The grave of Alvah H. Unthank

Alvah H. Unthank was a 19-year-old pioneer travelling the Oregon who died of Cholera at a spot near the Dave Johnson Power Plant outside Glendrock in July, 1850.  

One of many such tragic deaths on the trails.

 

Oregon Trail and Bill Hooker Markers, Converse County, Wyoming.

This spot along Wyoming State Highway 96 in Converse County, Wyoming has two historical markers, one for the Oregon Trail and another for pioneer Bill Hooker.

The Oregon Trail marker is unusual in that it isn't located on the Oregon Trail, but four miles to the south of the course of the trail. This would place the rail on State Highway 91, which was discussed in a memorial we posted earlier this week.  The State must have saw fit to place a marker on the more traveled Highway 93, which is near where the Interstate Highway presently is.  The same marker notes the location of Ft. Fetterman, seven miles to the north.  The marker was placed in 1943, by which time the older highway was no doubt more or less only a county road.

The same location also has a marker for pioneer freighter Bill Hooker, who later authored a book about his experiences as a bull whacker in Wyoming.  There is also apparently a marker at Hookers old cabin, which I wasn't aware of at the time that I took this photo. This 1931 marker predates the Oregon Trail marker.

Hooker was still living at the time that this marker was placed and the man responsible for placing it, F. W. LaFrentz, was a pioneer in his own right, being an early member of the legislature and being in the Territorial Legislature.  He's was the man who introduced the petition for statehood in the Territorial Legislature.

Ft. Halleck, sort of. Near Elk Mountain Wyoming

Where Ft. Halleck was, from a great distance.

This set of photographs attempts to record something from a very great distance, and with the improper lenses.   I really should have known better, quite frankly, and forgot to bring the lense that would have been ideal.  None the less, looking straight up the center of this photograph, you'll see where Ft. Halleck once was.

The post was located at the base of Elk Mountain on the Overland Trail, that "shortcut" alternative to the Oregon Trail that shaved miles, at the expense of convenience and risk.  Ft. Halleck was built in 1862 to reduce the risk.  Whomever located the post must have done so in the summer, as placing a post on this location would seem, almost by definition, to express a degree of ignorance as to what the winters here are like.

 The area to the northeast of where Ft. Halleck once was.

The fort was only occupied until 1866, although it was a major post during that time.  Ft. Sanders, outside the present city of Laramie, made the unnecessary and to add to that, Sanders was in a more livable 

Of course, by that time the Union Pacific was also progressing through the area, and that would soon render the Overland Trail obsolete.  While not on an identical path the Overland Trail and the Union Pacific approximated each others routes and, very shortly, troops would be able to travel by rail.

As that occured, it would also be the case that guarding the railroad would become a more important function for the Army, and forts soon came to be placed on it.

Elk Mountain

And, therefore, Ft. Halleck was abandoned.

Some Gave All: The Sundance, Wyoming Rest Stop Memorials.

Some Gave All: The Sundance, Wyoming Rest Stop Memorials.: 

 Memorials at the Sundance Wyoming Rest Stop.

I usually don't put a bunch of memorials, even at one single spot, in one single post.  Each, I generally feel, deserves its own post as each is its own topic, in terms of what it commemorates.

 Black Hills Sign at the Sundance Wyoming Rest Stop.

I'm making an exception here, however, as these are grouped so nicely, they seem to require a singular treatment. 

The first item we address is the Black Hills sign. This sign discusses the Black Hills, which straddle the Wyoming/South Dakota border.

 Crook County sign.

The second sign discusses Crook County, named after Gen. George Crook, and in which Sundance is situated.

The sign oddly doesn't really go into Crook himself, but then its a memorial for the county, not the general.  Still a controversial general, Crook came into this region in the summer campaign of 1876 which saw him go as far north as southern Montana before meeting the Sioux and Cheyenne at Rosebud several days prior to Custer encountering them at Little Big Horn.  Crook engaged the native forces and then withdrew in a move that's still both praised and condemned.  At the time of the formation of Crook County in 1888 he was sufficiently admired that the county was named after him, at a time at which he was still living.

 Custer Expedition Memorial.

Finally, the Rest Stop is the location of an old monument noting the passage of Custer's 1874 expedition into the Black Hills, which is generally regarded as the precursor of the European American invasion of the Black Hills and the Powder River Expedition of 1876.  Obviously, it's more complicated than that, but its safe to say that the discovery of gold in 1874 gave way to a gold rush which, in turn, made conflict with the Sioux, who had taken over the Black Hills (by force) from the Crow, inevitable.

This memorial is interesting in the super heated atmosphere of today given that the historical view has really changed since 1940, when this roadside monument was dedicated (surprisingly late, I'd note, compared to similar Wyoming monuments). In 1940 Custer was still regarded as a hero.  By the 1970s, however, he was regarded in the opposite fashion, by and large, at least in terms of his popular portrays are concerned.  The 1874 expedition into the Black Hills is not favorably recalled in history now at all.

I have to wonder, however, in terms of the history if this expedition changed history the way it is recalled.  The Black Hills always seem to be an attractant.  They attracted the Sioux who took them (in living memory in 1874) from the Crows and it seems highly likely that they would would have attracted European Americans as well.  Certainly they continued to even after the hopes of gold seekers were dashed.

Some Gave All: Washakie County Pioneers' Memorial, Worland Wyomin...

Some Gave All: Washakie County Pioneers' Memorial, Worland Wyoming

This memorial in the Washakie County Wyoming Courthouse commemorates the early residents of the county.

After Appomattox. The Civil War's impact on Wyoming.

 

 Grand Army of the Republic memorial, Casper Wyoming.

We recently posted this item on the Civil War in Wyoming:

Today In Wyoming's History: Wyoming in the Civil War: I posted this item on our other blog, Lex Anteinternet, very recently for a variety of reasons: Lex Anteinternet: The Stars and Bars as ...

That's not where Wyoming's story with the Civil War ends, however.  When the guns fell silent at Appomattox (which of course didn't really end the war everywhere), changes kept on coming.  And indeed it was inevitable that they would, given the operation of Holscher's Fourth Law of History, War Changes Everything.  So here we'll look at that part of the history of our state, which again is a very significant one we've heretofore overlooked.

