Document text
.T711
r
?abr. 21, 1925
tiecollestiona of a Plemeer
Ry C.L. Ray.
Miller L.L.
At this time Onlbortson was the nearest tors to the fork, of
the Republioan and was quite a trading gam, for the oow boys. The
town was divided into two parts. A wan by the ammo of Taylor was a
republican and held forth, in the west end, end John Kievan postmaster,
blacksmith and head of the democretio party. bush end had a hotel and
store. The log school house was surrounded by a sod well as a kind of
fort to be used in case of en Indian raid, The first person with on
became acquainted there was Joe Snyder, a young fellow ;rho was with
Taylor and who later was sleeted county superintendent and drew POO
salary. Later he ran a lumber yard at Alma, was county treasurers and
later representatitre of the legislature. The cow boys used to have a
little fun sometimes in their Mon way, but it was disconcerting to those
not used to them, The winter of 1879 and 180 many of the cowboys stayed
at Culbertson.
One day they went down to Indianola, looked up the sheriff and
tore the front out of a saloon and shot up the tern. Another time a
fellow same in on the stage and put up at the Culbertson hotel. Duro,
ing the nit the boys gathered around and shot up into the eaves and
OTOS shot out some of the window lights in the roan. where the fellow -was
sleeping. He left on the stage before daylight the next morning.
In the spring of 180 a young follow cane to town elaining to be
a cowpuncher from Australia. he wanted to know if they rode steers here
to herd on, saying that if they did he was alright. He seems to be some..
thing of a 'blew." There was an old well in the sinter of the street
ten or twelve feet deep and one night when 'the boys knee the Australian
**aid hear, two of them gat out behind the eorner of the store and said
that it had been a long time sine' any one had gone into the well, and
thought it would be all right to put the Australian in there the nest
night. The next morning the man was gene and was never heard of after.
During the winter of ,79*80 was a mild one in the west. There was a
little snow and the Republican river was frosen over but a short time.
The coldest spell we had was just before Christmas when the thermometer
got down to twenty below. The is. vent out of the river before New
Year's and it did not frees* over again until February.
The ranch where I worked had some hay up the South Fork and we
made use of this latter cold spell to get it home. A man by the name
of Johnny Cotton and I did the hauling with two ponies on the tongue
and two Spanish mules in the lead. We used to start before daylight coo
as to get book before the toe got too soft in the middle of the day to
hold up the outfit. 14 got it all over accept a little bit we went
after rather late the last morning.
We waded at South Fork, the team honking through the is. all
right, but when we reaohed the North Fork the ioe seemed to be stronger
and held up the mules until they got upon it when it broke up in big
oaken and floated off with them so they could not keep their footing.
The =les got tired of this finally and lay down in the water. There
was nothing to do then but throw our load into the river and wade around
in the water and break a path through the to.,
Jahnny Cotton so sailed bosons* of his white hair was so Chisage
boy who had eons west right after the Chicago fire and had drifted
armload over mush of the west and had seen $ome pretty rough times amoord*
ing to his talk. He was a generous hearted boy, pleasant, and a little
inolimod to bluff. The boys on the river used to say that he would get
killed some day booms* he did not have the grit to shoot when it ammo
to a emotion of shooting first.
In the fall of 1800 John with sone others had been down to Indian*
ola with bee mottle and having taken an a little of JOhn Barleyeorn
cowboy fashion, thought to have a little fun with the mail oarriers So
they stopped the carrier in the road and demanded the registered letters
and put a few bullet holes through his rig. I don't suppose the carrier
was seared for he knew them all and knew they did ,not mean to molest the
mail. The nest day it was reported that the United States 'Aerobe' from
Culbertson was coming up after Jahn. Jahn left the *country, but no oom*
plaint had been made; the idea was simply to emir* the boys out of the
country.
Three years later I was in Hebron 4braska. One winter day piok*
ing up an Omaha Republican lying on the oounter in one of the stores I
saw this from Fort Robison Naorioskas John, Cotton, otherwise Sayles,
who keeps the neighboring *hog ranee walked into the saloon here today
and shot a soldier who lay on the floor in drunken sleep and skipped
out.' This is the last I ever heard of Cotten.
One day in the fall of 179 about =env* looked over south and
saw smoke. It was a still day but we know it was a prairie fire. We
found that the fire evidently started from some one passing along the
Vellum trail and dripping a lighted match. Just as we had it put out
four or five "spinsters" oame rushing up en horeebaok. They more on a
hunting trip up the South Fork and while in oamp for dinner am the
smoke and acme back to put out the fire. They appeared frightened and
laid the origin of the fire to one of their party who lighted a pipe.
One day when the whole north was full of amok* and a big fire
seemed to be raging over south, we started out to save the range. We
went about ton miles to the bend of the Big Timber shore some home*
steaders frau Sioux City had located. Some of then had acme from. Atwood
that day and they said the fire was south of the trail that ran west
on the divide near the winter of Cheyenne County, Kansas. As there was
no wind we went book to the ranch. It was cloudy and the fire lit up
the sky until we could see our shadows. The next day the boss put me
on one of the best ponies an the rupiah and told me to go and see 'here
it was. I went to Indian Crook and the fire was as far away apparently
as ever. We went an until we same out on the hard land past the sand
hills at the bead of the creek. Before we turned beak we saw a long
string of something we could not tell whether settle or Indians. We gat
off and looked to the saddle girths and made ready for a ran if we had
to. But after watching the figures for sometime and noticing that they
did not get any nearer we concluded that they must be settle. The mirage
made the cattle seem very tall like MAU on horseback and with a little
wind they had all the appearance at a distend* of men an horseback on a
dead run.