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[Illustration: Very truly yours

  Robt Vaughn (handwritten dedication and signature)
]




  THEN AND NOW;

  OR,

  Thirty-Six Years in the Rockies.

  Personal Reminiscences of Some of the First Pioneers
  of the State of Montana.


  INDIANS AND INDIAN WARS.

  The Past and Present of the Rocky Mountain Country.
  1864-1900.


  BY
  ROBERT VAUGHN.


  MINNEAPOLIS:
  TRIBUNE PRINTING COMPANY.
  1900.




  COPYRIGHTED, 1900.

  BY
  ARVONIA ELIZABETH VAUGHN.




DEDICATION.


  ARVONIA ELIZABETH VAUGHN,
      Great Falls, Montana.

  MY DEAR LITTLE DAUGHTER:

The following series of letters, which include a short history of
Montana’s early days, together with a brief sketch of your father’s
life and a copy of my letter to you, giving an obituary of your dear
mother, I dedicate to you, knowing that they will be appreciated, and
hoping that you will have the pleasure of reading them after I am gone.

        Your affectionate father,
            ROBERT VAUGHN.

  Great Falls, Montana, May 15th, 1900.




PREFACE.


It may not be out of place to explain how this book came to find its
way into print. It was written for my little daughter, in the form of
letters at various times, and not intended for publication, but many
friends after reading them insisted that they should be published. One
said: “You must not wait until you are dead before these letters are
given to the world.”

As my desire is, by the grace of God, to live many years yet, I now
present these letters to the reader, supplemented by others from old
time friends who braved the perils and dangers of pioneer life; and as
they are intended to be a part of the history of this great state, care
has been taken to keep strictly to the truth.

It is hoped that a line here and there will be appreciated by those
who ride in palace cars as well as the old pioneers who came west in
prairie schooners.

            ROBERT VAUGHN.




CONTENTS.


                                                                    Page

    From Home to the State of Illinois,                               17

    Crossing the Plains,                                              22

    On a Stampede to the Yellowstone,                                 35

    The Discovery of Alder Creek, the Richest Gold Gulch on the
        Globe,                                                        39

    The James Stuart Prospecting Party,                               46

    From Alder Gulch to Last Chance,                                  57

    From the Mines to the Farm,                                       64

    A Letter to My Little Babe,                                       72

    From the Farm to the City of Great Falls,                         77

    Montana Pioneers,                                                 84

    The Dark Side of the Life of the Pioneer,                         89

    The Indian Praying,                                              103

    Indians Stealing my Horses,                                      106

    The Great Sun River Stampede,                                    109

    A Trip from Virginia City to the Head of Navigation on the
        Missouri River in 1866,                                      113

    My First Buffalo Hunt,                                           124

    Tom Campbell Running the Gauntlet,                               127

    Edward A. Lewis’ Early Days in Montana,                          130

    A Brave Piegan War Chief,                                        141

    Bloody Battles and Tragedies in the Sun River Valley,            147

    Charles Choquette Coming to Montana in 1843,                     163

    A Trip to the Twenty-eight Mile Spring Station,                  171

    John Largent’s Early Days in Montana,                            176

    A Visit to Fort Benton,                                          188

    John D. Brown, a Narrative of his Early Experiences in the
        West,                                                        201

    A Pioneer Minister,                                              216

    An old Letter,                                                   223

    Warren C. Gillette’s Early Experiences in Montana,               229

    A Meal in an Indian Camp,                                        245

    The First Settlement of What is now Montana,                     247

    Montana Then and Now,                                            266

    A Sample of the Pioneers of Montana,                             275

    The Indian,                                                      288

    The Sioux War,                                                   297

    General Sherman’s Letters,                                       329

    The Nez Perces War,                                              345

    An English Tribute to the American Scout,                        367

    Returning of Sitting Bull from Canada,                           370

    The Indian Messiah and the Ghost Dance,                          377

    An Indian Legend,                                                395

    The Roundup,                                                     403

    Traveling “Then” and Traveling “Now,”                            410

    Yellowstone National Park,                                       422

    From the Prospector’s Hole to the Greatest Mining Camp on
        Earth,                                                       447




ILLUSTRATIONS.


