The 'Johnson County War,' also known as the 'War on Powder River' or 'Wyoming Civil War', was a
range war which took place in
Johnson County, Wyoming,
USA, in April 1892. It was a battle between small farmers and large, wealthy ranches in the
Powder River Country that culminated in a lengthy shootout between local farmers, a band of hired killers, and a
sheriff's posse, eventually requiring the intervention of the
U.S. Cavalry on the orders of the
President of the United States.
The events have since become a highly mythologized and symbolic story of the
Wild West, and variations of the storyline have served as the basis for numerous popular novels, films, and television shows.
Background
Violent conflict over land use has been a somewhat common occurrence in the development of the
American West, but was particularly prevalent during the late 1800s and early 1900s when large portions of the west were becoming settled by the American population for the first time. It is a period which
historian Richard Maxwell Brown has called the "Western Civil War of Incorporation"
[1] and of which the Johnson County War was part.
Ella Watson, lynched by wealthy ranchers in 1889 on dubious evidence for cattle rustling.
In the early days in
Wyoming, most of the land was in the public domain, open both to stockraising as
open range and to
homesteading. Large numbers of
cattle were turned loose on the open range by large
ranches, sometimes financed by
British and other investors.
Ranchers would hold a spring roundup where the cows and the calves belonging to each ranch were separated and the calves branded. Before the roundup, calves (especially orphan or stray calves) were sometimes surreptitiously branded, and thus taken. The large ranches aggressively defended against cattle
rustling by often forbiding their own employees from owning cattle and by
lynching (or threatening to lynch) suspect rustlers. Property and use rights were usually respected among big and small ranches based on who was first to settle the land and the size of the herd.
Jim Averell, Johnson County businessman. Lynched along Watson in 1889 for cattle rustling, though he owned no cattle.
Many of the large ranching outfits in Wyoming were organized as the
Wyoming Stock Growers Association (the WSGA) and gathered socially as the
Cheyenne Club in
Cheyenne, Wyoming. A primary function of the WSGA was to organize the cattle industry by scheduling roundups and cattle shipments.
[2]
Nevertheless, large ranching outfits would sometimes band together and use their power to monopolize large swaths of range land, preventing newcomers from settling the area.
The often uneasy relationship between larger, wealthier ranches and smaller ranch settlers became steadily worse after the poor winter of 1887-1888, when a series of blizzards and temperatures of 40-50 degrees below 0°
F had followed an extremely hot and dry summer.
[3] Thousands of cattle were lost and large companies began to aggressively appropriate land and control the flow and supply of water in this area. They justified these excesses on what was public land by using the catch-all allegation of rustling, and vigorously sought to exclude the smaller ranchers from participation in the annual roundup. With rustling in the area likely increasing due to the harsh grazing conditions, and with emotions running high, agents of the larger ranches killed several alleged rustlers from smaller farms. However, many were killed on dubious evidence or were simply found dead while the killers remained anonymous.
Frank M. Canton, who was the Sheriff of Johnson County in the early 1880's, and better known as a detective for the WSGA, was rumored behind many of the deaths.
The double lynching of innocents
Ella Watson and
Jim Averell took place in 1889, an event that enraged local residents. A number of dubious
lynchings of alleged rustlers took place in 1891.
A group of smaller Johnson County ranchers began to form their own Northern Wyoming Farmers and Stock Grower's Association (NWFSGA) to compete with the WSGA. The WSGA "blacklisted" the NWFSGA and told them to stop all operations, but the NWFSGA refused the powerful WSGA's orders to disband and instead made public their plans to hold their own roundup in the spring of 1892.
[4]
The war
Frank M. Canton, former Sheriff of Johnson County, was hired to lead the band of Texas killers.
The WSGA, under the direction of
Frank Walcott (WSGA Member and large
North Platte rancher), hired 28 gunmen from
Texas and organized an expedition of 50 men with the intention of eliminating alleged rustlers in Johnson County and break up the NWFSGA. To lead the expedition, the WSGA hired
Frank M. Canton, the former Johnson County Sheriff-turned-gunman. The group became known as "The Invaders", or alternately, "Walcott's Regulators".
