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By DENNIS FARRELL I was a little over twenty-two years of
age when I reached Leavenworth, Kansas, with the full
intention of crossing the plains to California. I was slight
of build but large in ambition, and, while I am not brave, I
dared to go anywhere I felt like going. I was out to rough
it, and hired to the government as one to help take six
hundred head of horses to the different military posts
between Leavenworth and Fort Laramie. We started on the 30th
of April, 1865. There was a long rope fastened to the tongue
of a wagon and stretching forward, and to this rope were
tied one hundred horses by their bridles, with five men
riders, one at the head of the line, three in the swings,
and one on the wheel horse. |
that they had to be shot. Our military escort of cavalrymen and some of our own men followed, but failed to recover a large number of them. At the first alarm some one yelled, "Lie on your face!" and so I did, expecting every instant to be crushed by the horses or killed by flying picket pins. This was the only incident of note until we reached Julesburg, as Fort Sedgwick was then called, and I stopped at this place. The string of horses with which I was detailed was turned over to the commandant of that post. I found employment in the quartermaster's department under Captain Westbrook. In the fall I left the government employ and bought out old Sam Watt's interest in the eating house which was a part of the ranch he kept in the military camp at Julesburg. Sam Watt was also postmaster. He was a Missourian, about fifty years old, and well posted on frontier life. He was about fifty years of age then; he told me about the old Frenchman, Jules, and how he was attacked and killed by the Indians and the ranch set on fire. Old Jules' ranch was about a mile and a half below or east of the fort proper, but inside of the four-miles circuit. The story of the cattlemen wearing his ears as watch guards is manufactured out of whole cloth, as there were no cattlemen on the plains at that time; there were nothing but bull-whackers, wagon-masters or mule-drivers. Sam Watt knew Jules personally, and I regret that I cannot recall, at this interesting period, some of the things he told me. In reading "The Great Salt Lake Trail" I find illustrations1 purporting to be Old Julesburg 1Fort Sedgwick was established May 19, 1864, as Camp Rankin, but was not constructed until September of that year when, on the 27th, it was christened Fort Sedgwick by the war department. The post was situated on the south side of the South Platte river, about a mile west of Julesburg. In 1867 the name was transferred to the station on the Union Pacific railroad situated, not opposite old Julesburg, but a little more than three miles farther east and on the north side of the river. |
when, in fact, they are a picture of Jack Hughes' (of the firm of Hughes & Bissell of Denver) Julesburg of 1865 and 1866. Hughes had a contract with the government to furnish so many hundred cords of wood. Old Julesburg did not have any frame houses, but one can see in the picture two of the old adobe houses. Old Julesburg was on the south side of the Platte, and when the railroad builders reached a point opposite with their track, they called their town New Julesburg, and, in order to sell lots, they advertised the great improvements they were going to make there at once. Captain Westbrook, quartermaster of the post, was a Californian. He was succeeded by Captain Neill, a West Point soldier from Pennsylvania. While keeping this eating place at the fort, I boarded some of the officers and occasionally served transient meals Lieutenant General William T. Sherman, writing from Fort Laramie, August 31, 1866, said that Fort Sedgwick "is sometimes called Julesburg, by reason of a few adobe houses called by that name, three miles from the post." (House Executive Documents 39th Congress, 2d Session, v. 6, doc. 23, p. 9.) This statement indicates that the site of old Julesburg had been abandoned and the name applied to the place which became a station on the Union Pacific railroad the next year. The first buildings for Fort Sedgwick were constructed of sod by Company F of the Seventh Iowa regiment, under Captain Nicholas J. O'Brien. Captain P. W. Neill was of the Eighteenth U. S. infantry, then in the Division of the Missouri, and the next year, under the reorganization, in the Department of the Platte. Captain Eugene F. Ware describes the manner of constructing the first buildings in his History of the Indian War of 1864, page 326. Lieutenant General William T. Sherman, writing from Fort Sedgwick, August 24, 1866, said: "The post was first built of sod, and now looks like hovels in which a negro would not go". (House Executive Documents 39th Congress, 2d Session, p. 6.) Jules was not killed by Indians, but by Jack Slade, a desperado, at his ranch near O'Fallon's Bluff. It is said that Slade shot off one of Jule's ears and wore it as a memento. This brutal incident is related in detail in the history of Nebraska, volume 2, page 180, note; and in "The Great Salt Lake Trail", p. 205. The pictures alluded to by Mr. Farrell are in the book last named, page 162. Captain Royal L. Westbrook was in the volunteer service. He was appointed assistant quartermaster from California in 1863. It does not appear that Captain Neill was in the quartermaster service.--ED. |