                                                                    Page

    Robert Vaughn,                                                     6

    Leaving Home,                                                     19

    My First View of the Rockies,                                     28

    An Indian Grave,                                                  31

    In the Rockies,                                                   32

    Nature’s Grand Masonry Work,                                      33

    Indian War Dance,                                                 42

    A Prairie Schooner Crossing the Plains,                           59

    A Scene in the City of Helena,                                    61

    Great Falls, Montana,                                             78

    Copper Smelter at Great Falls,                                    80

    Lewis and Clark Meeting the Mandan Indians,                       81

    A Group of Pioneers, in front of Old Court House, Helena,         85

    Mrs. James Blood (a Piegan woman),                               111

    Freighting in the Early Days,                                    115

    Indians Hunting Buffalo,                                         126

    Wolf Voice (Gros Ventres),                                       139

    The Piegans Laying their Plans to Steal Horses from the
        Crows,                                                       143

    Going Home with the Stolen Horses,                               145

    Father De Smet,                                                  149

    Little Plume, (Piegan Chief),                                    153

    Alone in the Rockies,                                            166

    The Mule and Mountain Howitzer,                                  195

    Indians with Travois,                                            197

    “Then,” Buffaloes; “Now,” Cattle,                                199

    “Then,” Deer; “Now,” Sheep,                                      200

    Rev. W. W. Van Orsdel,                                           217

    A Mountaineer in his Buckskin Sunday Suit,                       226

    Indian Camp,                                                     246

    General George Crook,                                            299

    General George A. Custer,                                        305

    Colonel William F. Cody (Buffalo Bill),                          309

    Rain-in-the-face (Sioux War Chief),                              323

    A Crow Scout (winter costume),                                   325

    General Sherman,                                                 331

    General Miles,                                                   362

    Chief Joseph (Nez Perces),                                       363

    Robert S. S. Baden-Powell,                                       368

    Sitting Bull (Sioux Chief),                                      373

    Agency Indians having their pictures taken,                      387

    Cree Manuscript,                                                 390

    Mo-See-Ma-Ma-Mos (Young Boy), a Cree Indian,                     391

    Cree Alphabet,                                                   392

    Little Bear (Cree Chief),                                        393

    Roping a Steer to Examine the Brand,                             403

    St. Ignatius Mission Stock Brand,                                404

    Pioneer Cattle Company’s Brand,                                  404

    The Roundup--Turning Out in the Morning,                         406

    First Attempt at Roping,                                         408

    Lake McDonald,                                                   412

    In the Rockies on the Great Northern Railway,                    414

    Gate of the Mountains, Montana Central Ry.,                      420

    Old Faithful Geyser, Yellowstone Park,                           428

    Mammoth Hot Springs, Yellowstone Park,                           432

    Castle Geyser, Cone and Diana’s Pool, Yellowstone Park,          433

    Norris Geyser Basin, Yellowstone Park,                           435

    Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone,                                 438

    Quartz Mining at Niehart, Montana,                               456




THEN AND NOW;

OR,

THIRTY-SIX YEARS IN THE ROCKIES.




FROM HOME TO THE STATE OF ILLINOIS.


I was born in Wales June 5, 1836, and was reared on a farm until I
was nineteen years old. My parents’ names were Edward and Elizabeth
Vaughan. There were six children--Jane, Hugh, Robert, Edward, John and
Mary. Edward lives in the old home at the present time. His address is:
“Dugoed Bach, Dinas Mowddwy, Mereoneth Sheir, G. B.”

My parents were of good family; by that I mean they and their ancestors
were good Christian people, father and mother were members of the
Episcopal Church. Father was a warden as long as I can remember. Mother
was my only teacher. She taught me to obey, to tell the truth, to be
kind, to respect others, and above all to fear God.