To a degree, with our earlier thread on the Civil War in Wyoming, we've already started to look at that to a degree.  We concluded our examination there with noting three (actually two) battles that occurred in Wyoming in the summer of 1865, just after the war ended with the last battle of that war, ironically in the west, at Palmito Ranch in May 1865.  Just two months later cavalrymen from Ohio, Kansas, and infantrymen from southern states serving as paroled Confederates, fought in central Wyoming at Platte Bridge Station. Soon thereafter Patrick Connor's troops fought in northern Wyoming at the Battle of Tongue River.  Starting shortly after that, however, these state troops were sent home and the Regular Army started coming back in.

 Aggressive campaigner in the West during the Civil War, Patrick E. Connor.

They didn't come back in to peace, however.  What began, in some ways, as a Cheyenne uprising in 1864 in reaction to Col. Chivington's attack on peaceful Black Kettle in Colorado spread to a Sioux campaign in 1865 under the leadership of Red Cloud.  But why was Red Cloud fighting the Army in 1865?  European American expansion into the Powder River Basis was the reason why.

And this came about in part as part of the increased immigration west that started with the Civil War.  In popular memory, when the Civil War broke out men left their homes to join the fight for four years.  But that's not really true.  Many men did, of course (often for shorter terms of service, however) but some men, and some families, indeed quite a few, simply picked up and moved west to remove themselves from the strife.  Men and women from all over the country found themselves on immigrant trails leading west, hoping for a new, and more peaceful life, somewhere else.  And, with men again, some just yielded to a seeming American migratory instinct and placed themselves in the west, looking for something, with that something often being gold and silver. Given all of this, just as Indian tribes were becoming increasingly militant, an increase in European Americans in the west was being experienced as well.  This was, in part, a direct result of the war.

It didn't stop with the end of the war, however.  The war had put thousands of people in motion, some through military service, and some as refugees.  Following the war most people just went home, but some had no homes to return to, or didn't wish to, and a minority of servicemen just couldn't.  So following the war war they joined the immigrant trail.  The passage of the Homestead Act in 1862 further in creased this, as people made newly mobile found the inducement of land more than amply balanced against the difficulties of travel, particularly when they'd become accustomed to that, or had their backs forced up against the wall in any event.  This yielding to a migratory impulse would impact Wyoming and the entire country for years, with in Wyoming people moving to, or more often across, the state going on for a very long time.

It's easy to disregard the war in this context, but it shouldn't be.  Contrary to what Americans generally think about their history, Americans did move prior to the Civil War, but not usually very far. Seven miles per generation is the general figure for the pre Civil War advancement of the Frontier. But the war changed that, by force in part, and in part by acclimation.  It can be argued that the United States, as a mobile society, began with the war.

Tombstone of Illinois Civil War veteran, in Casper's Highland Cemetary. Such markers are not uncommon in the cemetery, an indicator of the many men who chose not to return to their homes after the Civil War or who ultimately left them.

All of this increased European American presence in the state (aided by the advancing Union Pacific Railroad, ran right into an increased Indian militancy, as already noted, and the Army found itself confronting a more difficult situation in 1865 than it had in 1860.  Added to this, the war ended up changing over the rank and file, and the officer corps, of what had been a fairly stable career Army.  Many men who would have continued on as career enlisted men in the tiny pre war Army either left it after years of intense combat, or were casualties of the war.  The post war Army therefore had many new men in it, including oddly enough even quite a few who had not served in the Civil War, having barely missed it.  The officer corps, for its part, was now heavily dominated by men who had cut their teeth in the Civil War and had risen up to high ranks, only to be reduced in rank in many instances to fill slots in the post war Army.  Added to their numbers were officers who had not come though West Point but rather who'd been wartime commission holders who were now accepted into Regular Federal service at the insistence of Congress, which required the Army to make room for a certain number of them.

The Army had gone into the Civil War as a very small institution, but one that had quite a bit of Frontier experience and which was very rough and ready.  After half a decade of modern war in the East, the Army that emerged in the 1865 to 1866 time frame quickly evolved from a Frontier force with experience into one that was almost entirely new and somewhat green.  The battles of the immediate post war period sometimes demonstrate this.  The Fetterman Fight in December 1866 epitomized this.  Troops from Ft. Phil Kearney, which was commanded by a pre war lawyer turned wartime officer, Col. Carrington, found themselves badly lead by former Lt. Colonel, now Captain, William J. Fetterman who failed to appreciate that fighting the Sioux was going to be different than fighting Confederates.  This lead, of course, to the destruction of his command in the worst Frontier Army disaster of the immediate post war period, which wouldn't be eclipsed until former General, now Lt. Colonel, George A. Custer lead his troops into a worst disaster in 1876 in Montana.

Monument to the troops of William J. Fetterman's detail.

The Army, practically a new Army, did learn how to engage in its new role, but it wasn't as quick or proficient as it as might generally be believed.  Red Cloud actually managed to win his war in 1868, giving us the only example of a Plains Indian War in which the native combatants emerged with a wartime victory.  A war weary and distracted United States yielded to the Sioux in this singular example in Wyoming, making this Wyoming experience unique, albeit temporary.  Hardly noticed is that the 1868 victory came only a few years before the campaigns of the 1876, which would see a spectacular Sioux battlefield victory but which would result in the ultimate Sioux and Cheyenne defeat.

 Red Cloud

Part of this story, of course, is that Col. Chivington's attack on the Cheyenne in 1864 caused a war with the Cheyenne that was fought in Wyoming and Nebraska.  The Cheyenne were Sioux allies and would fight with the Sioux into the 1870s before they experienced the same results.  In some ways, the Wyoming Indian Wars of the late Civil War period were more dominated by the Cheyenne than the Sioux, while the larger Sioux wold dominate the wars from 1866 on.

