Document text
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EDITORIAL FIELD COPY
by
Mrs. Florence Angermiller,
Pioneer Experienses
of it Sheepaan in a
Cattle CountrX UVALDN COUNTTO/pTR IC T #10
Page 1
le/
PART ONE
MARTIN HSNRY KILGORE
Wald*, Texas.
"Ism Clark and Susan Tibbetts Kilgore were my parents. My father wati
born in Ohio near Columbus. He was about 85 years old the last time I saw
him, which wee during the World's Fair at Chicago about forty years ago.
"I was born in 1853, in Richmond, Illinois. My people were all
farmers and dairymen. In the last few years I was on the farm, we put in
a cheese factory of our own and bought milk from about one -hundred and
fifty cows. We kept forty and fifty sows of our own all the time. We
have a cheese recipe handed down by my mother's people from Vermont that
no one knows anything about. I san make that cheese today. We worked
it over and treated it after it was made and it would keep for years and
years packed in Jars.
"I really took hold of our place when I was fourteen years old. It
used to be hard on me to sit and milk sows when the others boys were go-
ing swiAming. Then I was out mad at work at four o'clock in the morning.
"We left the farm in '68 or '70, trading it off for a block of business
buildings in Fulton, Illinois I met Miss Ann Porter there and we were
married in Clinton, lows, across the river from Fulton in November, 1874.
Her father was an expert meehanie and steamboat builder. He built steam-
boats for Diamond Joe for many years. Directly after we were married, the
money panie of 173-975 hit that caused me to take my tools and go out on
the road as a scale -repairer. I traveled over Illinois, Wisconsin and
Minnesota.
"We traded off our busines}; houses for a large farm in Missouri but
I only stayed there about two years. I turned it all over to my father
and Game to Texas in '81, hitting Fort Worth in a Texas blizzard.
'Yoneer txperienees M. H. Kilgore
Peg, a
ass
"When I name to ;FIri Antonio in 181, it WAS the end of the reiireed-
then. I weni into the :4heee trading. I lento* there one 'Sundry end went
down the next mornIne end formed a nertnerThin with two strengers Inever
hell seen before.
kent the drive hot ell the time and :Aide good massy.
bourht sheel eown eroued sn Diego, Duvel County, end sold in Sea AnteeLe*
To bouollt those sheep for about a aoller or a duller -end -a-quarter a heed
nn e soli Vlem for ebout two or three dollers lei heat. AP kept that u9 ah06,
two yeers. 7e woult drive them up t*sm kntonio es there was no illy to Skip
them ens we he to heve herders. There were Indians spores all the tia0
tb-
The anring before, the Inelenu tied come in there end kille# a baneh ottala4WONO
The eoverment Oldest So Pnything ebout those Indians, so Lee Hello asp**
of the reit:ere, took hold of the situetion himaelf. Hi °hosed thee soros* the
country Ant oPtulit them in s few hours. He hat a pretty good straw with $11*#
A brother to one of the nertners in our outfit, got stuck on the leggin' OW
the oiet had on when he was killed 9114 nothinr!: would do hia but to get tolWet,
ole ehlef'm legins. As we were drivirw the sheer) through thick pal
nePr all the ti., this boy took nity on his_eld naint 9010 une day sed'pet
those leg4las on his forele,-s to ke7 tne thorns out of him. when the* old
horse seUe. thohe lewinm, he lalrA here known it u an Indian's,. Of eU
the nitohinf,; --hell-fire, he AAW410 ell over thet °Ann.
used to travel nt ni*t because of the bed men in that country,
There were three or four of us snd we hed 0111. 01 PP0k nOny we nailed *Old
Peek° He would follow us just like, a colt mnii he soon learned how to drive
uheee. tlmn ewould et t: the lerr, the sheen would be awfully hare to
rive. They woule eet to eetim' neer -na wouldn't went to go on at oils
olt it lookee like, knew how to nose them slonrna Wzen he eoUida0t
r.t-ft them ;7,c), nt, 114A110 stop and sheke his leek a. rten the tin WIWI 41114
mkillets would esttle, the sheer) would stieri foie an he looked like he get
flioneer experiences M. M. Kilgore
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iota of fun out of watching them run. One time after we gut to an Antonio,
we left Olt Pack there in a big pasture, close to San Antonio. where part of
the town is now ant when we evt back, the stature had be n worked out and
eht
Olt Pack hadn't been fount. The water hne ail -1'104 up inlwater hole in the
11.!k
pasture one we were afraie he WOG dope, but we finally found him and he had
been in that neture without water about three weeks, just living off of prickly
peer. 'ee were all glee to see hin.