The group organized in Cheyenne and proceeded by train to
Casper, Wyoming and then toward Johnson County on
horseback, cutting the
telegraph lines north of
Douglas, Wyoming in order to prevent an alarm. Canton and the skilled gunmen traveled ahead while a party of WSGA officials led by Walcott followed closely behind, accompanied by two
newspaper reporters whose lurid accounts later appeared in the eastern newspapers.
Nate Champion and the KC Ranch
The first target of the WSGA was
Nate Champion at the KC Ranch (name sake for today's town of Kaycee), a small rancher who was active in the efforts of small ranchers to organize a competing roundup. Four men were at the KC; two men who were evidently spending the night on their way through were captured as they emerged from the cabin to collect water at the nearby Powder River.; the third, Nick Ray, was shot and died a few hours later after making it back into the cabin. Champion was besieged inside the log cabin.
During the siege, Champion kept a poignant journal which contained a number of notes he wrote to friends while taking cover inside the cabin. "Boys, I feel pretty lonesome just now. I wish there was someone here with me so we could watch all sides at once." he wrote. The last journal entry read: "Well, they have just got through shelling the house like hail. I heard them splitting wood. I guess they are going to fire the house tonight. I think I will make a break when night comes, if alive. Shooting again. It's not night yet. The house is all fired. Goodbye, boys, if I never see you again."
[5].
With the house on fire, Nate Champion signed his journal entry and put the journal in his pocket before running from the back door with a six shooter in one hand and a knife in the other.
[5]. As he emerged he was gunned down by four different men and the invaders later pinned a note on Champion's bullet-riddled chest that read "Cattle Thieves Beware".
[4] [8]
Two passers-by noticed the ruckus and rode to
Buffalo (the
county seat of Johnson County), where the
sheriff raised a
posse of 200 men and set out for the KC.
The TA Ranch
A map of the TA Ranch during the Johnson County War. Depicts the positions of the Invaders, posse, and 6th Cavalry.
The WSGA force then headed north toward Buffalo to continue their show of force. The following day the posse led by the sheriff besieged the gunman WSGA force at the TA Ranch on
Crazy Woman Creek. After two days, one of the WSGA members escaped and was able to contact the acting Governor of Wyoming,
Amos W. Barber. Frantic efforts to save the WSGA group from the sheriff's posse ensued, and subsequent telegraphs to Washington resulted in intervention by the
President of the United States,
Benjamin Harrison. Harrison ordered the
Sixth Cavalry from
Fort McKinney near Buffalo to proceed to the TA ranch and take custody of the WSGA expedition, thus saving them from the sheriff's posse, just as the posse was preparing to set fire to the large log barn in which the expedition had taken shelter.
Barn at the TA Ranch, where the Invaders had been besieged by the posse.
The WSGA group was taken to Cheyenne to be held at the
Laramie County Jail, where they received very preferential treatment, and were allowed to roam the streets by day as long as they agreed to return to the jail to sleep at night. Evenutally, they were released on bail and were told to return to Wyoming for the trial. Many simply fled back to Texas and were never seen again. In the end the WSGA group went free after the charges were dropped on the excuse that Johnson County refused to pay for the costs of prosecution.
[9]
Aftermath
Emotions ran high for many years following the polarizing events of the so-called Johnson County Cattle War, as some viewed the large and wealthy ranchers as heroes who took justice into their own hands in order to defend their rights, while others saw the WSGA as heavy-handed villains intent on monopolizing what was public land.
Although many of the leaders of the WSGA's hired force, such as W. C. Irvine, were themselves Democrats, the ranchers who had hired the group were tied to the Republican party, and their opponents were mostly Democrats. Many viewed the rescue of the WSGA group at the order of President Harrison, a Republican, and the failure of the courts to prosecute them a serious political
scandal with overtones of a
class war. As a result of the scandal, the
Democratic Party became popular in Wyoming for a time, and Wyoming voted Democratic in the
1896 U.S. Presidential Election.
A longer economic legacy was that Johnson County was slower to develop economically than some other parts of the state as the shadow of the war and subsequent events created the view that the area was a volatile place to live.