The collapse of the Indian effort was a feature of Wyoming's history and Wyoming featured prominently in the campaigns on the Northern Plains.  And of course a result of that collapse was a vast expansion of the reservation system in the West.  That expansion would see the Cheyenne and Sioux, who had entered Wyoming in the first half of the 19th Century taken back out and removed as a demographic in Wyoming.  The Crow, who had ranged into and contested for Wyoming as well would also find themselves outside of the state, although only barely given their reservation in southern Montana (the Cheyenne also have one of their reservations in southern Montana near the Wyoming border).  The Wind River Reservation was established at the request of the Shoshone in 1868 (again, a unique Wyoming fact, given that it was unusual for an Indian tribe to ask for a Reservation).  The Arapaho's, a small tribe allied to the Sioux and  Cheyenne (and who had members of their tribe at Sand Creek at the time of Chivington's attack) came on to the reservation in 1878 as a result of the increasingly desperate straits the collapse of Indian efforts following 1876 entailed.

It would be a stretch, of course, to say that the Indian Wars of the 1866 to 1890 time frame are all the result of Civil War, but not much of a stretch.  Some of this strife would have happened anyhow, but it cannot be denied that the tribes were activated and made militant by the events of the Civil War and that the increase of European American immigration into the West which the war fueled played a major part in making that strife what it was.  Likewise, the Army effort was heavily impacted by the loss of the pre war soldiers who knew Frontier campaigning.

Part of the influx of immigration into Wyoming which hasn't been addressed, and which has to be addressed as a separate topic, is that of post war cattlemen. This was, in fact, a direct result of the Civil War.

Wyoming had seen very little in the way of agriculture prior to the Civil War.  Small agricultural units did pop up around the advancing Union Pacific to serve it, but they weren't much.  Prior to that, farming had been introduced by Mexican immigrant labor around Ft. Laramie, when the "Mexican Hills" were farmed by families that had come up after the Mexican War to work on the new buildings at the fort.  The war changed all of this.

During the Civil War enormous herds of feral cattle had grown up in Texas, as those cattle were simply abandoned by those who owned them as they went away to Confederate service.  After the war, these wild cattle were basically free for the taking, or rather for the taking for those who would expend the effort.  Without a market however, they were of very low value.

 Branding cattle in Texas, approximately in the 1860s.

The East provided that market, and it was a market for beef. Prior to the 1865, the United States was really a pork eating nation, not a beef eating one.  Cattle in Texas were raised in the Mexican market fashion, for their hides.  Meat was only a locally consumed byproduct.  The expansion of rail into the West, however, which had commenced before the war and which continued on during it, brought railhead within long distance trailing of Texas herds, and that meant that they could now be driving, as difficult as that was, to railheads for shipment to the hungry East.

It's already been addressed here, but nearly as soon as it became evident that money could be made driving cattle to railheads in Kansas, it became evident that the cattle industry could expand into the plains regions of the West profitably.  This took off rapidly and Wyoming the cattle industry was reaching far up into Wyoming by the mid 1870s, although with difficulty.  Following the collapse of Indian resistance in the late 1870s, the door was open and it really took off in the 1880s.

The story of the early cattle industry is a complicated one, but one of the prominent but lesser noted aspects of it is the extent to which it reflected Southern livestock raising practice.  In the Antebellum South, and indeed well after it, cattle had been turned out into the woods, which while owned were largely unexploited.  This meant that cattle were effectively grazed in "commons" by men who necessarily had to be mounted.  Following the Southern defeat in the war, the use of the wooded commons became increasingly restricted as the timber lands owners, often of the planter class, actively acted to deprive Southern yeomen of the use of them.  Already having suffered the impacts of defeat, some of these men simply took off and went where cattle were otherwise raised, such as in Texas or ultimately elsewhere in the West, taking their mounted lives and practices with them.  This reflected itself in the practices of the cattle industry, even though it is difficult to find the stories of individual cowboys who reflect this. But, for that matter, the stories of individual Mexican cowboys, or black cowboys, who made up 1/3d of that class, is also difficult to find.

Which brings us to another aspect of this story, the addition of African Americans to the Wyoming demographic.  They did not come in huge numbers, but they did come, and even ended up being incorporated into Wyoming's civic life very quickly.  At least one black juror served in a capitol murder jury early in the 20th Century, a remarkable fact for the United States that time, and Casper elected a black Civil War veteran as its mayor during the 1890s.

Something often omitted, oddly, in the popular recollection of the early cattle industry is that this is an economic story. That is, the cattle industry was and is an industry, not some sort of exotic hobby.  The cattle industry in the West differed markedly from cattle raising efforts east of the Mississippi as those efforts, prior to the Civil War, had been much less market oriented for practical reasons.  Most meat was butchered and consumed locally, as there there was no practical means of preservation other than salting or corning (and hence the widespread consumption of bacon, ham, corned beef, and sausages in that era).

I note this as one of the hugely significant aspect of the Civil War is that it accelerated, partially through political actions, the industrialization of the United States, and that had a big impact on the early history of Wyoming.  Indeed, while very poorly understood, that impact still lives on today, although its ironically contested by the same forces that brought it about.

The Civil War did not cause the Industrial Revolution in the United States. That had been ongoing for quite some time.  However, the Industrial Revolution had not come to all o the United States prior to the war, and that impacted the war and its results.  Industrialization had occurred much more significantly in the North.  The South provided 25% of the nation's exports prior to the war, but nearly 100% of that 25% were agricultural products.  The South, famously, had no arms industry at all when it chose to take on the North, which had a significant one.

This is not to say, as is sometimes implied, that everyone in the North was working in a factory.  That view was somewhat popular in the South at the time, which is one of the things that gave Southerners false comport, feeling as they did that a bunch of pasty faced factory workers would not be able to take on the hardy yeoman of the South.  In fact, most Northerners were from farms as well and many were also Yeoman.  One of the rude shocks of the war that the South experienced was to learn that, as they did for example taking on the Michigan Brigade early in the war where they were stunned to find that Michigan's troops weren't bothered by the rain.

The industrialization of the North, however, is important to this story as industry had widely developed and was supported politically in the North. While a majority of Northerners were yeomen, as in the South, Yeoman in the North had not retained a huge cultural identity as they did in the South.  Southerners were not only mostly yeomen, in outlook they were hostile to industry.  This wasn't the case in the North.  Because the Democratic Party identified with the  South, and the political class in the South was Democratic, and because the Whigs had folded into the Republican Party in the North, this impacted politics.