I left home when I was between nineteen and twenty. At this time I
could speak but the Welsh language. I had a great desire to learn to
acquire English; therefore I went to Liverpool, where sister Jane
lived. I secured employment from the Hon. Benjamin Haywood Jones
to work in a flower garden at his beautiful home on the West Derby
Road. He was a rich banker in the city. I remained there over a
year. Brother Hugh had gone to America a year before I left home,
locating near Rome, N. Y. In the fall of 1858, instead of going home
as I intended, I concluded that it would be a good idea for me to go
to America and see my brother; then return in four or five months.
So, without the knowledge of my parents, I took passage on board a
steamship named the “Vigo” bound for New York. I was on the ocean
twelve days and a half. As soon as I landed I wrote home and stated
what I had done, and that I would be back home in four or five months,
and at that time it was my honest intention to do so. From New York
City I went to my brother’s, and stayed with him about three months;
then I went to Palmyra, Ohio, to see Aunt Ann, my father’s sister.
I was right at home now, and my father was satisfied since I was in
the care of his sister. I was there over a year, going thence to
Youngstown, Ohio, where I worked for Joshua Davies on a farm, and in
the coal mines. From here I proceeded to McLean county, Illinois, where
my brother had been for two years. I farmed with him one summer, then I
went to Fairbury, Livingston county, and mined coal until 1864. During
all this time I wrote home regularly and received letters in return.
Instead of going home I was continually getting further from it.
Somehow I could not resist the desire of venturing into the unsettled
regions of the West. I kept drifting further and further until I found
myself in the heart of the Rocky mountains, six thousand miles from
home.

[Illustration: LEAVING HOME.]

In this way forty-one years elapsed since I left my childhood home,
but the picture remains in my memory as though it were but yesterday;
everything appears to me as it was the last time I saw it. The house
still seems the same; the ivy creeping up its walls; the sycamore,
alder, birch and spruce trees stand there like sentries guarding it.
The rose bushes and the evergreens in front, the hollies where the
sparrows huddled together at night, the orchard and the old stone barn;
and I imagine that--

  “I see the quiet fields around,
    I stroll about as one who dreams;
  ’Til each familiar place is found,
    How strangely sweet to me it seems.

  “The old and well known paths are there,
    My youthful feet so often pressed;
  Gone is the weight of manhood’s care,
    And in its place a sense of rest.

  “The broad expanse before me lies,
    Checked here and there with squares of green;
  Where, freshly growing crops arise,
    And browner places intervene.”

I see the dancing rill flowing by the garden gate, and the great arch
of white thorn overspanning the passage way that led to the main road.
There my mother embraced and kissed me and bade me good-bye for the
last time. Here my “only teacher” gave me her last instruction, it was
this: “My dear son, be careful in selecting your companions to go out
with in the evenings. God be with you, good-bye.”

  Oh, how sweetly her voice fell on my listening ear,
  And now, I imagine those soft words I hear;
  If I ever view her silent grave,
  My tears will flow like tidal wave.

There she stood staring at her wandering boy leaving home. We watched
one another until a curve in the road took me out of sight; that was
the last time I saw my mother. Father came with me about a quarter of a
mile. We spoke but very little; we were both very sad. Suddenly father
turned to me and took me by the hand and said: “Well, my son, fare thee
well, be a good boy.” I was weeping bitterly and after I had gone a
little way I looked back and saw father leaning against a gate which
led to the meadow, with both hands on his face; this caused my tears to
flow faster than ever. I shall always believe that father was praying
for me then. And that was the last time I saw him. Father and mother
are now sleeping in the silent tomb. But in my memory they appear like
statues as I saw them last, and that was forty-one years ago. Mother
standing at the gate with tears in her eyes waving the kind and tender
hand that soothed and fondled me when I was a babe, and father leaning
on that rude gate with his face buried in his hands offering a prayer
in my behalf. Nothing can efface that vision from my memory. Mother
more than once said in her letters to me that she always remembered me
in her prayers. I often think that I might not have fared so well and
perhaps be a worse man than I am, were it not for the prayers of my
father and mother.

            ROBERT VAUGHN.

  Great Falls, Mont., March 20, 1898.




CROSSING THE PLAINS.


I left Fairbury, Livingston county, Illinois, March 4, 1864, in company
with James Gibb, John Jackson, James Martin, and Sam Dempster and wife,
destined for the new gold fields in Idaho, for the Territory of Montana
had not then been created.

Our mode of traveling was with a four-horse team and a farm wagon. A
great portion of Illinois and Iowa was then but sparsely settled; we
would travel for hours without seeing any signs of habitation. The
roads were very bad through those states; and it took us twenty-five
days to come to Council Bluffs, which was then but a small frontier
settlement. An old man, one of the inhabitants of the place, called my
attention to two small hills on the bluff above the village and said:
“It was there General Fremont, with his men, held a council before
crossing the river to traverse the plains to California, and from this
incident the town derives its name.” We crossed the Missouri on a
ferry boat. Omaha had scarcely twelve hundred people. Here we made up
a train of sixty-five wagons, some drawn by oxen. It was a mixed train
as far as the destination was concerned. Some were going to California,
Oregon, Washington, and Salt Lake, but mostly to the new gold diggings
in Idaho. We were to travel together as far as Utah.

