USA > Montana > Then and now; or, Thirty-six years in the Rockies. Personal reminiscences of some of the first pioneers of the state of Montana. Indians and Indian wars. The past and present of the Rocky mountain country. 1864-1900 > Part 15
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to me, and I could not do it. The Indian said that so far as he was concerned he did not care, but that it wasapetofhiswife's; that she was crying and nothing but the mare would console her. I finally settled the matter by his giving me another horse, and I turned over the animal and one plug of tobacco. In the mean- time the wagons had gone on and I followed an hour or two later on horse back, leading the new horse. About twelve miles be- yond Sun river, as I was riding slowly up a rocky hill, I heard a sound and, looking back, I saw an Indian on horseback within twenty feet of me and he was warning me of some danger; so I hurried on, and overtaking the wagons, I informed the men of the incident, and when we went into camp, which was opposite the Bird Tail mountain, we deemed it wise to place the wagons in a square, and, putting the horses inside, we slept on our guns that night, but had no trouble. The next night we camped on the Dearborn river. The days since leaving Fort Benton had been beautiful, and when we retired to our blankets that evening the weather was mild, but in the morning we awoke to find ourselves covered with a foot of snow and the Dear- born river frozen over. We laid there two days and nights, and on the third day traveled to Wolf Creek, about seventeen miles, when we found that the snow had all disappeared. The next day we passed over the hill in Prickly Pear canyon, where there was the grave of a young man named Lyon, who had acci- dentally shot himself but a few weeks before. He was buried where he died and a rough headboard gave an account of his death. This point was called then and is still known as Lyon's Hill. The third day from Wolf Creek at Three-Mile creek, which is three miles south of Silver City, we met Mr. King, ac- companied by 'Gold Tom.' It appears that the camp on the Prickly Pear had been broken up and nearly all had moved out to go to Gold Creek and Bannock; so Mr. King had come to tell us to keep our wagons moving and to go over the Mullan Pass.
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About the last of November we rolled into Deer Lodge. Here we stored our goods in one end of a building owned by A. Fall. In the meantime we purchased an unfinished building owned by C. A. Broadwater, who was living there then. It was there I first saw Kohn Kohrs. He had come to Cotton- wood to buy some cattle of John Grant to be butchered in Bannock. For want of funds he was unable to buy more than three head, while now his herds are counted by thou- sands. Also Captain Nick Wall came up from Gold Creek on his way to the states. He had with him Thomas Levatta, a mountaineer whom he had hired as a guide, and was going by the way of Bannnock and Salt Lake. Mr. King was in- duced to join him and I was left to sell our goods and send the dust down the river the coming spring. As trade was dull in Cottonwood, I hired Dunphy to haul my goods to Bannock and put me up a cabin. It took about a week to make the trip, going over the mountains and down the Big Hole river. The weather was clear, but cold, with no snow except upon the divide. We reached Bannock about the twentieth of De- cember. At Bannock I saw a rustling mining camp, with many saloons and gambling houses. Goods commanded aston- ishing prices.