"There were so many dengerous men and cutthroats in that section at that
time, we used to'heve to trevei at nights end when we eot down in thPt country,
we use* to ormo olose to an old Nexican who livek in the vicinity of an Diego
on a rrnehe he kopt um informed ebout all thouc fellows down there. ene nieht
we were corneae therm rne all seemed to be quiet, ene of our iJoyu ht been up
nn (ext all the news end it seewee pretty peaceable, e'or 410ele rePeon, I woke up
in the night sometime and there &too* n exioan. jumped up with a six-shooter
in my hent an the ieexicen began eraying. That woke the other eoys up net they
eot up with their emu. The eaxioan was soared to iteeth and told us he had come
there for water. As it was triezlin; rein, we knew that wasn't right hut after
we hate some fun out of him, we let him eo an the next eornide we noticed his
tr oks. it looked like about fifteen feet between eech treck every juxin he touki
"he carried orovisions enough. to last us between eettinmeets. eeemtimes
there iould ee a litele store on our road where ee could t R few'teinee along
es we neelee. ee hal our corn meal and 0 little flour and of curse ;at wee
elentiful. Anyway, we could get 'jerky' (triet meet) at any ranch we eerie toi
"In '84 or '85, I went eown into eesxico buyin rses. I MOOS these or foul
tripe to eorreon but 1= weiepee them
to eexico then. I sold some of the
shipped to Louialana and Arkansas.
book by rail. Uh, yes, there was a railroad
horses in Son Antonio and some of them
They only cost about ten pesos and I would
:et from ewenty-five to sixty AollPro over here. I mete eood money on them.
Aoneer experiences -e H. Kilgore
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But I only mete these few shipments. I took four cerloeas of nuleu to
Arkansas from !Jan Antonio once an6i. trete& them for cettle. They made me a
barrel of money.
"In '86 I took my family ane went to ;snare with five-thoumend heed of
sheep. It was about eeptenber end we wereehunting gress end found it to be
fine up there rieet efter a eood rain they heti held. But, by Novefeber, it had
turned off hot nna try and the wind het blowei it ell off. I had to skin out
,egmin hunting erese. I couldn't get any help to wove exoept one 014 one -eyed
herder 1 hest, uo I went down to 'Robbers Roost' or oil eg-Legs elece, RV it
was celled, ens hired three outlewe to help MA move, ';le never got off the first
diny till late in the efternoon en S the first nie;ht out, my oid'elexicen herder
got up in the night and stole my Winchester end lit out, e:Lr3ti it ncross the
pinine with the hale 1 hne left. But ,those leen wouldn't go foot unlese I
would lot them k, ee a est lehorse. 'eg were crossing the elyins end couldn't
(Jerry much water in the wagons nnd ee knew it would be bilk for the horses would
twee to hnve water as 'well me us, :ell, nftex we got out on the 'line, we
were twenty-one, says without water 2er tie sheep. The eryss VJ7,11 ereen in she:er
could live without wnter, I ueee to ride shoed and oout out the water. Once
we had drrineo our barrels end hyil about a -half a bueket of eeter, deems and
all. Jack leendere wee a kind ef exciteblo fellow end iecleeed that we would
at,rve te teeth. hI1e he wpc fu.Ang pround., he atureeled over the bucket of
lonter sank tipped it over, Thrt ended alle weter. I thought he would eo orezy.
I know thet the dews that fell up on the eleins eere -always heavy and that it
was said that it "mule run down the nountain sites of a moreing. So I went
UD on n eert of 11 end found it collected end dipped ue two or three gallons
Then 1 struck out for eever Lake to locate it and came back one helped drive
the sheep to it. e lined the on ellup on the horses nnt stayed in the lead
to heed the aheep off for they were ervey when they smelled the water. That
cdioneer c.xperisuceit Yllgore Tiige 5
Z32
lake cov*red ebout en etre or two but when those anite7) ron into it, you coultn't
see any water at all. They jufit clovimed it. They erenk till firt one leg
ant then the other tould raise 47) for their tt0000ns were -1.4rumei. I thought
they would all tie out using in the water, I gues44, was whet save* them for
that est nt we killet a :,,utton ono there was full gullon weter image of
71m out on the outside of his intoistinet. it showed t4 t the dater na4 gone
through nis nits mna that he had soned up a lot. i never lost a sheen.
wife ens baby deughter, floret's., were along in the wagon this trip.