Our trail was on the north side of the North Platte river as far as
Fort Laramie, following most of the way the surveying stakes on the
line of the Union Pacific Railway. For several hundred miles, while
we traveled in the Platte river valley, we passed over fine land for
agriculture. Here we met a great many Indians of the Pawnee tribe, but
all appeared to be friendly. I was approached by one of them, who came
and asked me to give him some coffee; he was over six feet tall, and
had a very large bow and arrows. I made a mark on a big cottonwood tree
and stepped off fifty paces and told him if he put an arrow in that
mark I would give him some coffee. At once he began sending his arrows,
every one piercing the tree about two inches in depth, and the fourth
one into the center of the mark. I gave him his coffee. On another
occasion I put my hat on a bunch of sage brush for two Indian boys to
shoot at for a piece of bread; the next thing I knew there was an arrow
through my hat. Several days, when traveling in this valley, not a
stick of timber of any kind could be had; the only fuel we could obtain
was buffalo chips which were abundant.

The mail carrier told us that after passing a place called “Pawnee
Swamp,” which was about fifty miles west of Fort Kearney, we would be
in the Cheyenne and Sioux country, and that those Indians were very
hostile to the whites. It was two days after we crossed this line
before we saw an Indian. The third morning at day break, when I was
on guard, I discovered one from a distance who was coming towards our
camp. I kept watching him; finally he came to me and spoke, at the
same time making signs; of course I did not understand either. While
going on with his gibberish and making those motions with his hands he
stepped up and patted me on the breast and on my vest pocket. I told
him in plain English that he was getting a little too familiar for a
stranger, and to keep away from me. Then he picked up a stem of some
dried weed about the size of a match and scratched it on a stone as a
person would when lighting a match. This convinced me that he wanted
some matches. I gave him half a dozen and he thanked me, or at least I
thought he did, for he gave a kind of grunt with a faint smile and went
back in the direction he came from.

In the afternoon of the same day we crossed a small creek; on its bank
there was a newly made grave in which a young woman twenty-two years of
age had been laid to rest. At the head of the grave, for a head-board,
a round stick, which had been used at one time for a picket pin, was
placed, and on this some unskilled hand had written with a pencil
“In memory of ----,” the name I could not decipher, but the words
“dear daughter” were plainly written, which indicated that there was
a parent present to kiss her marble brow before it was lowered into
the silent tomb. This instance made a deep impression on me then when
viewing that lonely grave in the heart of the wilderness and thinking
of its occupant, who possibly was once the center star in some lovable
family, but was left there alone in her earthen couch to sleep and rest
forever; and when, on the coming of spring, no one would be there to
even pluck wild flowers and lay them on the grave of the unfortunate
young traveler. What more sorrowful sight could there be than
witnessing those parents leaving that sacred spot before continuing
their westward journey, and, when on that ridge, taking the last look
at the little mound by the winding brook in the valley below? Here the
curtain drops on this pitiful scene; the emigrant train is out of sight
and all is over.

At Fort Laramie we met the noted frontiersman, John Bozeman, after whom
the city of Bozeman, Montana, was named. He sought to organize a train
to take a cut-off route east of the Big Horn mountains. There was also
a man by the name of McKnight, who was a trader at this place. He had
two wagons loaded with goods for Alder Gulch, each wagon being drawn by
four fine mules, and he was getting up a train to go west of the Big
Horn mountains and through the Wind River country. McKnight said to me
that he wanted about one hundred wagons and about five hundred good,
resolute, determined men and they would get through all right. I told
him that there were five of us, and that we would accompany him. There
were scores of wagons passing Laramie every day and most of them were
bound for the new gold diggings.

The first day we got twenty wagons to join the McKnight train, and
we pulled out about a quarter of a mile in the direction we were to
travel. This new camp was a kind of “refinery;” here one and all might
consider the perils, dangers and privations likely to be encountered.
The faint-hearted ones took the safer route by way of the South Pass.
However, in a few days we had four hundred and fifty men and over one
hundred wagons. We were aware that we were going to travel through
several hundred miles of an untrodden wilderness, where Red Cloud and
Sitting Bull reigned over twenty or twenty-five thousand savages, so
it was very necessary for us to be well armed