to the passengers in the overland stages at two dollars per meal. This would seem high, but flour cost twenty-five dollars for a fifty-pound bag, and other necessaries were equally high. I remember the battle with the Indians nine miles west of the fort, near Ackerly's ranch. Two women were brought to the fort and placed in the hospital tent, where they were cared for. It was said one woman was scalped, and whether they lived or died I cannot say, but the reports of the hospital would show. I remember that one morning, about ten o'clock, the Indians made a great dash through the grounds of the fort, below on the Platte river; and for a time all was excitement with rumors that the fort was attacked. New rules were made at the fort that no private business should be carried on within the four-miles limit; therefore old Sam Watt, myself and others had to go. The reason for this was that Adams, Green & Co. became the sutlers at the fort. That was in the summer of 1866. While at the fort I built a ranch on the main road to Fort Laramie, twenty-two miles up Lodgepole Creek. This ranch was on the west side of the valley and close to a dry creek, that in the spring used to fill up and become a large stream. It drained a large valley directly back of my ranch in a northwesterly direction and nearly at right angles to Lodgepole Creek valley. Here the history of my settlement, or intended settlement in Nebraska begins. By some my ranch was called "Farrell's Ranch" and by others the "Twenty-two Mile Ranch". Most of the time at the ranch life was monotonous; then, again, wagon trains used to stop there and make things quite lively. This section of your state at that time had few ranchmen and no settlers. In the first place, the Indians would make it too uncomfortable for anyone who tried to make a home there, as the Cheyenne wanted it for their hunting grounds, and it was pretty good for that use at that time. They had to go only |
ten miles east or west to find plenty of antelopes and buffaloes. Farther northeast[?], toward Cheyenne, in the timber section, there were deer and moose. At the ranch we had no trouble in getting antelopes, as they used to show themselves on the bluffs on either side of the valley. One afternoon, about the last of August, 1866, I was riding on an Indian pony from my ranch to Julesburg. At a point about nine miles from Julesburg, as it was getting dark, I was traveling south, the creek at my left and the bluffs at my right, when suddenly my pony's head turned west toward the bluffs and his ears shot backward and forward very excitedly. He kept this up for quite a while and then began to increase his speed and tried to leave the road, making toward the bluffs. I looked in the direction that he was trying to go and saw what I thought was a band of Indians looming up on the crest of the bluff and riding parallel to my course, in the same direction. It seemed to me a race for life, and I desperately dug the spurs into the pony's flanks. I had a great struggle to keep him on the road. He seemed to want to go to the Indians, as I supposed because he was a real Indian pony. Soon my Indians left the bluffs and were heading me off, still gaining on me and getting closer to the road. I had hoped to beat them, but it was of no use. I then began to think of turning back as there seemed to be about a mile between us; just at this time they had reached the road and were crossing it and to my great relief and astonishment I discovered they were a herd of antelopes going down to the creek to water. I was almost paralyzed from excitement and exhaustion. There were three ranches between Julesburg and the divide--the point where the road left Lodgepole Creek and turned north toward the Platte or Mud Springs; there was one ranch at Mud Springs. The first ranch was twelve miles from Julesburg. It was a temporary affair, made of |
lumber, and did not last long. I cannot. recall the ranchman's name. My ranch was next, twenty-two miles from Julesburg; the next fifteen miles farther on, and Mud Springs was next to that. The ranch next beyond mine was kept by a Frenchman named Louis Rouillet (?) and Jim Pringle. They did a very large business. They afterward left the ranch and moved to Sidney Station, on the Union Pacific railroad, situated a few miles up the valley. The ranch at Mud Springs was kept by a man named James McArdle, who did a very good business. The last time I saw him he was starting for Texas. My ranch was built of sod. It was about 15x18 feet, and the walls were three feet thick. It had a rear and a front door and three windows, one on either side of the front door and the other on the south side, looking down the road. These windows were built like portholes, bevelled off on two sides and bottom, and each had two small panes of glass. I had heavy double battened doors, and the roof was of sod laid on poles. I began an addition to the ranch house, in the rear, which I never finished, but used it as a stable for my mules and ponies. On my way from California, twenty-four years ago, from the car windows I saw the walls of the ranch still standing. My two brothers lived with me at the ranch. I had quite a number of men working for me from time to time, making hay in summer and cutting wood in winter. I remember that the names of four of them were, Dickenson, Wiley, Tibbets, and Walden, but always called "blueskin". He was about sixty-five years of age. He drove a stage to and from Chillicothe, Ohio, before there were any railroads at that town. Tobacco juice was always running down his protruding chin. He was a peculiar character and chewed and swore by note. I also had a colored man, Dick Turner, who was very faithful and trustworthy. He went west |