e went on to the Altos and hit it at the old Toney 'trotiling. IL got there in
Oeaft,50mr an there witan't any grail within three mile of the river end it was
killOWi3 ant colt to At trove beak irl;o the hest piece we eould get to make
temp anti next toy I went town to Tardpe temp ant sontultet him Iglu he said,
'You couldn't get Porous that river with those sheep. The water is three feet
demo an runnini, like it mill rect.' The atrium was about one -hundred feet
*arose one haat a rook bottom. It Was running D044t two or three miles en hour
and there I wee. I says, 'boys, we pet got to trots that river,' ant they
1-situ:het et me. le bad two %dogma and a .trail wagon. I crossed the riv*r and
travelet on to øt to John Como's ranch as I littera they were buillirfea n -w h
houses there. After I °roamed the river one was on the way to the xenneh, it
was elreedy night. There was a townwers slope fur a goat mays ens the bleak
gremma rasa was ,e -owing pretty ttok ns as i yeti going eown this elooe, my
hint -wheel tire ran ar and I mew it roll town the.eill ant clisten in the
i took In nfter it efool, ant rollet on gown the ''l right into
a bunch of'exicens thnt rere vamped there ant were. politer). They were grease
cutters rur t:ot :weetrument. Tle tire run rigt town enon g them and neely
-gaille4 them to tooth. .1 exlairts to them and ruatlet in among those .Ateitens
an* ,!..rot biGt44,
went on. i
4 boot lenther and went o-ok to the wagon end set qt I tire era
bout thirty oleces of lumber fit the -nach after 1 told them
e4ndltion ant that I lied to have some /umber to built a bridge. I got Week
Pioneer hxperiences M. U. Kilgore
Vega 6
23.21Fh
with the lumber eat put three wagons in the river ant seece4 them the length
of the lieteer end it reeohei cleer across. My lumber mate e floor between
the wegonsALsel the side boards. I had to weight the wagons down with rooks to
keep them from flonting oft. I took my mea ond went out end dregget brush up
r tenphrery pen. Then:we to,ek one mon with n bread-een or etAA end
commene6i shekin.7, thht salt and goinh morose thet first wegon. The Ith:ep
been following him beceuse thiew were orezy for welt.and they hent,soroos that
wegom bridge rih;ht *long out in en hour's time, the whole fluel: het eroweed.
Then we :havet the cemp eorous•nnd everything Wkii so happy my old shepherd tog
had pups thnt night,
"From then hn we had pretty good soiling. I got .pernialition from John
Camp enei went in below Dryten ent stnyeti there P yehr. Thet was the finest
rnnhe i ever yew. -13, sheep'wne sure fet. You ',mow whet a time sheep men heir*
at lambiw time? now, the idee of hrvieh four or five 'Len nt lambing time
seenei senseless to me. Rih.ht where I 'hes cermet, I hi d three or four sectiens
of fine hrezing lend-. fronting on the river. fe hni a good watering place
-*nit when it eome lambing season, 1 hat two oexioan herders on horses end hat
them round those uheep up. At night one of them would come p-ck ond gnther
the ewes that het lambed ant run theh off to one side together nnt the other
man kept the other herd together. I kepththet up till 1 lnmbe4 uut and
risei a ninety-six ,or cent lamb crop. It is P simple tillnt;, theugh
don't know how the sheeh nen hentle their ewes at lembiag time now. Ninety
ix Per cent average is e good one, but oT cAirac there was a goat.mnny twins
born. I hr i ')oisoned the hills out there till there wasn't n soyote in the
country. Therm weren't many to stnrt with.
"7811, I hot done pretty good with the aheee and they were fnt when
decided to sell hut. A -party from Peiseno Pass by the name of Windy Almon
mnie ne s -eronosition to buy the stock for J. B. hhannon and Company of Nor-
honnecticut. I mode the tee]. With them agreeing to hold all the ewes
enimr Mxperienees M. 11. Kilgore
Page 7
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and lmmbs the% couldn't travel end they took the others to Pagano Pass, so 1
turned about war of my flock over to iJ:inay. hen the other bunoh was ready
to move, I P sketch or a sort of map from cowboy as to the route 1 WO8
to VICO to -lidsoulp Peas, nnd I irodo Lreen ooy to drive the 'mown.- Th-t WPS
a a..iLiteke thvt *tire eut ms see iing. 1 sot within thirty or forty miles of my
destination end ade,ordinl to my direetions, I cot to a windmill. end from there,.