I here met the Minnesota contingent, some mining, others keeping boarding houses, and all seeming to prosper. It took but a short time to dispose of the major part of the goods at a sound profit in gold dust. Knowing that I could obtain goods at Fort Benton, which I could pack over the mountains, and sell at Bannock at a good profit, I left my place in charge of Warren Whitcher and started about the middle of Febru- ary, 1863, on horseback, with James Gourley, for Fort Benton. The distance from Bannock to Fort Benton is about three hundred miles, and we made the trip in eight days. Major Dawson was the manager of the American Fur Company at
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Fort Benton and Matthew Carroll and George Steell were his head men and did the trading. This company had a large herd of horses which were kept up the Missouri river about fifty miles. They bought many of these horses very cheap, for when a man got ready to go down the river it was the com- pany's price or nothing. I bought fifteen of these horses at from thirty to forty dollars each, and enough of such goods as were in demand in Bannock to load them. A good horse would carry easily two hundred pounds. I hired a cook, for his board and passage, and returned to Bannock without acci- dent. Tobacco, for which I paid $2.50 per pound, sold for $10 and $12. Seven by nine window glass brought one dol- lar per pane; other articles in proportion. The venture hav- ing proved so profitable I was soon on my way back to Fort Benton. Henry Plummer gave me a letter for Miss O'Brien, who was the sister of the wife of I. A. Vail, the government farmer who lived at the crossing. of the Sun river, so that when the pack train reached the river my men camped across /
from his house, and I went over to deliver the letter, and on invitation I remained all night at the farm. In the morn- ing one of my men came over and told me that all of the horses had been stolen, which proved to be true. And Mr. Vail had only one horse left. It was a sore-backed sorrel that had been left in the corral over night, which I bought for thirty dollars, and started for Fort Benton, sixty miles away, to buy more horses in order to move my packs. After traveling twelve miles I left the river and took a trail up the hill, now known as Frozen Hill, and in a little hollow, I took off the saddle and picketed the horse that had been all night without food. I laid down, intending to rest about an hour. As I was very tired I went to sleep. I could not tell how long I had slept when an Indian aroused me, and, as I looked back down the road, I saw quite a large party of Indians coming up the trail,
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I hurried to my horse, quickly put on the saddle and rode on. The Indians left the trail on the top of the hill and bore off to the northwest to my great relief. I did not get into Benton until after daylight. There they told me that, from my de- scription, the Indians I met were Little Dog, a Blackfoot chief, and his band, and that Little Dog was a friend to the white men. I told Major Dawson my trouble and that I wanted to buy some horses ; he gave me a good horse to ride and sent me with "Buffalo Bill," whose name was William Keyser, to the horse herd. We forded the Misouri river where the city of Great Falls is now located, then went over the hill to where Mr. Paris Gibson's stock farm is situated, and found the horses there in charge of the herders. After the round up of the band I se- lected the horses I wanted and drove them up to where my packs were, crossing the Missouri where we forded it the day before. My men had recovered some of the stolen horses that had given out and were abandoned. The Indians who stole the horses were Shoshones or Snakes and had followed me from Bannock. They had killed one man near Square Butte who was employed by Mr. Vail as a hunter, and his widow, a Blackfoot squaw, had cut off one of her fingers as an evidence of sorrow and was bewailing his death in loud cries, sitting with other women on the side of a hill. Taking another start, I got to Fort Benton, bought more goods, and returned to Bannock. While I was in Bannock this time occurred the shooting of Jack Cleve- land by Henry Plummer. He was shot in a saloon which was opposite my place. I heard the shots, and going to the door I saw Plummer come out of the place with a pistol in his hand and walk with a friend down the street. I immediately went across to the saloon and saw Cleveland lying on the floor with a bullet hole in his cheek and surrounded by a string of men. He would raise himself on his elbow and mutter some words and then fall back. Some one in the crowd asked him if he
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had any friends. He said, 'Old Jack has no friends,' when one of the crowd replied : 'Yes, you have; you bet your life.' He was shortly removed to a butcher shop, which was near by, and he lingered for a day or so and died. Plummer was tried and acquitted, as it was proven that Cleveland had said that 'Plummer was his meat.' There were frequent rumors of robberies by road agents, and among trusted friends men would be pointed out as belonging to such organizations, and that Henry Plummer was their leader. James Gourley once in- formed me that he had good reason to know that I was once followed, when on a trip to Fort Benton to buy goods, by three of Plummer's band who intended to rob me in the Sun river country, but that they were delayed on account of losing their horses and did not reach that place until I was well on my way to Benton.