with Captain Greene to Fort Laramie and was on his way back to the states when I got him. In the summer of 1866 1 cut and put up about twenty tons of hay. It was not of a very good quality. Some of it I used myself and some of it I sold, but most of it was overrun by freighters' cattle in the storms of the winter of 1866-67; some of the wagon masters would pay me a little for the hay they took and others nothing. There was an officer at the fort who, while he was supposed to be giving all his time to the government, did a little private business with a cattle train. I will not mention his name. His cattle not only used my hay in a big storm, in March, 1867, but destroyed what might have been used by myself; his wagon master gave me a receipt for the hay, but the gallant officer refused to pay. I brought suit in Julesburg, catching him over from the fort with his light wagon and tried to put a lien on it, but the lawyers discovered that there was no jurisdiction in such cases in that part of the territory, so I lost the claim. I mention this to show what law-abiding citizens there were in those good old days. In 1867 I cut and put up about fifty tons of hay and put it in two ricks, one of thirty, and the other of twenty tons. The larger rick was burned. In the summer of 1867, the men were making hay on the west side of the creek when the Indians made a dash down on them, but as the Indians had been seen before they left the bluffs and were delayed by high water in the creek, the men got away safely. Another day Dick, the colored man, was down fishing and before he discovered them the Indians were almost upon him, but on the other side of the creek. He ran so fast to the ranch that he dropped at the door and could hardly speak. Dick's steel trap down at the creek caught an otter by the hind leg and he would not be led or driven. |
Every time Dick pulled him the otter made a dive for Dick and they kept up the game until they got to the ranch, and it seemed as though Dick was the worst used up of the two. We caught a coyote in the trap, and we thought we could tame him. We had made a house for him, but after keeping him several months we found he was just as wild as the day we caught him, so let him go. I got up one morning, early, as we had been annoyed all night by coyotes; we thought there were about a thousand of them, but, to our surprise, I found only two or three. I shot at them with my old musket, wounding one of them so badly that he had to drag his hind legs after him. He started to run up the cañon, and, thinking that a blow of the gun would kill him, I followed him nearly a mile as fast as I could run when he stopped and faced around to fight me. I was so exhausted that I could not raise my gun, so I made up my mind to let him go. I was attacked several times by the Indians, usually very early in the morning. According to the New York Herald "the Farrell Ranch was burned and they were killed and scalped". I came very near being killed one day while alone at the ranch. A half dozen Cheyenne, led by Chief White Eye, marched in without ceremony. They were somewhat friendly at first. The chief sat on the counter near a show case and demanded sugar and coffee and a silk handkerchief and other trinkets, and I got a pair of moccasins in exchange. The others wanted whisky. I had a loaded gun outside the counter, and one of the Indians picked it up and pointed it at me; but I lifted the lid of the counter and went out and took the gun from him, which made him very angry. Another of them caught a mouse and brought it over and put it under my nose, ordering me in broken English to eat it. By this time they were getting very ugly and demanded whisky. Two of |
them started out of the back door to look around. I reached behind the counter and picked up my sixteen-shooter Henry rifle and leveled it at the fellow who put the mouse under my nose. He backed out of the door, and then I waved the chief to go after him. After a good deal of grunting he left. When outside, they mounted, yelled, shot at the ranch, whooped and rode away. Generals Sherman and Myers, while on their way to Fort Laramie (I cannot remember the date)2 went into camp just north of the ranch. General Sherman came to the ranch with his quartermaster and asked me if he could see the proprietor. I said, "You want to see me, General?" "No", he said, "I don't want to see you, I want to see the proprietor of the ranch". "But", I said, "I own this ranch". "You!" he said, "You! Why where did you come from?" I said, "I came from New York". "What, a New York boy out here keeping a ranch! Well! Well!" He got what he wanted. I had fifty cords of wood cut at Lawrence's Fork the winter of 1866-67 and when attempting to haul some of it my two hundred dollar mule was taken by the Indians (?) I suspect they were white Indians in uniform going to Fort Laramie. As the driver heard that the Indians were coming, he took to a place of safety and when he came out 2 General Sherman started from