SEPTEMBER 2023 Ghost Towns and History of Montana Newsletter From The Madisonian, Sept. 17, 1903 Death Pursued Broadwater in His Ride from Bannack to Deer Lodge City in 1864 Accessed via: montananewspapers.org From The Glacier County Chief Newspaper, Feb. 25, 1938 Carson Lake, reporter for the New York Press, in 1890, had the following story as related to him about Charles A. Broadwater, uncle of Tom Marlow of Helena, and one of Montana's early millionaires. In the Gilsey House corridor a few days ago I met Col. C. A. Broadwater about whom I had heard a most exciting pioneer incident when I was in Montana last year. Colonel Broadwater is a pioneer Montanan and is wealthy. He is president of a railroad, proprietor of a famous natatorium near Helena and the owner of famous mines and cattle ranges. He is short and stout. In his younger days he must have been very athletic. Banished From Bannack The story is about a happening in the early ’60’s. Bannack City, the first capital had been overrun by a gang of desperadoes- A vigilance committee was organized. It hanged some and banished others. Two of the banished were Moore and Reeves. Broadwater and a young man named Pemberton (Judge W.Y. Pemberton of later days) had gone into the Deer Lodge valley where mining was going on, and had begun platting what is now Deer Lodge. One day Moore and Reeves arrived in the Deer Lodge locality and made their camp beside the Deer Lodge river in a clump of willows. They had no protection from the weather but their blankets. Their only food was beef washed down by coffee. Moore took sick. He had mountain fever (mountain fever was identified by its effect. If the patient recovered it was typhoid. If he died it was mountain fever). Broadwater, with the characteristic generosity of the old west, had Moore removed to a cabin and supplied him with food and medicine. He recover
P a g e 2 G h o s t T o w n s a n d H i s t o r y o f M o n t a n a N e w s l e t t e r ed in time to learn that Bannack had just rescinded the edict of banishment against himself and Reeves and that they were at liberty to return. Moore’s horse had been stolen while he was ill. Broadwater gave him another and promptly forgot all about him. Became Cattle Man Broadwater went from real estate and mining into the cattle industry. He bought beef in Deer Lodge and sold it in Bannack at a big profit. Payment was always in gold dust. On one deal he made $6,000. He was about the leave Bannack with his sack of dust when Moore suddenly turned up. He told Broadwater privately that there was a band of road agents at Bannack, with Sheriff Plummer at their head, and that they were planning to waylay Broadwater and rob and also possibly kill him. Moore, it seems, was a member of the road agent gang but this he kept secret. Photo by Jolene Ewert-Hintz Photo by Jolene Ewert-Hintz Moore further advised Broadwater to slip out of Bannack quietly and not to tell even his most intimate friend the hour of his leaving. Broadwater accepted the advice. He started for Deer Lodge early in the evening and rode until 3 a.m. Then he laid down to rest. The horse was tied to his wrist with a lariat. The horse awakened him with its snorts about daybreak—in time for him to see an Indian creeping toward him. He shot the Indian who, however, was able to run away. He resumed his journey. Ives and Cooper After traveling 20 miles he came upon two men seated by a campfire. They were George Ives and John Cooper. Both were doomed to be hanged, later on, by the Vigilantes for their many crimes. They were surprised to see him. Their behavior impressed him with the belief that they had been sent out to waylay him but had not expected him so soon. Their horses were grazing about two or three miles away from the fire along the foothills. They hailed him and urged him to wait for them. There were road agents along the way, they said. It would be better for the three to ride together. Broadwater pretended to consent. But, he said, since his horse couldn’t keep up with theirs he had better keep on riding; they would have no trouble in overtaking him. He further allayed their suspicions by dismounting within eye shot of them to lead his horse up a little hill. But as soon as he was out of sight he rode “hell for leather” for the second crossing of the river where the French squawman, Contway, was living with his Indian wife. It was the nearest shelter. It was a race for life.
