William A Allen - Adventures with Indians and Game: Twenty Years in the Rocky Mountains

First Skyhorse Publishing edition 2016

All rights to any and all materials in copyright owned by the publisher are strictly reserved by the publisher. All inquiries should be addressed to Skyhorse Publishing, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018.

Skyhorse Publishing books may be purchased in bulk at special discounts for sales promotion, corporate gifts, fund-raising, or educational purposes. Special editions can also be created to specifications. For details, contact the Special Sales Department, Skyhorse Publishing, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018 or info@skyhorsepublishing.com.

Skyhorse and Skyhorse Publishing are registered trademarks of Skyhorse Publishing, Inc., a Delaware corporation.

Visit our website at www.skyhorsepublishing.com.

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.

Cover design by Richard Rossiter

Print ISBN: 978-1-63450-439-3
Ebook ISBN: 978-1-5107-0030-7

Printed in the United States of America

TO MY MOTHER ,

who first took me afield, I dedicate this record of an out-of-doors life. In the earlier days, as I approached home, I would lilt some song to let her know of my safe return. Let this book now be my tribute to her as she closes a beautiful life, whose words and deeds have instilled into my own life whatever has been shown as noble and manly.

This fascinating narrative, which the publishers experience much pleasure in offering to the public, has come forth as the result of years of loving participation in hunt, in Indian fighting, and in nature studies, by Dr. W. A. Allen, a typical old time Westerner, who, for over a quarter of a century, has taken part in the wild life of the West, being in the early days the trusted leader of immigration, a keen enjoyer of the sports of the chase, a crack rifle shot, who won and successfully maintained an enviable record as an Indian fighter of bravery and distinction.

This volume will be welcomed by lovers of nature and nature studies for its scientific value in the portrayal of natural history; by the old-timers of Montana and Wyoming for its lifelike retrospect of the days when every man held his life in his own hand, and peril lurked on the bank of every stream, glanced out from every mountain side and lay in wait everywhere amid the rich grasses of the plains; by all lovers of their country, true Americans, for the light it throws upon the flora and fauna of the primitive prairies and mountains, and for its minute descriptions of the different animals that were once the occupants of this then strange, mysterious, unknown country, since that time wrested from savage domination for the establishment of civilization by that class of tireless, brave and heroic pioneers, of which the author is a notable example.

An attempt to narrate, even in epitome, the incidents which have characterized the life of this Montana pioneer would transcend by far the normal province of an introduction, yet it would be culpable neglect were there failure to advert to their more salient expressions, for he stands prominent, not merely in a local way as one of the founders of the city of Billings, Montana, but also as a leading student of physical, natural and geologic history, and as an acknowledged authority on the flora and fauna of the Rocky Mountain region. He is known as a dead shot hunter, and such journals as the Turf, Field and Farm esteem him as a valuable correspondent and contributor to their columns.

Descending from good old English and Irish families of the long ago, Dr. William A. Allen is far more proud of his relationship on the paternal side with Ethan Allen, the hero of Ticonderoga, and on the maternal, with the distinguished Benjamin Franklin. He was born at Summer-field, Noble county, Ohio, on September 2, 1848. His finishing literary education came to him in an Ohio normal school, and, showing marked mechanical tastes, he early became both a blacksmith and a maker of guns. In 1877 he started for the Black Hills. At Spearfish, now in South Dakota, he joined an emigrant party of 250 persons, here commencing his twenty-five years of adventurous western existence and hunting exploits.

Starting for Bozeman, in far off Montana, the strenuous existence of the frontier soon came to the party in full vigor in attacks of savage Sioux Indians, in which a number of the company were killed and others wounded, Doctor Allen being among the latter. Returning to Spearfish to reform their organization, Doctor Allen was made the commander of the train, which he divided into four companies. Their route took them up the Belle Fouche River, past old Fort Reno, through Wyoming, by the site of Buffalo and old Fort Kearney, thence up Goose Creek, where, in a spiteful attack by Indians, one man was killed and others wounded.

In the locality of the historic last battleground of the gallant General Custer, they remained three days, which they profitably passed in a careful study of the grounds, tracing accurately the various movements of the contesting foes until they ended at the pile of bones that showed where the last white survivors met their death. Here the party divided, one part going to the Crow agency, another by Pryors Pass, Sage Creek and Stinking Water crossing to Wind River, the others, with Doctor Allen, going to Camp Brown and to Bozeman, the end of their journey.

Various vocations have been followed by Doctor Allen in the Great West. He was for some time a blacksmith, having a shop at Bozeman, later an express messenger, the government blacksmith at Fort Custer, a stockraiser on Canyon Creek, in 1882 removing to Billings, then a mere cluster of crude, primitive dwellings, where he erected the first house in the Yellowstone Valley covered with a shingle roof. After this he thoroughly pursued the study of dentistry in the Chicago College of Dentistry and in Haskells Post-Graduate School of Dentistry, and has since maintained his home dental office at Billings, acquiring an extended reputation as an expert in both mechanical and surgical branches of dentistry. The genial Doctor is a true old-timer, a man of honesty and integrity, charitable and generous to his fellow men. He has ever been a total abstainer from intoxicating liquors. Honored as a citizen, reverenced as a pioneer, few people of the state of his adoption stand higher in the estimation of the public.

We have closely adhered to the plain vernacular used by the Doctor and trust that the reader will fully appreciate the thrilling interest of the narrative. Of the numerous illustrations, so profusely scattered through the work, too much cannot be said of their accuracy and value. Many are from photographs taken by Doctor Allen himself, in localities and under circumstances never again to be repeated. The Past of the Great West here comes once again to the reader, in all of its romance, peril and enjoyment, and, in the perusal of these pages, the greatly changed and practical Present will be for the time forgotten.