri. He followed that oc- cupation four years, during which time he was obliged to traverse a large area of country subject to Indian depre- dations, had many narrow escapes from the red-skins, and was three times wounded. Mr. Lovell afterward pur- chased a fine mule train, aud became wagon-master in a transportation company. They conducted an immense business, and at times penetrated the Mexican domain to the city of Chihuahua. His train was captured by In- diaus in 1864; continued with the company for wages during the following two years, and then Mr. Lovell made his last trip in that capacity to Salt Lake City. After following Government contracting and other occu- pations until 1870, Mr. Lovell embarked in the cattle business. During the first year he owued an interest in 800 head, in the second year 1,300, and now owns 8,000 head; he has also 900 acres of land in Wyoming. His cattle roam the hills and valleys of that State and Mon- tana. Mr. Lovell has had an extensive and thrilling ex- perience in the mountains of the West, has had many talks with Kit Carson and other famous frontiersmen, is an entertaining and instructive conversationalist, and is a favorite with all who know him.

In 1884 our subject was united in marriage with Miss Bertha Collins, a native of St. Louis. They have one son, Willard T. The wife and mother died in California two and one-half years after the birth of her child. In politi- eal matters, Mr. Lovell affiliates with the Republican party.

Un Margen

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there on the top of the mountains lay the mines.

But to proceed in the case. We have room for only two indictments, samples of hundreds, however. I. M. Bozeman, a friend and an able defender of the Indians from the first, till they stabbed him in the back while they ate his bread on the Yellowstone, early in 1867, is one. The de- tails are too terrible to set down. Malcolm Clarke, (a gentle, good man, who began life a West Point cadet) murdered at his own house by the treachery of an Indian he had raised, while his son was shot badly and his wife saved from the brutal creatures only by the help of a squaw,

HON. WILLIAM MAYGER, One of the early pioneers o Lewis & Clarke county, was born at St. Louis, Missouri, November 24, 1842. His father, John Mayger came to America from London, England, in 1837. He was mar- ried in bis native county to Miss Elizabeth Cheesman, also a native of London. They had two children born to them in that city : Elizabeth and Charles. With his little family Mr. Mayger came to St. Louis, Missouri, remain- ing there until his death, January 14, 1885, at the age of seventy three years; his widow departed this life three years later. Their family consisted of one daughter and seven sons, all of whom are now living, with the excep- tionof the eldest son, who died in infancy. William May- ger, the fifth child in order of birth, was reared and edu- cated in St. Louis. In the spring of 1864 he came to Montana (then the Territory of Idaho), making his first mining venture on Silver creek, where he met with but varying success. During the same year Mr. Mayger discovered gold in paying quantities in the left-hand fork of Silver creek, and in company with J. W. Rhodes and Alvord Hintze he located the first placer ground in the gulch, organizing the district and naming the gulch in honor of the town of Ottawa, Illinois, the home of Mir Rhodes. In 1866 Mr. Mayger and associates put in a bed- rock flume, and continued to placer-mine until 1876, mak- ing as high as $30 a day, but the greater portion of the time with but indifferent success. Ile was the first to discover the float of the now famous Drumlummon mine ; this was in the gulch below where the mine is located. lle and his partners spent many days in trying to dis- cover the vein, but unluckily for themselves they were doomed to disappointment. In the following spring Mr. Cruse, having worked out bis placer ground in Trinity gulch, moved his camp convenient to where the lode was supposed to be, and upon the disappearance of the snow from the mountain side, he commenced a systematic search for the lode. The first hole sunk disclosed the foot side of the vein, be then commenced a shaft some ten feet higher up the mountain side, which disclosed the vein, and from which the discovery was made.

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An illustrated history of the state of Montana, containing biographical mention of its pioneers and prominent citizens, Part 69

Author: Miller, Joaquin, 1837-1913. cn Publication date: 1894 Publisher: Chicago, The Lewis pub. co. Number of Pages: 1216

Author: Miller, Joaquin, 1837-1913. cn
Publication date: 1894
Publisher: Chicago, The Lewis pub. co.
Number of Pages: 1216