P a g e 3 G h o s t T o w n s a n d H i s t o r y o f M o n t a n a N e w s l e t t e r After 10 miles, Colonel Broadwater says, his horse began to tire. He looked behind him to see a cloud of dust about three miles away that was being raised by Ives and Cooper in hot pursuit. With a tired horse and 30 pounds of gold strapped to his waist he was under a terrible handicap. But he pounded onward. He reached Contway’s doorway with Ives and Cooper only 50 yards behind him. Ives pretended to Contway that he and Broadwater were having a race. Broadwater fell in with the pretense. Ives and Cooper decided to stop all night at Contway’s. Broadwater was forced by circumstances to do likewise. Broadwater took advantage of an opportunity to tell Contway the facts and to purchase one of the Frenchman's fleet horses privately. Under the arrangement the Frenchman was to saddle the horse –one of his fleetest—and Contway owned some fine horses, and bring it to the door on pretense that he, himself, was going to hunt for cattle. Broadwater was to notice the horse, admire it and mount it “to see how it behaved" with an eye to a possible purchase. The program was carried out with Ives and Cooper looking idly on. Their mounts were staked out on the prairie. When Broadwater found himself in the saddle he exclaimed: “I’ll keep him and pay you for him later, Contway. I must be on my way." “I have witnesses that you promised to pay.” the Frenchman said, after pretending to make an attempt to dissuade Broadwater from leaving until “the horse is paid for.” Ives and Cooper tried to persuade him to wait for them. "It isn't fair to ride off and leave us." they urged. But Broadwater said he had “business in Deer Lodge” and dashed away. He rode 20 miles without stopping—from the Frenchman’s ranch to Deer Lodge. He found on checking up that he had ridden 107 miles in 18 hours including stops—from Bannack to Deer Lodge. -Accessed via: https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/ Mary Fields. Also known as "Stagecoach Mary" or "Black Mary", Mary Fields was born into slavery in 1832 in Tennessee. Gaining her freedom after the Civil war, she worked as a chambermaid on the steamboat Robert E. Lee. In the 1870's, Mary began working at the Ursuline Convent in Toledo, Ohio with Mother Mary Amadeus as acting superior. Amadeus traveled to Montana to establish St. Peter's Mission west of what would become Cascade. When Amadeus fell ill, Mary hurried to Montana to nurse her back to health. Even after Amadeus was well again, Mary stayed on to work at the convent. She handled the stage, hauled and protected goods, washed clothes and tended to the chickens. But, because of her routine habits of drinking, swearing, fighting and gunplay, the bishop asked Mary to leave the convent in 1894. In 1895, Mary secured a contract to deliver mail between the convent and Cascade, a fifteen mile journey. Because of her reliability and speed, she earned the nickname "Stagecoach Mary". At 6 feet tall and 200 pounds, Mary was known as one of the toughest women in Montana history. She passed away in Great Falls, Montana in 1914. Photo by Jolene Ewert-Hintz
P a g e 4 GLEANINGS FROM A SENIOR’S DIARY -This appeared in the Monmal (Dillon, MT), May 1, 1918 G h o s t T o w n s a n d H i s t o r y o f M o n t a n a N e w s l e t t e r At last we’re in the Highlands. Joy! what a day this has been. We started at five o ’clock this morning with a team and light wagon loaded down with bedding and eats, plus five healthy individuals and the “Family Skeleton.’’ Yes, it was a heavy load, but we had two saddle horses to assist. We had a profound sympathy for the poor horses; consequently we spent much of our time walking up mountains. We shall never forget that wonderful spring we passed on the road. To us, overheated as we were, it seemed the most refreshing drink we ever had. This is a most beautiful place. Huge pine-clad mountains surround our camp. We can see a snow bank on the highest peak. We have made our beds of spicy pine needles under the limbs of two towering pines. A small cabin stands near by, but we have shunned its dark recesses. Our horses are hobbled and are roaming about through the darkness, nibbling grass. Skidoo, the Family Skeleton, is the limit. He rushes out and barks at the darkness, making us think there are wild animals about. Fran keeps asking Mickey, her small, twelve year old brother, why he brought that pesky dog along. We’re going to wait for the moon to come up, because we are afraid to put our fire out until we get some other kind of light. At last the moon is rising over the mountain. The darkness is disappearing rapidly; and we can go to bed, feeling safe from harm, with a trusty ax and a rusty shovel within Fran’s reach. I’ll have to write some more tonight to tell about our bed. We’ve made it over three times in order to keep from running our feet out into the pine needles. September 5: Last night was fine. After a long time we all managed to go to sleep. This morning the sun woke us up at an unearthly hour. We crawled out of our warm beds, and dashed, with quilts wrapped around us, to the creek. In we jumped, leaving our garments on the bank. Such blood curdling yells! That water almost made frozen images of us. Was ever such a breakfast! Sallie made about forty hot cakes apiece, while we cooked eggs, prepared the wild gooseberries we had gathered the night before, and made coffee. Believe me! Gooseberries and hot cakes are delicious. As we were sitting at our crooked table, balancing ourselves on tottering benches, Ann and I heard a queer buzzing sound. “A bee!” cried Ann, and we both jumped up, scattering all obstructions to the four winds, and took to the tall timber. ‘‘Oh, come on back,” Sallie called, ‘‘Bees won’t hurt you if you leave them alone ” We finally sneaked back to the table. Those bees! They just stuck around our camp all the time. Ann and I had some time trying to dodge them. We would get nicely seated when along would come those bees. Over would go our benches, taking with them Sallie, Fran, and Mickey, who shouted loud protests at such treatment. However, we did succeed in eating our share of the breakfast between
P a g e 5 G h o s t T o w n s a n d H i s t o r y o f M o n t a n a N e w s l e t t e r jumps. In the afternoon we went for a long hike up a pretty mountain road. We left a kettle of beans cooking on the stove. When we got back our fire was out. Someone had raided our camp for eats. The unknown person had left the cover off the bean-kettle; and the bees had taken possession. Fran, the brave, lifted the kettle; but she had taken only a few steps when she gave a loud shriek, dropped the kettle, and ran to the stream. A bee had stung her! N. B. Don’t mention bees to Fran. It is evening now, and we are sitting around the fire singing and telling stories and fortunes. The Family Skeleton still barks. He is afraid of his own shadow but seems to think he could protect us if his protection were needed. He is no taller than a good- sized cat and much skinnier. His hair is short and white, and he has a poor excuse for a tail. But what he lacks in tail he makes up in voice. The impressive stillness of the night holds one in thrall. Nothing but the rush of the water in Roaring Brook can be heard. This only adds to the charm. Now and then we think we can see gleaming eyes a few feet away from us, and our imaginations succeed in making our hearts work double duty. We have put our fire our carefully, and Fran is hunting for the weapons to put at the head of the bed. It is quite cool these September nights. It is great to sleep out in the open with nothing but the sky and twinkling stars for a roof. September 7: This is our last evening. We had a delightful time today. We had already explored everything but Roaring Brook, and this morning we took a lunch and started out to find its source. We tried climbing up the steep mountains; but the trees and underbrush were so thick that we soon had to take to the rocks in the stream. These were not much better, They were large and slippery with pretty green moss. We were forced to crawl over them much of the time to keep from slipping off into the stream. We each