"The weather during the whole winter and spring had been wonderfully fine, with only one or two snow storms. On my last trip to Benton that spring I carried considerable dust and some mail; letters coming from the states by the way of Walla Walla often costing from one to two dollars each. When Oliver's express was started, letters from Salt Lake cost one dollar each and newspapers fifty cents. The gold dust I car- ried was not all my own. I put the purses (buckskin) in an old carpet bag which was put on top of the pack on the back of one of the pack horses and securely lashed it. We proceeded along without any trouble until one morning at a camp on Willow Creek, near what is now known as Mitchell's Station, the horse carrying the dust became fractious and tried to buck off his pack. The dust, being so heavy, burst through the lining of the carpet bag and scattered the sacks of gold. After some little search we found all the purses, and, taking care that such an occurrence should not happen again, I finally landed the treasure safely in the American Fur Company's safe. Ow-
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ing to the light snows in the mountains the Missouri river was low and the steamer Shreveport, which carried the goods that Mr. King had purchased in the East, did not reach Fort Ben- ton, and had to unload her freight at Cow Island, where she arrived about the last of June, 1863. Captain Nick Wall, of I. I. Roc & Co. of St. Louis, also had merchandise on this boat. Cow Island was inaccessible to wagons on account of the high bluffs without the construction of a road. So after waiting some time for La Barge to get the freight up to Benton we made a contract with Wall to haul his goods to Virginia City in Alder Gulch (a newly discovered mining camp) for thirty cents per pound. We did not get this freight through to its destination until the middle of November, hauling our own goods at the same time. This proved to be a wonderful camp. The times were good. It was only a question of how much you should ask for what you had to sell, for gold dust was plentiful. The next spring, 1864, I opened a new road to go to Fort Benton by the way of the Jefferson river, White Tail Deer, Boulder and Big Prickly Pear. Heretofore wagons had to cross the main divide twice. C. A. Broadwater was the wagon master. I had about twenty-five teams and hired a hunter who kept the train supplied with game, which was principally antelope and deer. It took about a month to make a passable road for freight teams. In the fall of that year, 1864, gold was discovered in Last Chance gulch, and the goods which we shipped the next spring, 1865, were taken to Helena and Last Chance gulch. We put up a store house here, and the coming spring, 1866, we bought of Malcolm Clark and Ed- ward A. Lewis their charter for a toll road through the Little Prickly Pear canyon. This road was finished in time for the
travel from Fort Benton that season. Owing to the high price of labor and the rocky character of the canyon this road cost about forty thousand dollars, but as tolls were high also, it
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took only about two years to get it back. The charter of this road expired in 1875, and it now belongs to Lewis and Clark county. In the summer of 1865 I sold to Mr. Copeland for I. I. Roe & Co. two freight trains of twenty-four wagons each and two hundred head of oxen. That year Copeland had much freight put off near the mouth of Milk river on account of low water. This was the commencement of the Diamond R. Freight Company. Cattle in those days varied much in price. Then ox teams brought freight all the way from Leavenworth, Kan., and St. Joseph, Mo., and the cattle lean, and with tender feet, would be often sold for thirty or forty dollars per yoke. A few months of rest and feeding on the native grasses, and they would treble in value. As far as possible merchants held their dust until the spring of the year and sent it down the river in preference to having it go by stage coach by the way of Salt Lake. I remember (I think it was in 1865) of leaving Helena with $8,000 in dust to take to Fort Benton. I carried it in canteens on the horn of my saddle. When I got to the Dearborn crossing, I found among others camped there for the noon, Malcolm Clark. He was traveling with a light spring wagon and he kindly consented to carry my canteens and lighten my load as the gold alone weighed over forty pounds. He said he wanted to give his horses rest and would not start till late in the afternoon. I saddled up and went on and had gone about eighteen miles when I saw some person ahead coming toward me, driving a packed mule. He was going as fast as possible, whipping the mule continually. When we met I saw it was a man by the name of Coppick, whom I had known in Virginia City. He was much excited and told me that a runner (Joseph Kipp) had come to Sun River in the night, and that he had been sent from Fort Benton to warn all travelers that there had been an uprising of the Indians, and that they had killed
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ten men on the Marias river and were murdering all the white people they could find. Coppick said he would rather take chances with the road agents than the Indians, and that he would go back to the states by the way of Salt Lake. I tried to persuade him to turit and go on to Sun river with me, that it was only twelve miles away, and as there were several out- fits camped there, would stand the Indians off. He said he had on his mule about thirty thousand dollars in dust, and he believed it would be safer to go the other way. I went on to the crossing of Sun river, but kept a sharp lookout for the redskins all the while. I found there quite a large party of freighters who by arranging their wagons, were prepared for any surprise the Indians might make. During the night who should come into camp but Coppick. It appears that Mr. Clark had persuaded him to put his gold into his wagon, and that, as they would travel at night, they could get through safely. We lay at this place all the next day and at night started for Fort Benton, getting there in the morning. We found that the story was true; that Barris, Angevine and eight others, who had been camped at the mouth of the Marias, were waylaid and all killed.