The GOP of this period, and all the way through World War One, is an interesting mix of views that are sometimes difficult to reconcile. Basically, however, the GOP inherited the pro industry view of northern Whigs, while also having what we'd regard today as strong pro civil rights platform. The party was simultaneously radical and conservative, depending upon which aspect  of its politics you are looking at.  What this meant in practical terms, however, is that the party tended towards strongly supporting government support of business, while also being strongly supportive of individual rights.

The Civil War caused the fortunes of the Democratic Party to fall enormously, and the early history of Wyoming as well as most of the rest of the West was marked by the Republican Party being the dominant political party.  That party favored industry and it favored government support of industry, which directly impacted Wyoming.  The GOP favored retention of the public domain by the Federal government for direct claim by homesteaders and mineral entrants, something that the states had not done so generously. The GOP sponsored railroad through the granting land to them.  The GOP backed land grant universities. The GOP dominated the early political history of Wyoming, and it was both pro civil rights and pro business.  Wyoming, by extension, reflected those values, being remarkably progressive at least as to black residents and through also being a backer of women's rights in the context of the 19th Century. That latter movement, notably, had grown directly out of the the abolition movement.

The acceleration of the fortunes of industry during the war, and the decline of the Democratic party which had backed a more agrarian view of the economy, also meant that the entire country progressed into a more industrial era at a more rapid pace than it otherwise would have.  The region of the United States that remained resistant to that evolution remained the South, and as late as the 1930s the Southern Agrarians would push back against Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal with their manifesto I'll Take My Stand. That was well after the era we are discussing, of course, but it is the case that the fortunes of industry advanced remarkably for at least a couple of decades after the Civil War, during that same period of time during which the  Wyoming Territory was created, and Wyoming became a state.  Wyoming itself did not participate in heavy industry, but almost from its onset as a territory, in spite of it being primarily agricultural, it looked towards mineral development very favorably, and that mineral development could only have taken place in the context of a large national industrial economy.

Also in the context of politics, Wyoming's early political history featured many individuals who had been Union soldiers during the Civil War.  Francis E. Warren provides a prominent example, as he not only had been a Civil War era solider, he had been  a recipient of the Congressional Medal of Honor.  Not too surprisingly, almost all of the Wyoming's early politicians were immigrants to the state, and a fair number of those men had served in the Union's forces during the war.  Confederates were notably absent in this category.

 

Francis E. Warren wearing his Congressional Medal of Honor.

All this goes, in part, to the fact that the settlement of Wyoming and its obtaining of statehood in 1890 is itself a direct byproduct of the war.  Without the cattle industry's expansion in the 1880s, which really started in Texas in the late 1860s, it just wouldn't have happened in the same manner or nearly so quickly.  If pre war trends had continued, its hard to see the same event taking place in 1890, and foreseeing a different future in which statehood came about in the 20th Century is more likely.  Indeed, Wyoming itself wasn't recognized as a territory until 1868, and its doubtful that would have occurred at the same pace, if at all.  The Indian Wars of the 1860s and 1870s probably wouldn't have occurred as well, and it's possible that Indian fortunes would have played out more favorably than they did.

 

Ft. Caspar Cemetery.

Wyoming Fact and Fiction: Milton Sublette--The Lost Mountain Man.

Milton Sublette--The Lost Mountain Man.

December 25. Christmas

Today is Christmas Day

This day remains the most popular holiday in the Western World, and much of the rest of the world, in spite of the inroads of commercialization, the return of the seven day a week workweek, and the blathering of commercial entertainment, which offers up, in this season, such pathetic offerings as the televised seasonal stupidity of Chevy Chase and other such alleged comedic attempts.  May you all have a Merry and Joyous Christmas, in the true sense of the words and in keeping with the true meaning of the holiday.

In terms of history, in recent years it is often claimed that the December 25 date was chosen by the Church for Christ's Mass as it would override existing Pagan feast days, but this is a myth.  The most common claim involves Sol Invictus, but the problem with this assertion is that the earliest recording of that Pagan day being celebrated on December 25 comes from the year 354, and even that is unclear as to whether the day was honoring "The Unconquerable Sun" or something else.  There are claims for earlier dates in the 270s, but the record doesn't support a clear date until 354, to the extent that date is even clear.  The earliest indication of  Christians celebrating the Birth of Christ on December 25 comes from 206, over a century and a half earlier, and in a form suggesting that the date was generally accepted, which would indicate it having been established for some time.  Some will cite to 336 as the year in which the date was established, but this fails to acknowledge that the 336 date reflects a recorded Christ's Mass, when earlier Christian writings were noting that the December 25 date for Christ's birth.  Even the 336 date doesn't reflect the establishment of the date as a Christian Holy Day, but rather notes a Mass being celebrated for the Holy Day.

Another claim is that it overrides the date for a festival committed to Saturnus, but in fact that event occurred earlier in December, lasted several days, and was over by December 23.

1866 Portugee Phillips arrives at Ft. Laramie after a harrowing several day ride from besieged Ft. Phil Kearny. Contrary to myth, Phillips did not make the entire ride alone, but had other civilian volunteers in his company except for the very last section of the ride.  Their mission was essentially complete when they arrived at Horseshoe Station, where news of the Fetterman defeat was telegraphed to Omaha.  But Phillips went on alone, an additional hours ride, to bring the telegram and news to Ft. Laramie, arriving at 11:00 p.m. as a party was going on in Old Bedlam, the bachelor's officers quarters, which his arrival interrupted and made somber.  Phillips was given the gift of a fine horse by Company F of the 2nd Cavalry for his efforts.

1882  First recorded turkey dinner in Wyoming takes place at Ft. McKinney.

1917   Mexican Raid on Brite's Ranch, Texas. December 25-26, 1917.
 

On this day in 1917 Mexican raiders attacked Brite's Ranch in Texas. This resulted in a two day running fight that ultimately involved the U.S. Army's 8th Cavalry, including motorized elements of the same.

 Brite's Ranch in 1918, including small fort built on the location by the Texas Rangers for defensive purposes.