Fort Sedgwick to Fort Laramie on the 25th of August, 1866, and, at the rate he traveled, must have passed Farrell's ranch that day. (House Executive Documents, 39th Congress, 2d Session, Doc. 23, P. 7.) Brevet Brigadier General William Myers, was quartermaster of the department of the Platte. A letter from the war department to the editor, under date of January 19, 1914, says: "It does not appear from the records of this office that any of the companies of either the 13th or 18th regiment United States infantry, was stationed at Fort Sedgwick, Colorado, during any part of the year 1865, nor does it appear that Captain P. W. Neill, 18th Infantry, or that an officer named Royal L. Westbrook, was stationed at that fort in that year. Royal L. Westbrook was not an officer in the Regular Army. Nothing has been found of record to show for whom the fort referred to was first named."--ED. |
he found the mule had been unhitched, and afterwards he learned that some of Uncle Sam's Indians had passed. I do not now recall the exact date of the Plum Creek massacre3 when they scalped Mr. Thompson, who, a few years ago sent his dried scalp from Australia to your society. A story of this incident in the New York Herald, copied from a paper in your city, recalled it to my mind, and I wrote to the editor of the Lincoln paper to strengthen the accuracy of the account, as I was on the train on which this man was taken to Omaha. I was permitted, with a few others, to go into the car where he lay. The man in charge of him raised a cloth from his head and allowed us to look at it. He lay motionless, as though dead, and I was always under the impression that he was dead until I read the Herald's article. I was on my way to Omaha to buy goods for my ranch. I dealt with Will R. King & Co., large wholesale merchants. The ranchmen from Mud Springs went down a few days ahead of me. We had our goods shipped to the end of the Union Pacific railroad, and there we loaded our teams. We traveled up the north side of the South Platte, but waited long enough to get a number of teams together to form a corral, as the Indians were ugly at that time. At the end of the second day's drive we went into camp, forming a close corral. Everything was very quiet, we had finished our supper and it was growing dark when, suddenly, the horses began to be very restless, 3 "Plum Creek Massacre" should be confined to the tragedy near Plum Creek station which was an incident of the Indian outbreak of August 7, 1864. This station was on the old Oregon and California road, about a mile west of the mouth of the creek. It is said that eleven emigrants were massacred there. On the seventh of August, 1867, Indians attacked a freight train on the Union Pacific railroad, about six miles west of the new Plum Creek station, now called Lexington. This station is situated about three miles west and six miles north of the old station and on the opposite--north--side of the Platte river. According to contemporary reports, the Indians killed four men and destroyed ten cars and their contents. Thompson's scalp was deposited in the Omaha public library. --ED. |
then to strain at their halters. We looked in the same direction they did and saw a band of Indians dashing down from the bluffs, waving red blankets and yelling as loud as they could. It seemed not more than five minutes before they were upon us. We grabbed our guns and rushed for cover--some into, and others under the wagons. The Indians dropped onto the off side of their ponies and rode so fast that it was next to impossible for us to hit them. They answered our fire mostly with bow and arrow. After a while, when it was quite dark, they rode away, as, probably, they were uncertain of our numbers. They scared us badly, for we thought they were some of the same band that committed the massacre at Plum Creek. When the Union Pacific road reached Julesburg the camp followers moved up with it and the bad element was increased by others of the same kind from below. The town was filled with gambling houses, and tough men and women from "Bitter Creek", as they used to say. At one time a telegraph operator sent up a notice from Julesburg that he and his friends were coming up to the ranch to clean me out, but they failed to come. At another time a young Pennsylvanian became crazed with Julesburg liquor and when he reached the ranch he wanted to run everybody and everything. I objected to the new manager, and then he grabbed the weights from the counter and let them fly at me, one after another. He next pulled a little pocket revolver, rushed at me and pressed it against my forehead; but just at that moment some one struck him and he fell to the floor, and then some of his friends took him out of the ranch. These were some of the little pleasantries of frontier ranching. In the fall of 1867, having left the ranch for lack of business, I moved down near the creek and near the hay which I afterwards sold at twelve dollars a ton to Captain 18 |
O'Brien. From there I moved to the Black Hills, between Laramie City and Cheyenne, where I stayed all winter. This ended my stay in Nebraska. I tried to file a government claim to the land on the bottom in front of the ranch, but it was only a squatter's right, and I never went any further in the matter. I served in the army from 1861 to 1863. |
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