"Up river freights that had been from ten to eighteen cents per pound came down in a few years to three, and wagon freights from Benton to Helena from six cents to one cent. Business conditions changed as gold and greenbacks were ap- proaching an equality in value, and goods purchased in the East were sometimes sold at a loss. I virtually went out of merchandise in 1869.
"When I commenced this narrative I did not think it would be so long, and to draw it to a close, I will skip the years until 1877, in which year I first engaged in sheep raising with Gov. B. F. Potts and D. H. Weston as partners. This was the year of the Nez Perces war, in which Chief Joseph
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was captured by General Miles in the Bear Paw mountains. We located on the Dearborn river, about three miles above the present bridge, in August, 1877. The following year, as the shearing time approached, I was going up to one of the sheep camps with some supplies tied behind me on the saddle for the herder. When I was about four miles from the home camp I saw two horsemen coming over a hill. At first I thought they were cowboys, but as they came nearer I could see the red blankets; then I knew they were Indians. As they approached one rode opposite me and said, 'How,' to which I replied, 'How.' The other stopped his horse about forty or fifty feet away and dismounted, coming towards me. I thought maybe he wanted tobacco or matches. The Indian who remained on his horse had his gun across the saddle in front of him, the other had laid his gun down, and as soon as he came to the side of my horse he put his hand under my right foot and I landed on the other side of my horse. I had no coat on, therefore they could see I was not aitmed, He then took off my saddle, which was a new one, and put it on his horse. As I stood holding my horse by the bridle he came up to me and suddenly grabbed my watch chain with his right hand, jerking the watch from the vest pocket, but the chain hung to its fastening at the buttonhole. As the watch was of great value, being a Jurgensen, and a stop watch for timing horses, and the chain of heavy gold, I would not let it go, so I grasped his wrist with my left hand making him let go and shoved him back. He then drew his gun, a short Henry rifle and threw in a cartridge with the lever and aimed it at me; by that time I had concluded that I did not want the watch, and as I made motions to give it up, he low- ered the muzzle of his gun and received the watch and chain. He then mounted his horse and rode away to the south, car- rying the watch and chain in his hand. When this Indian
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drew his gun the one on the horse spoke something quickly which sounded to me as if he had said, 'Don't shoot.' The one that robbed me was a tall and fine-looking man, twenty- five years old, I should judge, his face was painted and he wore brass rings in his hair. The other was older, shorter and not so good looking. I took the old saddle, put it on my horse with the provision that had not been disturbed and went on to the camp. I found that these Indians had been there before me and had taken a gun, some cartridges and food. I learned afterwards that they were a part of Chief Joseph's band who had escaped from General Miles and had been in the Brit- ish possessions all winter and were at that time trying to get back across the mountains to their old home. A few days after two of my neighbors were killed on the Dearborn river by this same tribe, Cottle and Wareham. They are buried at the Dearborn Crossing, where Carson also reposes who was previously killed by Indians.
"I had considerable trouble to keep herders in those days, and I then decided that the growing of sheep was a great industry in Montana, only for the Indians.
"WARREN C. GILLETTE."
Mr. W. C. Gillette is a native of the State of New York, having been born there in 1832. He has always been an active and useful citizen. He was a member of the Mon- tana Territorial Legislature three terms-once in the coun- eil-and was a member of the Constitutional convention in 1889. Mr. Gillette now resides in the Dearborn valley, in Lewis and Clark county, where he owns one of the largest and best stoek ranches in Montana. He has a large herd of cat- tle and several thousand sheep. He is considered to be one of the wealthiest men in the state and one of the most hon- orable in his dealings with his fellow men.
ROBERT VAUGHN.
May 21, 1900.
.
A MEAL IN THE INDIAN CAMP.