took a turn at falling into the water. Even Skidoo, in leaping for another rock, tumbled into the swift little current, which almost carried him down stream. Our hearts were so touched at the sight of his struggling that Mickey waded in and rescued the yelping canine. We climbed for about three hours but seemed no nearer the source of Roaring Brook; so we called a halt and ate our lunch. As we were eating, threatening clouds began to pass over our heads; and soon it commenced to rain. The big pines sheltered us very well as we climbed over rocks and slid down the mountain side on pine needles. Nevertheless, we were drenched when we reached camp; but we were soon dried by a good campfire. September 8: We got tired waiting for the moon last night and went to bed in the dark. We had been asleep for some time when we heard Fran yelling, “ Mickey, get up! There’s a forest fire.” This startling announcement brought us all to a sitting posture. Sure enough we could see a huge blazing fire on the mountains to the southeast. It took a long time to get Mickey out of bed, but he finally crawled from under the covers. He slept with all his clothes on and, consequently, was the
P a g e 6 G h o s t T o w n s a n d H i s t o r y o f M o n t a n a N e w s l e t t e r only one prepared to investigate. He went out into the open and climbed a tree. A few minutes later he came running back. He looked at us disgustedly. “You poor fish! It’s only the moon,” said he, as he rolled up once more in his covers. It did not take us long to follow suit. A rapid exit from the canyon by the light of a forest fire did not appeal to any of us. It was with a feeling of absolute safety and peace that we finally closed our eyes as we saw our terrible forest fire rise majestically above the haze of the mountains.— Ruth Harding., Accessed via: http://montananewspapers.org/ Chastine Humphrey The first boy born in Butte, Chastine Humphrey, was born April 16, 1868, in a three-room log cabin beneath the shade of a fir tree – the only tree in the townsite of Butte. The cabin stood on West Quartz Street at the later site of the Maryland Boarding House, which was located at 21 West Quartz, the parking lot immediately west of the Fire Station, today’s Archives building. Chastine Humphrey, Sr., the boy’s father, laid out the townsite of Butte in 1866. The senior Humphrey’s brother, Oliver, passed through the Butte area in the early 1860s but ultimately settled in Helena. He wrote to his brother encouraging him to come to Montana, and in late 1864, Chastine, his wife and daughter (later Mrs. Nell O’Donnell of Walkerville) arrived in Butte. Mrs. Humphrey was reportedly the first woman in Butte. These cabins and the tree were on the first block of West Quartz Street, where the old fire station (Butte Archives) stands today. The main cabin and tree were just west of the fire station, in today's parking lot. All these buildings are gone today. All but the left-most of the row of three cabins were gone by 1901. Of the cluster of cabins Humphrey built, only one was still standing in 1901, just east of the then new fire station. That log cabin served as a barn and stable for Gilmore & Salisbury’s stage coach horses. Further east, another small cabin had been built by Ben Kingsbury. The 3-story Kingsbury Block was built about 1887 on the northwest corner of Quartz and Main, where it stood until it was demolished in the Model Cities program in 1969-70. Furthest east, probably the cabin in the lower left corner in the image above, William Matthews and Bryan Irvine shared the space. Matthews committed suicide by jumping from a window at the Insane Asylum at Warm Springs. Irvine was still in Butte 30 years after the date of the image above (circa 1868), living at 643 West Granite Street in 1895. Other residents in the 1860s in this block included A.W. Barnard, on the south side of the street. The story went that when W.A. Clark first came to Butte, he spent his first night here in Barnard’s cabin. Barnard, like Kingsbury, became quite wealthy, and built the Barnard Block on the site of his original cabin.