I got directions from anothr eowboy nue to guetraight across the country. It
was about fifteen ;Aloe eround 1Le nountein like the wagon would hove to go,
but utrailt **rose with the Ships) It ensn't over three miles. It was the Old
Smugtaer's Trail. I Ault the wagon on telling the boy to ooze beck over the
pass and oect us with enter. ',2enderfoot-like,-hm got crazy when he strdak the
railroad nnu skinned out te tr4A.n, leovinc. ay wagon and outfit in the shippil
pens. The stetiAL egent found them end took wire or them till he could find Jut
who twiy uelotwed to.. I had aireedy sent my ferAly on out to Marfa on the train,
so they gore not alon. A911, the two herders and I started out across that
,ount!4in afoot and it eea three of the hottest days I ever saw. We at about
half -wry over and the sheep refused to A:Are another foot. e kept waiting for
the boy on tho weon to brini: us sume wetor. All that Afternoon and the next
day, the sheen didn't buk-ige. Just stood in %het broiA.ng sun down in Chalk
Valley. The south side of the .wunteins Jaolsws thot valley for *bout fifteen or
twenty .1.1os h9(1 n ,irop of about t‘gont:i feet, forming a relulnr wire2et.
n!,boet the Jecond day in i4t, moon, 'WI two teoittnn herders .,ent erozy,
Jtrippod oft thcir clot' in gm lit out for water. Wu had no water nor nothing
to eel;. Aiere was a sort of -eed or _growth in thet velloy that had a fluid puln
been 01-1c. on. I tin. Its nae isisnnger. it had made us all siek7, we had
A
e -ton so :alai or IL trZin to et mo4ot!iinc Ad;:it. all, after -the herders left,
I ',old the ber4 t:etlor till dumk then i dr6ve them up on the larapet and left
them. Vstnrted b 0-7, to the la et on;le that we t'Alid loft at the wInd7%111. bow, it
Pioneer txperieneei Me H. Kilgore
„Itga 8
832
was peeuliar the way I would travel and think I had gone about a half -mile,
when I don't suppose I would go over a few -hundred yards. I would fall down and 4
go to sleep. When I woitld wake up, I would get up and hit it again and do the
same tning over. I was several hours getting bask to that windmill but when I
got there, I had sense enough to drink a little water at a time. I drank for an.
hour or two. Yinally, at daylight, I felt relieved enough to stmrt for c ranah
several miles away. I got to their camp early in the morning and they were just
sitting down to breakfAst and asked me to eat. I said, 'No, thank you, I never
Got,' Hut I asked for some milk and they brought me some but don't know how
mush I drank. I had no appetite to eat anything for several days. I just
couldn't take anything in my atom/lobs,
“Well, at this ranch, I got threo men and hors4 to help me with my sheep.
One was the eaptain of the rangers and his brother, also another man. re got
bask and rounded up the sheep. we had a little lunch fixed up and stopped to
sat it and one of the men threw a match or eigerette down and set the grass afire
hell, air, there was a prairie fire going in'a flash. There were the sheep in
the middle of it and we all lit in to fighting the blaze. we fought it with our
saddle blankets and as fast as we would whip it out in one place, it would break
out behind us. We finally got the fire out and were nearly exhausted as well as
all black and smutty. We took the sheep on to water end assembled my wagon out-
fit from the railroad agent. I ifet immediately with the herd and went on to
Paisano Pass. When I arrived,* member of the firm of Shannon and Company same
to me and sash 91 find this in, windy Wilson, is robbing me. We were short
about four -hundred het4 of sheep we eouldn't mount for. What are we going to
do?' I says* 'I don't knoW He told me then thpt he wanted me to take the
sheep and take WAre of them for him as he was .perfectly helpless against that
fellow. My reply was, 0I sold these aheJp beclouds I was tired of running them
and wonted to get rid of them, but under bush conditions, I will help you out
Pioneer Experiences Me He Kilgore
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but bow long will you want -me to stay with them?' He said he would et someone
th'ore as rppidly as possible. I have never son any of those eo 1e Since
that day. He left us there, but I soon got into correspondence with the firm
and tola them the best thing we could do would be to buy up several seotione
of land as the state of Texas had passed an act recently whereby a person might
take 1.u) six alternate sections in that locality at a pretty cheap price.
"I advised them to do that and we made application for those six sections.