The Mexican forces responsible for the raid were never clearly identified.  Villistas were logically suspected for the raid at first, and may well have been responsible. However, Carrazaistas came to also be suspected to have been involved. Whether or not they were has never been determined. At the same time it cannot helped but be noted that the border had become lawless and the raids that came out of Mexico in this time period did not necessarily have any political motive and some of them were simply armed criminal expeditions.  Some had mixed purposes.

The raid started at about dawn when a party of about 45 or so Mexican raiders rode into Brite's Ranch, which was not only a ranch headquarters but a small town as well.  Only one man, Sam Neill, the son of the ranch manager, was awake at the time but realizing what was happening he armed himself and engaged the raiders. This soon awakened others there and the fight expanded and went on for some time until the Mexican raiders captured two Mexican ranch hands and bargained for their lives for entry in to the general store, which was then granted to them.  As they were robbing the store, a postal carrier with two Mexican passengers arrived and all three of them were killed by the Mexican raiders, bringing the total deaths in the raid to four.

The Neill's were hosting a Christmas party that night and as a result as the hour for the party arrived guests began to arrive and this resulted in the resisting party being expanded and the alarm being spread.  The message was carried to Lucas Brite in Marfa by telephone and then to the 8th Cavalry and the local sheriff, who formed a joint posse and cavalry detachment that then drove the raiders back into Mexico.

The following day men of the 8th Cavalry, who had arrived at Brite's Range by automobile, borrowed horses from the ranch and launched a punitive raid into Mexico, hoping to catch the responsible parties.  They met with additional cavalrymen near the Rio Grande and a detachment of about 200 troopers entered Mexico. The cavalrymen caught up up with the raiders and engaged them near Pilares, killing about 29 of them and recovering some of the stolen property.

This story would not end here, unfortunately, as the events that were unleashed by the raid on Brite's Ranch inflamed feelings on the border and would lead to tragedy, as we will see in a later entry on our real time exploration of the Punitive Expedition and the events that preceded and followed it.

So, while all eyes were on France, things were getting tense again on the Mexican border.

 The Brite's Raid made the cover of the Casper Record in a not very Christmasy issue, along with something that would actually happen the next day rather than on Christmas Day.  Hooverize?

December 24

 Today is the day of the Christmas Vigil (Christmas Eve) in the Christian world.
 Aðfangadagskvöld, the day when the 13th and the last Yule Lad arrives to towns, in Iceland.
 Feast of the Seven Fishes in Italy.
 Jul in Denmark and Norway.
 Nochebuena in Spanish-speaking countries.

1809.  Christopher "Kit" Caron born in Kentucky.  Raised in Missouri, he would have an amazing career as a frontiersmen in the West, including Wyoming.  He is one of those fellows who seems to have been everywhere, and at the right time.

1814     The War of 1812 officially ended as the United States and Britain signed the Treaty of Ghent.  Fighting continued, as news in the 19th Century traveled slowly.

1826   The Eggnog Riot at the United States Military Academy begins that night, wrapping up the following morning.

1851     Fire devastated the Library of Congress destroying about 35,000 volumes.

1859  First known lighting of a Christmas Tree in Wyoming occurs, near Glenrock. Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society.

1868  A. J. Faulk, Territorial Governor of Dakota Territory, approved of act incorporating Cheyenne.

1922  Sunday, December 24, 1922. Christmas Eve, 1922.

Normally I post these matters in chronological order, oldest to newest, but I missed something here of interest, that being the death of Sgt. John Martin.

Sgt. Martin, circa 1904.

Martin was a career soldier in the U.S. Army who is remembered today as the 7th Cavalry trumpeter who was assigned by George A. Custer to deliver a message to Frederic Benteen, to the effect of:

Benteen.

Come On. Big Village. Be quick. Bring Packs.

P.S. Bring packs. W.W. Cooke

The message delivered to Benteen, from Custer, had been reduced to writing by Custer's adjacent, W. W. Cooke probably because Benteen didn't trust Martin to be able to accurately convey the message, given his heavy Italian accent.  Martin had been born Giovanni Martino.

Martino had started off in life roughly, being born in 1852 in Salerno and being delivered to an orphanage just days after his birth.  He served as a teenage drummer under Garibaldi, joining that revolutionary force at age 14.  He immigrated to the United States at age 21 and joined the U.S. Army, serving as a trumpeter.  He was temporarily detailed to Custer's command on the date of the fateful Little Big Horn battle, and therefore received the assignment that would take him away from disaster somewhat randomly.

He married an Irish immigrant in 1879, and together they had five children.  He served in the Spanish American War, and retired from the Army in 1904, having served the required number of years in order to qualify for a retirement at that time.  Note that this meant he'd served, at that time, thirty years.  Following that, his family operated a candy store in Baltimore.  In 1906, for reasons that are unclear, he relocated to Brooklyn, seemingly to be near one of his daughters, working as a ticket agent for the New York subway.  The relocation meant a separation from his wife, which has caused speculation as to the reasons for it, but he traveled back to Baltimore frequently.  That job wore him down, and he took a job as a watchman for the Navy Yard in 1915.  His sons followed his footsteps and entered the Army.

In December 1922 he was hit by a truck after work and died from his injuries on this day.

All in all, this presents an interesting look into the day.  Martin was an adult when he immigrated in 1873, and found work in an occupation that readily took in immigrants, the military, and doing what he had done in Garibaldi's forces before, acting as a musician.  His marriage was "mixed", of a sort, with the common denominator being that he and his wife were both Catholics.  In spite of retiring from the Military after long service, he continued to need to be employed, at jobs that at the time were physically demanding.

And of interest, when his life, long under the circumstances, was cut short, he was a veteran of Little Big Horn living during the jazz age.

1944   All beef products are again being rationed. New quotas are introduced for most other commodities as well.

1983  Recluse Wyoming sees -51F.  Echeta, -54F.

December 21

Today is the Winter Solstice, the shortest day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere.

1620     The Mayflower voyagers went ashore for the first time at present-day Plymouth, Mass.  

1866  A force principally comprised of Sioux lures a force principally made up of post Civil War recruits, commanded by William Fetterman, into an ambush outside of Ft. Phil Kearny.  Fetterman was arrogant in regards to his opinions of his abilities and that of his green troops and insubordinate to some degree in regards to his weak commander, Col. Carrington.  In the resulting battle Fetterman's entire command, 82 (including two civilians) are killed in the largest post Civil War military disaster of the Indian Wars up until Little Big Horn a decade later.  The battle also results in a type of siege around Ft. Phil Kearny, just a few miles from the battlefield, where the command buttons up as a result of the disaster.

