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Subject: OLD MAN SAUNDERSON
Submitted By: Mrs. R. T. F. Simpson
Original Copy, Not Rewritten
Wordage: 550
Date: August 15, 1936
Checked By: Alice Cnrhin, Editor
Approved By: Ina Sizer Cassidy, State Director
Simpson, Mrs. R. T. P., 8/15/38 c1-550
OLD MAN SAUNDUSOI
When sNewcombls Trading Posts was one small building and a
"dug -outs under the hillside, operated by Charley Nelson, daring
the early years of this century, it was the scene of a weird in-
cident when two young freighters, named Roy and Clinton Burn-
ham, cousins, drove up to the store with a dead man as a part of
their load of freight. They had left Farmington, the morning
before for Gallup, with freight and one passenger, an old pros-
pector named Saunderson, who had come down from the mountains to
go to Arizona for the winter months, and whom they had agreed to
take as far as Gallup. They had not made Nelson's Post the first
night, so had camped by the roadside when dusk overtook them.
Drawing the two wagons close together, they had a bite to eat,
then made their three beds on the ground between the two wagons,
throwing a big canvass across both wagons and tying the four cor-
ners to the wheels, thus making a shelter and giving them some
protection from the cold :)ir the December night. In the morning,
the two younger men were up as soon as it began to get light, not
disturbing the older man till breakfast ivs cooked. Then Roy mill-
ed him a couple of times, but without response, so he went nearer
and laid his hand on the old manta shoulder to awaken him, but he
found the old man was cold and dead, sdeader then a door nail."
After the first shock was over, the problem confronting them
was what to do with the body. The law required certain observances.
none of which were possible out there in the middle of the great
American desert. The law required that the body be untouched till
the arrival of an officer. As this could not be complied with,
they decided to move on to Nelson's Post, and send an Indian run-
ner back to Farmington with a note to the Justice of the Peace.
It was a well known fact that the Navajo Indians immediately
leave the vicinity of a dead body, and the young men were not in
alined to thus rain the Indian business of Nelson's Post. So, to
keep the fact that they had a dead body on the wagon, a secret,
from the Indians at least, they, accordingly, before leaving camp,
wrapped the body in the big canvass, and strapped it, in a care-
less fashion, to the top of the covered wagon, thus hiding it in
the most conspicuous place, on the very top of the wagon. Their
arrival at the store was without incident, and as far as known
the Indians never learned of anything unusual about it.
After telling the trader their experience, he gave them per-
missi n to lock the body in the dug -out after dark, and to leave
it there till the Indian runner came back with directions from the
Justice of the Peace, which they supposed wouTd be to take the
body back to Farmington. So that night they stealthily put the
body under the hillside in the dug -out, and locked the door, and
next went on their way to Gallup.
Returning from Gallup with a load of *turkey and trimmings*
for the Christmas trade in Farmington, they stopped at the Nelson
Trading Post to make sure the Justice trAe Peace had tpter the
body and attended to it. They were most astonished that the note
brought in by the Indian runner had instructed them to *bury the
body there*.
Thin was a very hard task, as it also involved concealing the
death from the Navajos. However, instead of sleeping that night,
they went dawn to the flats and with axes they chopped a hole in
the ground a very long one it seeme7'. to them for the man was
tall, the ground was frosen, it was dark and gruesome and they
thought the taA would never be finished. But they made better
time when they got below the frozen crust, and could work with
sh-vels, and t}lny finally completed the task. They had dug a
grave in the darkness of the night. Unlocking the door to the
dug —out, they stumbled out, bearing the body of the old man, laid
him on his own pillow, and his own bed, wranned him in his own
bedding, slowly and with much difficulty, carried him to the new—
ly made grave, and slowly and reverently placed him in his last
resting place down in the flats, where today the driftinP s-nds
av leveled the lonely grave, and le,t not a sign to tell where
lies the body of Old Man Saunderson.
Source of Information:
Ray Burnham, Farmington, New harico.