I established camp and began to rustle for w*t.r I made arrangements with :a
ranchman till I could do something else. The cattlemen in there hated sheep
and water is scarce in that country, so it was a gloomy' outlook. After I was
established, I was visited by General Magruder who had been sent out there to
my camp. lie introduced himself and told me that the qtnte had raised tie price
on the land in that locality, stating that they should have a tree claim,
desert claim and water claim. I asked him if he had any help and he said no.
told him that he would rvaed help because I wasn't going to get off of there.
He said he knew it was wrong to demand Buell a thing, but he would report that
he coultn't get us off.
"I began investitvtions an0. found that the Oltolie Church had all the
water rigPts to that Big Bend country. I suppose they owned a seition or so
at each waterit-w i].roe, 80 I got a le!Ase on that Part of the country from the
Catholic priest -t Peso. Consequently, I returned the six sections of land
to the State. I moved on down to my new loc-tion and it was the finest sheep
country I was ever In. There wore two snringa, one was the Rosillo Spring and
the other was the ain spring that ran a 'Jig +Aisne of water at the base of
the ahlsos ecuntains.
"The cowmen had sworn to kill anybody that ever OOMB in there with sheep.
had the lease all right but it didn't count against those cowmen's guns..
I boated the first cap at the Rosillo Spring on the west side of the
mountain. About the third day there, a delegation of three oompunehers rode
ioneer Experiences M. H. Kilgore
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in and wanted to know whet the hell I was doing in there with sheen. 1 snw
was outnumLored, so I. resorted to stratagem.
"I began diseoursing on the remarkable feats of Julius Verne, whose book
had been published about his trip to the moon and which was being widely I
discussed. Be had described his trip to the moon so I put on a crazy spell and
pretended to be Julius Verne and told them that I and my partner had constructed
this machine to mrke this trip to the moon. I toldihem that we got everything
ready about dusk and hod the plane loaded with ballast, water and other things
and at the last, we put in our camp dog. Ike rose about 5,000 feet traveling
along at a fairly good rate when we discovered that we were losing altitude
about midnight. We commenced throwing out ballast but were still losing altitud
so we throwed out the rest of the ballast and finally throwed out the dog.
seemed to be traveling with,alt any trouble from that time on. At dylight, we
discovered that the dog was traveling right along beside of us in the air.
Right along side of the mrchine.
"When I got to that point, the leader of the cowboys got up and soya,
'his damn fool is crazy; lets go.'
"It was laughable, but we got to be good friends later and dismissed it
from my viewpoint.
"Along about then, there was a" et deal of talk about war between Mexico
and the United States so I and these throe sowpunehers began to lay plans to
make sale money in ease of war. e concluded it would be the right time to
stock up on Mexieun eattle._ ,e made all preparations to cross the Rio Grande
at the ChiNos ountstins where thousands of cattle and torsos watered every day.
We soul& round up about forty acres of them and drive them across the river.
!4e got word iron i Marfa every day. The Lleminole geouts were camped there close
to me and some of us get information every day and kept up with what the ,ov-
ernment was c>ing to do. The w -r didn't occur. Ve thought that we were the
Pioneer -Experiences M H. Kilgore
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originrtors of this skeme but, psheW we weren't in it. We found where en
errengement hP4tbeen'made with a buneh of men from Silver City, New Mexico,
through the hell of a discarded priest, to start down to the City of Mexico and
rob all the churches and missions oftkerr gold and silver and everything valuable
if war was declared'. We were not the only smart ones with ideas. But since the
wer.didn't occur, the skemes didn't either.
"Later I moved from the Chisos to New Mexieo close to Deming. I run sheep
there about a yesr and sold them out. I wrote the eastern concern (Shannon
Company) that I had this chance to sell out and was tired of running the sheep
any lonr!er. I sold the flock to the United States Marshall at Silver City, and
sent Phannon Comnany their money.
"I have more to tell you -for I have seen some ups and downs in my day. I
am 84 years old now but in the last few years I have perfected and patented a
pump that will probably mice another fortune. I don't like to be idle and now
since my -patent has gone through, I must be getting out to work right away snd
get thing' started. I like to figure and have had a greet deal of pleasure
getting up my drawings and specifications. M y IAA idea has not been patented
yet. It is a pump for the oil wells, but in order to put it through, I had to
go to work nnd -patent the wpter pump to get money for the oil pump-.
"Out of my five sisters, there is only one living. She lives in San &atonic',
I was the only b_y, exeept one who died in his youth. I hpve two daughters in
trixona. My wife longs to go there to live. Well, I find life pretty' interest-
ing wherever I go nnd always find plenty to keep me occupied.
PART TWO FOLLOWS.