P a g e 7 G h o s t T o w n s a n d H i s t o r y o f M o n t a n a N e w s l e t t e r The tree that sheltered the Humphrey house, the last one in the area, finally “yielded to the axe and fell like the gallant soldier on the field of battle, after all hope had gone.” The Humphreys burned the wood in their fireplace and kitchen stove. Chas Humphrey, the son, took a job with the Butte Miner newspaper in 1879, at age 12. He eventually became a member of the International Typographical Union, working until automated machines – Mergenthalers – replaced him in 1895. He continued in the printing profession including typesetting for the Jefferson County Zephyr, in Whitehall. Chastine Humphrey, Jr. died of pneumonia January 12, 1901, only 32 years old. The Humphreys are buried in Mount Moriah Cemetery. On the occasion of Chas’s death, his sister Nell O’Donnell recounted the locations of the Humphrey cabins on West Quartz. “Our house stood where the Maryland House now stands [i.e., the lot immediately west of the Archives building today]. It has been said that it stood upon the site of the new fire station. It is true a house belonging to father stood on the fire station site, but we did not live in it. The old tree stood on the slope almost where the kitchen of the Maryland house stands. [i.e., near the alley, just west of the northwest corner of the Archives building].” The photo below is from 1875 and shows the Humphrey cabin and the tree at far right. Beneath it is the same photo, annotated to show buildings and Main Street. -By Richard I. Gibson Primary resource: Anaconda Standard, January 27, 1901. Also Sanborn maps and city directories. See also this post about the first house in Butte, on East Quartz St. See also The Story of Butte, special issue of The Butte Bystander for April 15, 1897. Images of Butte in 1875 from A Brief History of Butte, Montana: the World's Greatest Mining Camp, by Harry C. Freeman, 1900, digitized by Butte Public Library, annotations by Gibson. Richard Gibson is a geologist. His career has ranged from analyzing kidney stones to 35 years in oil exploration. Butte's history, architecture, and people captured his interest like he thought nothing could, and have expanded his life significantly. He’s still passionate about geology, but now he’s passionate about Butte, too. His book "What Things Are Made Of" came out in March 2011; his writing blog focuses on it. The Butte History blog contains interesting stories discovered in Butte, Montana, which are documented in "Lost Butte, Montana," from The History Press. Check out more great stories from Richard by visiting his sites: http://buttehistory.blogspot.com/ http://butte-anacondanhld.blogspot.com/ https://www.verdigrisproject.org/butte-americas-story
P a g e 8 G h o s t T o w n s a n d H i s t o r y o f M o n t a n a N e w s l e t t e r Driving the Golden Spike The most visible art in the Montana State Capitol attests to the importance of the arrival of the Northern Pacific Railroad. Driving the Golden Spike commemorates the great event that took place at Gold Creek on September 8, 1883, marking the completion of the last section of track across the vast stretches of the state. Amédée Joullin, Driving the Golden Spike, 1903. Oil on canvas, 183" x 90". Grand Stairway While Governor Joseph Toole oversaw the subjects of the Capitol’s other art, the Northern Pacific insisted upon the right to dictate the subject matter and the people depicted in this painting. Railroad officials chose as the artist Amédée Joullin, who earned his credentials as an artist at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts and the Académie Julian in Paris. Finished in 1903, the oil on canvas was unveiled first in California and subsequently mounted in its place of honor at the top of the grand stairway beneath the stained glass barrel vault in the Capitol. It is indeed impressive in its place of honor. In consultation with railroad officials, Joullin drew on photographs of the event and portraits of the participants to create the mural. Former President Ulysses S. Grant holds the sledgehammer while Northern Pacific president Henry Villard looks on. A delegation of Crow Indians, whose land the railroad crossed, includes Chief Iron Bull. Generic onlookers include soldiers, cowboys, miners, and railroad men. Absent, however, are those who actually did the work laying the tracks across Montana: the Irish, the Chinese, and other laborers. The golden spike used in the ceremony was not actually gold at all but a working iron spike that reputedly was used to begin the transcontinental project in Minnesota in 1872. –Ellen Baumler Ellen Baumler is an award-winning author and Montana historian. A master at linking history with modern-day supernatural events, Ellen's true stories have delighted audiences across the state. She lives in Helena in a century-old house with her husband, Mark, and its resident spirits. To view and purchase Ellen’s books, visit: http://ellenbaumler.blogspot.com/p/my-books.html This view shows the Last Spike ceremony on which Joullin's painting is based. Photo by F. Jay Haynes. Montana Historical Society Photograph Archives, H-984 My/Donor Information: SUBSCRIBE TO THE GHOST TOWNS AND HISTORY OF MONTANA NEWSLETTER! Renewal? Y/N Send a Gift to: NAME____________________________________ NAME___________________________________ ADDRESS__________________________________ ADDRESS_________________________________ CITY______________________________________ CITY_____________________________________ STATE__________________ZIP________________STATE_________________ ZIP________________ Yearly subscriptions are $19.95 (published monthly). Please make checks payable to Ghost Towns & History of MT, LLC and send with this clipping to P.O. Box 932 Anaconda, MT 59711
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