Coming just a year after the carnage of the Civil War, the defeat, which was recognized as a military disaster at the time, nonetheless did not have the huge public impact that Custer's defeat a decade later in Montana would.  Indeed, while recognized as a disaster at the time, the Sioux victory would be a significant battle in Red Cloud's War, the only Plains Indian War won by the Indians.  

Like Little Big Horn, the battle has been subjected to continual reinterpretation, and has been nearly from the onset.  As a recent article in the Annals of Wyoming (Spring 2012) reveals there were "eyewitness" accounts that were fiction from day one, and Col. Carrington started receiving criticism from the onset.  As it turns out, conventional accounts of the battle remain the most accurate, with Carrington urging Fetterman not to go beyond the nearby ridge-line, and Fetterman ignoring that order.  Fetterman's contempt for his Indian foe that day would prove disasterous.

1916   The Cheyenne State Leader for December 21, 1916: Mexican raid into Arizona threatened.
 

The terrible fire at the Inter-Ocean was still very much in the news, but we also learned that there was concern over a potential raid into Arizona by some Mexican bands.  Of course, the Wyoming Tribune had reported on this yesterday.

President Wilson's peacemaking efforts also hit the news.

1927  Ed Cantrell, Wyoming lawman, born in Bloomington Indiana.

1933 A bill to introduce a state income tax failed. Attribution.  Wyoming State Historical Society.

1938  Construction on Seminoe  Dam was completed, bu the resulting reservoir would not start being filled until the Spring.

1941  $5,077 collected in Sheridan Wyoming war relief drive. Attribution.  Wyoming State Historical Society.

December 20

1803 The Louisiana Purchase was completed as the territory was formally transferred from France to the United States during ceremonies in New Orleans. The transfer actually technically also involved Spain, but only in some odd jurisdictional sense.  Much, but not all, of what would become Wyoming was thereby transferred to the United States, leaving approximately 1/3d of the state in the hands of Spain and a section of country near what is now Jackson's Hole in the Oregon Country belonging to the United Kingdom.

While the very early territorial jurisdictions pertaining to Wyoming are now largely forgotten, and while they were always a bit theoretical given the tenuous nature of actual pre Mexican War control over the territory, there have been six national flags that claimed Wyoming or parts of it, including Spain, France, the United Kingdom, Mexico, the Republic of Texas and the United States.  With the Louisiana Purchase, France's claim would be forever extinguished and the majority of what would become the state would belong to the United States.

1812     One of the dates claimed for the death of Sacajawea.  If correct, she would have died of an unknown illness at age 24 at Fort Manuel Lisa, where it is claimed that she and her husband Toussaint Charbonneau were living.  If correct, she left an infant girl, Lizette, there, and her son Jean-Baptiste was living in a boarding school while in the care of William Clark.  Subsequent records support that Charbonneau consented to Clark's adoption of Lizette the following year, although almost nothing is known about her subsequent fate.  Jean-Baptiste lived until age 61, having traveled widely and having figured in many interesting localities of the American West.

The 1812 death claim, however, is rejected by the Shoshone's, to which tribe she belonged, who maintain that she lived to be nearly 100 years old and died in 1884 at Ft. Washakie, Wyoming.  A grave site exists for her, based on the competing claim, in Ft. Washakie, the seat of government for the Wind River Reservation.  This claim holds that she left Charbonneau and ultimately married into the Comanche tribe, which is very closely related to the Shoshone tribe, ultimately returning to her native tribe This view was championed by  Grace Hebard who was discussed here several days ago, and it even presents an alternative history for her son, Jean Baptiste, and a second son Bazil.  It was later supported by the conclusions reached by Dr. Charles Eastman, a Sioux physician who was hired by the Bureau of Indian Affairs to research her fate.

While the Wyoming claim is not without supporting evidence, the better evidence would support her death outside of Wyoming at an early age.  The alternative thesis is highly romantic, which has provided the basis for criticism of Hebard's work.  The 1812 date, on the other hand, is undeniably sad, as much of Sacajawea's actual life was.  Based upon what is now known of her story, as well as the verifiable story of Jean-Baptiste Charbonneau, who had traveled in the US and Europe, and who had held public office in the United States, the Wyoming claim is seriously questionable.  That in turn leaves the question of the identify of the person buried at Ft. Washakie, who appears to have genuinely been married into the Comanche tribe, to have lived to an extremely old age, and to have lived a very interesting life, but that identity is unlikely to ever be known, or even looked into.

1886  Territorial Governor George Baxter resigned. He had only been in office for a month.  The West Point graduate and former U.S. Cavalryman's history was noted a few days ago, on the anniversary of his death.

1916   The Wyoming Trubine for December 20, 1916: Troops Rush to Forestall Border Raid (and a truly bizarre comparison made in the case of a Mexican American militia)
 

A story of a near raid in the Yuma era with a rather bizarre comparison between a claimed Mexican American militia and the KKK.   Apparently the authors there had taken their history from D. W. Griffith's Birth of a Nation rather than reality.

It's rather difficult, to say the least, to grasp a comparison between a Mexican militia of any kind and the KKK which wouldn't exactly be in the category of people sympathetic to Mexican Americans.  And it's even more difficult to see the KKK used as a favorable comparison.  Cheyenne had a not insignificant African American, Hispanic, and otherwise ethic population associated with the Union Pacific railroad and I imagine they weren't thrilled when they saw that article.

Apparently the "war babies" referred to in the headline were stocks that were associated with Great War production, which logically fell following the recent exchange of notes on peace. As we saw yesterday, the Allies weren't receptive to them, so I'd imagine they those stocks rose again.
1942  Sheridan's high school added a vocational preparatory class for essential work work.  Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society.

1945   Tire rationing in the U.S. ended.

2005   Wyoming commenced a somewhat controversial cloud-seeding research project with the intent to increase mountain snowpack.  Attribution:  On This Day .Com.