One of the Diamond R. Company's men had been down about the falls of the Missouri river looking for some oxen that had strayed away. He came up the valley to my house. He told me that there were six Indian tepees a little ways above the mouth of Sun river and that there were five horses that he thought belonged to me not far from the tepees. He gave a description of them and I could see that they were my horses. I mounted my saddle pony, which I always had at home, and went to the place where the horses had been seen, but I could not find them. I went to the Indian camp (now Sun River Park belonging to the city of Great Falls). A fine old Indian came and met me. I told him that I was looking for horses, describing them and making my brand, the letter V, with my finger in the dust on the ground. He said that he had seen them and that they had galloped away over the hill, at the same time making signs and pointing his hand in the direction the horses had gone. I thanked him; then he asked me to come to his tepee. I went with him, and when we got to the camp he called on a young In- dian to come and take my horses to good grass. He took me to his own tepee and brought from his wardrobe a very fine buffalo robe, spread it upon the ground and asked me to sit on the robe. I accepted the invitation. Then he filled his pipe with dried red willow bark (kin-ni-ki-nic) and after light- ing and smoking it, long enough to get the pipe going in full blast, he handed it to me. Although I never indulged in smoking a weed of any kind, at this time, to please the old fellow, I passed the pipe around with him half a dozen times, and, of course, I had to take a whiff every time he did; after that I asked to be excused, telling him that my heart was good and that I knew his heart was good also. In the meantime
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he had told his wife to give me some victuals (much-a-muck). She took about one dozen grains of coffee and put it in a piece of buckskin and pounded it between two stones and made me some coffee; she brought it to me in a tin cup, and also some dried antelope meat. No one could be treated with ยท more respect by an Indian than I was by them. Bringing the best robe, and presenting the pipe of peace, as this Indian
INDIAN CAMP.
did, is one of the most courteous acts an Indian can do for a man. When I told him that I was going to leave and go over the hill to get the horses, he ordered the young Indian . to bring my horse. I gave the old fellow fifty cents in silver and he was much pleased, and I am sure I was, for I was treated royally. I found the horses on the other side of the hill where the Indian told me they had gone. This was in the sunner of 1873.
Jan. 21, 1898.
ROBERT VAUGHN.
THE FIRST SETTLEMENT OF WHAT IS NOW MONTANA.
No doubt it will be of interest to many, especially us Mon- tanans, to know the history of the first settlement of this state and which was made in the western portion in 1841. Knowing that Hon. Frank H. Woody of Missoula is one of the old pioneers and among the oldest residents of the city of Missoula, I wrote asking him to give me a brief history of western Montana. In reply he sent me a carefully prepared paper written by himself some two years since, giving a very complete early history of that part of this state, also a letter containing valuable information on the same subject and giv- ing me permission to make use of so much of his writings as I desired. No one is better qualified to give such a sketch than Judge Woody, for he has been a resident of what is now Montana for over forty-four years. The following are ex- tracts from Judge Woody's letters :
"All that portion of the state of Montana bounded on the north by the British possessions, on the east by the main range of the Rocky mountains, on the south and southwest by the Bitter Root mountains, and on the west by the one hundred and sixteenth degree of longitude, at one time con- stituted a portion of the vast domain of the great Northwest, known as Oregon Territory. When and by what means the government of the United States obtained possession of the great Territory of Oregon are facts not generally known. Oregon was for a great number of years claimed by the United States and Great Britain, and was held in joint occupation
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by citizens of both nations. Great Britain claimed by the right of discovery, and the United States by the right of dis- covery and by virtue of the French cession of the Territory of Louisiana of April 3, 1803, and the treaty of limits with Spain of Feb. 22, 1829, and also by right of actual occupation of soil for a great number of years. The 'Oregon Question' engrossed the attention of congress and came near resulting in a. war between the United States and Great Britain, but the matter was amicably adjusted by the treaty of June 15, 1846, by which the forty-ninth parallel of latitude was estab- lished as a boundary line between the two nations, and the United States became the sole and undisputed owner of all that portion of Oregon lying south of that line.
"Oregon was organized as a territory by act of congress, passed in August, 1848, and included within its limits all that portion of Montana lying on the west side of the Rocky mountains.
"By act of congress approved March 2, 1853, the Territory of Oregon was divided, and this portion of it became a part of Washington Territory. The first legislature of Washing- ton Territory created the county of Clarke, named in honor of Captain Clarke, of the Lewis and Clarke expedition. Clarke county extended from a point on the Columbia river, below Fort Vancouver, to the summit of the Rocky mountains, a dis- tance of some six hundred miles. This portion of the present State of Montana was then a portion of Clarke county, and was then for the first time included within the limits of a county.
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