The War In Popular culture
The Johnson County War, with its overtones of
class warfare, and intervention of the President of the United States to save the lives of a gang of hired killers and set them free, does not fit in well with the
American myth of the west. ''
The Virginian'', a seminal 1902 western novel, solved the problem by taking the side of the wealthy ranchers, creating a highly mythologized tale dealing with the themes of the Johnson County war but bearing little resemblance to the actual events. The novel was popular, striking a strong chord with the public and later made into no less than six film versions (in 1914, 1923, 1929, 1946, 1962, and 2000).
Though not explicitly connected with Johnson County,''The Ox-Bow Incident'' (1940), by Walter Van Tilburg Clark, is a novel that dramatizes and condemns a lynching of the sort that Wister's novel appears to defend.
Jack Schaefer's popular 1949 novel ''
Shane'' also dealt with the strong themes associated with the Johnson County War, but instead took the side of the settlers. The novel spawned both a film ''
Shane'' (1953) and a 17-episode
TV Series (1966).
The 1980 film ''
Heaven's Gate'' and a TV movie called ''The Johnson County War'' (2002) also painted the wealthy ranchers as the "bad guys." ''Heaven's Gate'' was a dramatic romance somewhat based on the historical events, while ''The Johnson County War'' was based on the 1957 novel ''
Riders of Judgment''. Yet another novel titled ''Riders of Judgment'' was released in 2001 that also depicts fictional events similar to that of the Johnson County Cattle War, except this ''Riders of Judgment'' was written by Robert Vaughn under the
pen name of the now deceased legendary western author
Ralph Compton .
In addition, numerous
western films and novels have been made that borrow small facets of the Johnson County War and combine them with otherwise invented storylines. One example is the 1970 film
The Cheyenne Social Club with depicts the Cheyenne Club as a brothel taken over by two Texans ultimately besieged by a throng of angry local ranchers.
The story of the Johnson County War from the point of view of the small ranchers was chronicled by
Kaycee resident
Chris LeDoux in his song ''Johnson County War'' on the 1989 album ''Powder River''. The song included references to the burning of the KC Ranch, the capture of the WCGA men, the intervention of the US Cavalry, and the release of the cattlemen and hired guns.
The Banditti of the Plains
In 1894, eyewitness
Asa Shinn Mercer published an indignant account of the war, titled ''
The Banditti of the Plains''. The book was effectively suppressed for many years, as the WSGA actively tracked down and destroyed all but a few of the
first edition copies from 1894 printing, and was rumored to have hijacked and destroyed the second printing as it was being shipped from a printer north of
Denver, Colorado [10]. The book was later successfully reprinted several times during the
20th Century.
See also
★
Kaycee, Wyoming
★
Lincoln County War
References
1. Oxford University Press ''No Duty to Retreat Violence and Values in American History and Society by: Richard Maxwell Brown''''Product Description'' 1992
2. Burt, Nathaniel 1991 ''Wyoming'' Compass American Guides, Inc p.157
3. Burt, Nathaniel 1991 ''Wyoming'' Compass American Guides, Inc p.156
4. Burt, Nathaniel 1991 ''Wyoming'' Compass American Guides, Inc p.159
5.
Trachtman, Paul ''The Gunfighters'' Time-Life Books 1974 p. 212
6.
Trachtman, Paul ''The Gunfighters'' Time-Life Books 1974 p. 212
7. Burt, Nathaniel 1991 ''Wyoming'' Compass American Guides, Inc p.159
8. Meyers, Sue ''Commemorating the 'Johnson County War' ''Casper Star-Tribune'' April 9th, 2007
9. Burt, Nathaniel 1991 ''Wyoming'' Compass American Guides, Inc p.160
10. Homsher, Lola M. ''Archives of the Wyoming Stock Growers' Association'' The Mississippi Valley Historical Review, Vol. 33, No. 2. (Sep., 1946), pp. 281.
External links
★
Photographs and a brief account of Johnson County War
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