2010  The University of Wyoming puts Bruce Catton's papers on line. Catton was a well known historian of the Civil War.

December 8

1868  Crook County created out of portions of Albany and Laramie counties.

1869  Territorial Governor Campbell approved measures to ask Congress to establish a prison at Laramie and to acquire the location for the prison.  The prison still remains in Laramie but as a tourist site.  For a while in the late 20th Century it was used as the University of Wyoming's sheep barn.

1869 Louis Riel issues the Declaration of the People of Rupert's Land and the North West declaring that the sale to Canada of Rupert's Land without their consent entitles people to set up their own government. Riel's view is not without sympathy in Canada, including that of Militia Minister George-Etienne Cartier.  Nonetheless, events would soon lead to armed conflict in Canada.

Riel was a Metis, and in that era Metis traveled routinely into Wyoming.  There are even some who believe that there were some Metis in the Sioux camp during the Battle of the Little Big Horn, Montana.

The Declaration of the People of Rupert's Land and the North West stated:

Proclamation by the Provisional Government, Dec. 8, 1869.

Whereas, it is admitted by all men, as a fundamental principle, that the public authority commands the obedience and respect of its subjects. It is also admitted, that a people, when it has no Government, is free to adopt one form of Government, in preference to another, to give or to refuse allegiance to that which is proposed. In accordance with the above first principle the people of this country had obeyed and respected the authority to which the circumstances which surrounded its infancy compelled it to be subject.

A company of adventurers known as the "Hudson Bay Company," and invested with certain powers, granted by His Majesty (Charles II), established itself in Rupert's Land, and in the North-West Territory, for trading purposes only. This Company, consisting of many persons, required a certain constitution. But as there was a question of commerce only, their constitution was framed in reference thereto. Yet, since there was at that time no Government to see to the interest of a people already existing in the country, it became necessary for judicial affairs to have recourse to the officers of the Hudson Bay Company. This inaugurated that species of government which, slightly modified by subsequent circumstances, ruled this country up to recent date.

Whereas, that Government, thus accepted, was far from answering to the wants of the people, and became more and more so, as the population increased in numbers, and as the country was developed, and commerce extended, until the present day, when it commands a place amongst the colonies; and this people, ever actuated by the above-mentioned principles, had generously supported the aforesaid Government, and gave to it a faithful allegiance, when, contrary to the law of nations, in March, 1869, that said Government surrendered and transferred to Canada all the rights which it had, or pretended to have, in this Territory, by transactions with which the people were considered unworthy to be made acquainted.

And, whereas, it is also generally admitted that a people is at liberty to establish any form of government it may consider suited to its wants, as soon as the power to which it was subject abandons it, or attempts to subjugate it, without its consent to a foreign power; and maintain that no right can be transferred to such foreign power. Now, therefore, first, we, the representatives of the people, in Council assembled in Upper Fort Garry, on the 24th day of November, 1869, after having invoked the God of Nations, relying on these fundamental moral principles, solemnly declare, in the name of our constituents, and in our own names, before God and man, that, from the day on which the Government we had always respected abandoned us, by transferring to a strange power the sacred authority confided to it, the people of Rupert's Land and the North-West became free and exempt from all allegiance to the said Government. Second. That we refuse to recognize the authority of Canada, which pretends to have a right to coerce us, and impose upon us a despotic form of government still more contrary to our rights and interests as British subjects, than was that Government to which we had subjected our-selves, through necessity up to recent date. Thirdly. That, by sending an expedition on the 1st November, ult., charged to drive back Mr. William McDougall and his companions, coming in the name of Canada, to rule us with the rod of despotism, without previous notification to that effect, we have acted conformably to that sacred right which commands every citizen to offer energetic opposition to pre-vent this country from being enslaved. Fourth. That we continue, and shall continue, to oppose, with all our strength, the establishing of the 'Canadian authority in our country, under the announced form; and, in case of persistence on the part of the Canadian Government to enforce its obnoxious policy upon us by force of arms, we protest before-hand against such an unjust and unlawful course; and we declare the said Canadian Government responsible, before God and men, for the innumerable evils which may be caused by so unwarrantable a course. Be it known, therefore, to the world in general and to the Canadian Government in particular, that, as we have always heretofore successfully defended our country in frequent wars with the neighbouring tribes of Indians, who are now on friendly relations with us, we are firmly resolved in future, not less than in the past, to repel all invasions from whatsoever quarter they may come; and, further more, we do declare and proclaim, in the name of the people of Rupert's Land and the North-West, that we have, on the said 24th day of November, 1869, above mentioned, established a Provisional Government, and hold it to be the only and lawful authority now in existence in Rupert's Land and the North-West which claims the obedience and respect of the people; that, meanwhile, we hold our-selves in readiness to enter in such negotiations with the Canadian Government as may be favourable for the good government and prosperity of this people. In support of this declaration, relying on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge ourselves, on oath, our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor, to each other.

Issued at Fort Garry, this Eighth day of December, in the year of our Lord, One thousand eight hundred and sixty-nine.

John Bruce, Pres. Louis Riel, Sec.

1873  A bill was introduced in the Territorial Legislature to move the capital to Evanston.  Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society.

1875  Territorial Governor Thayer approves an act creating Pease County, which was later renamed Johnson County.

1902  USS Wyoming, BM-10, commissioned.

1941  The FBI warned Japanese residents of Rawlins to be discreet.

1941 Japan released its Declaration of War against the United States and the UK, which stated:

By the grace of Heaven, Emperor of Japan, seated on the throne occupied by the same dynasty from time immemorial, enjoin upon ye, Our loyal and brave subjects:

We hereby declare War on the United States of America and the British Empire. The men and officers of Our Army and Navy shall do their utmost in prosecuting the war. Our public servants of various departments shall perform faithfully and diligently their respective duties; the entire nation with a united will shall mobilize their total strength so that nothing will miscarry in the attainment of Our war aims.

