A Crossroads Resource

Unit VII: What, Then, Is This American? ca. 1865 - 1900

Question/Problem 4: What was the West like for miners, cattlemen, and homesteader?

Cattlemen Worksheet #1
I was with what is known as the Shoesole outfit on the banks of the Oyee river in Idaho in July, 1889. There were thirty-eight cowboys in the camp, and on July 23rd we had just completed a roundup of beef cattle that we were to drive to Shoshone Falls to ship east. There were between 1,700 and 2,000 head of big steers in the band, and we had them all safely bunched for the night. There was a storm brewing all the afternoon and the boss cowboy, Coon Foster, thought we had best not unsaddle our ponies at all that night. He laid his uneasiness to the weather, and most of the boys in the outfit took it for granted that... was what was troubling him, but when we crossed a creek I saw moccasin tracks... and I knew better.

I knew that Foster had seen 'em, too, and it was Indians and not weather that worried him. About six o'clock in the evening it commenced to rain, and Foster stationed six of the cowboys, myself among the number ... as guards over the camp and cattle....

Everything was quiet, seemingly, but I heard several suspicious sounds, coyote barks and other noises.... Suddenly a big steer that stood far out on the mesa beyond the herd twisted his tail and let out a bellow that would raise the dead. In an instant the entire herd was on its feet. They came straight at me and only about fifty yards away. Foster came at me yelling like mad for the boys to saddle up and get the cattle stopped. He had just reached my side when the leaders of the herd surrounded us. Our ponies turned and ran with them. The bellowing and rearing of the cattle was frightful.

We were managing to get the steers nearest us separated a trifle so as to get room to turn, and had a fair chance of getting out of the bunch, when Foster's horse stumbled and fell. My pony fell over him and I landed between his body and that of Foster's horse, and that is the only thing that saved my life. The whole herd tumbled and pitched and tossed over us. Foster was literally mangled to sausage meat. His horse was little better, and mine was crushed into a bloody mass. I found that I could not get up, for my leg was broken just below the thigh. I was soon cared for, however, and in six weeks was all right and on the range again. We found 341 dead cattle, two dead horses, one dead cowboy and two more with broken legs after the herd had passed. Indians had stampeded the herd.

From Clifford P. Westermeier, ed., Trailing the Cowboy: His Life and Lore as Told by Frontier Journalists (Caldwell, ID: Caxton Printers, Ltd., 1955), pp. 95-97.

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