To ensure the stability of East Asia and to contribute to world peace is the far-sighted policy which was formulated by Our Great Illustrious Imperial Grandsire and Our Great Imperial Sire succeeding Him, and which We lay constantly to heart. To cultivate friendship among nations and to enjoy prosperity in common with all nations, has always been the guiding principle of Our Empire's foreign policy. It has been truly unavoidable and far from Our wishes that Our Empire has been brought to cross swords with America and Britain. More than four years have passed since China, failing to comprehend the true intentions of Our Empire, and recklessly courting trouble, disturbed the peace of East Asia and compelled Our Empire to take up arms. Although there has been reestablished the National Government of China, with which Japan had effected neighborly intercourse and cooperation, the regime which has survived in Chungking, relying upon American and British protection, still continues its fratricidal opposition. Eager for the realization of their inordinate ambition to dominate the Orient, both America and Britain, giving support to the Chungking regime, have aggravated the disturbances in East Asia. Moreover these two Powers, inducing other countries to follow suit, increased military preparations on all sides of Our Empire to challenge Us. They have obstructed by every means Our peaceful commerce and finally resorted to a direct severance of economic relations, menacing gravely the existence of Our Empire. Patiently have We waited and long have We endured, in the hope that Our government might retrieve the situation in peace. But Our adversaries, showing not the least spirit of conciliation, have unduly delayed a settlement; and in the meantime they have intensified the economic and political pressure to compel thereby Our Empire to submission. This trend of affairs, would, if left unchecked, not only nullify Our Empire's efforts of many years for the sake of the stabilization of East Asia, but also endanger the very existence of Our nation. The situation being such as it is, Our Empire, for its existence and self-defense has no other recourse but to appeal to arms and to crush every obstacle in its path.

The hallowed spirits of Our Imperial Ancestors guarding Us from above, We rely upon the loyalty and courage of Our subjects in Our confident expectation that the task bequeathed by Our forefathers will be carried forward and that the sources of evil will be speedily eradicated and an enduring peace immutably established in East Asia, preserving thereby the glory of Our Empire.

In witness whereof, we have hereunto set our hand and caused the Grand Seal of the Empire to be affixed at the Imperial Palace, Tokyo, this seventh day of the 12th month of the 15th year of Shōwa, corresponding to the 2,602nd year from the accession to the throne of Emperor Jimmu.

 The UK declared war on Japan.

Sir,
On the evening of December 7th His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom learned that Japanese forces without previous warning either in the form of a declaration of war or of an ultimatum with a conditional declaration of war had attempted a landing on the coast of Malaya and bombed Singapore and Hong Kong.
In view of these wanton acts of unprovoked aggression committed in flagrant violation of International Law and particularly of Article I of the Third Hague Convention relative to the opening of hostilities, to which both Japan and the United Kingdom are parties, His Majesty's Ambassador at Tokyo has been instructed to inform the Imperial Japanese Government in the name of His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom that a state of war exists between our two countries.
I have the honour to be, with high consideration,

Sir,

Your obedient servant,

Winston S. Churchill

 The US declared war on Japan, with President Roosevelt declaring the following:

Mr. Vice President, Mr. Speaker, members of the Senate and the House of Representatives:
Yesterday, December 7, 1941 - a date which will live in infamy - the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan.

The United States was at peace with that nation, and, at the solicitation of Japan, was still in conversation with its government and its Emperor looking toward the maintenance of peace in the Pacific.

Indeed, one hour after Japanese air squadrons had commenced bombing in the American island of Oahu, the Japanese Ambassador to the United States and his colleague delivered to our Secretary of State a formal reply to a recent American message. And, while this reply stated that it seemed useless to continue the existing diplomatic negotiations, it contained no threat or hint of war or of armed attack.

It will be recorded that the distance of Hawaii from Japan makes it obvious that the attack was deliberately planned many days or even weeks ago. During the intervening time the Japanese Government has deliberately sought to deceive the United States by false statements and expressions of hope for continued peace.

The attack yesterday on the Hawaiian Islands has caused severe damage to American naval and military forces. I regret to tell you that very many American lives have been lost. In addition, American ships have been reported torpedoed on the high seas between San Francisco and Honolulu.

Yesterday the Japanese Government also launched an attack against Malaya.

Last night Japanese forces attacked Hong Kong.

Last night Japanese forces attacked Guam.

Last night Japanese forces attacked the Philippine Islands.

Last night the Japanese attacked Wake Island.

And this morning the Japanese attacked Midway Island.

Japan has therefore undertaken a surprise offensive extending throughout the Pacific area. The facts of yesterday and today speak for themselves. The people of the United States have already formed their opinions and well understand the implications to the very life and safety of our nation.

As Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy I have directed that all measures be taken for our defense, that always will our whole nation remember the character of the onslaught against us.

No matter how long it may take us to overcome this premeditated invasion, the American people, in their righteous might, will win through to absolute victory.

I believe that I interpret the will of the Congress and of the people when I assert that we will not only defend ourselves to the uttermost but will make it very certain that this form of treachery shall never again endanger us.

Hostilities exist. There is no blinking at the fact that our people, our territory and our interests are in grave danger.

With confidence in our armed forces, with the un-bounding determination of our people, we will gain the inevitable triumph. So help us God.

I ask that the Congress declare that since the unprovoked and dastardly attack by Japan on Sunday, December 7, 1941, a state of war has existed between the United States and the Japanese Empire.

1944 Bryant B. Brooks, governor from January 1905 to January 1911, died in Casper.  Brooks was a true pioneering figure in Wyoming, having come to the state in 1880 and having been, at first, a trapper and rancher.  He reflects a class that isn't often discussed, however, in early Western history in that he was well educated (but not a lawyer), having attended Business College in Chicago Illinois.  Nonetheless, he was only 19 years old at the time he moved to Wyoming.  He was highly energetic and was successful in ranching.  After his term in office expired he was also very active in the early oil industry and was partially responsible for the construction of one of Casper's first "skyscraper" buildings, the Oil Exchange Building, which was built in 1917, during one of the region's earliest oil booms, this one due to World War One. The building remains in use today, with its name having been changed to the Consolidated Royalty Building.

1953 President Eisenhower delivered his "Atoms for Peace" address to the UN.

1967  Artist Hans Kiebler died at his home in Dayton.

1972  4.1 magnitude earth quake felt in Theromopolis.  On the same day, Sheridan experiences a record low of -30F.