New Ulm weekly review. [volume] (New Ulm, Minn.) 1878-1892, 1878-06-26
Not as New as Supposed.

1 -
Not as New as Supposed,
Kansas City Times.
Thes question as to whether the Black
Hills were or were not occupied by white
men prior to the white settlement of 1856,
is being discussed by the Eastern and West
ern press. The Kansas City Times. during
the winter of 1876, announced the discovery,
near Calamity Peak, on French creek, Of the
remains of white mans camp or settle
ment, long since deserted and abandoned.
Black Hills had been inhabited by white
men many years before Tallant's colony
from Sioux City entered the Hills and made
the first white settlement at Custer.
The statement made by the Sioux City
Journal, and now going the rounds Of the
press, announcing the discovery of white
is confirmed by discoveries made by gen
tleman in Kansas City, who spent several
years scouting in the Hills as early as 1868.
A party of scouts, including Henry Levin,
Wilbur F. Harris, Thomas Terrier, Charles
Engle, and the Kansas City man, found at
the mouth of Beaver creek, at its junction
with the Cheyenne river, the skulls of three
men, the remains of boats, the bones of two
horses, few rusty mining tools, and other
relics of a white mans camp. They were
found in the centre of a rocky backbone or
ledge. The large slabs of loose stone set up
edgeways as wall of protection are still in
position as left by the unknown pioneers,
who were killed there, perhaps a generation
before. The bones were bleached and de-
cayed, and had certainly lain there for
years.
Another positive evidence of the early oc-
cupation of the Black Hills was furnished by
the Times in 1876, when another and larger
deserted camp was discovered near Tallant's
stockade, on French creek. Here Col. Tai
liant, the leader of the white colonists ex-
PEELED from the Hills in the summer of 1875,
pointed out the remains of white mems set
Elements. In the bed of the creek was the
rotten remains of rudely constructed sluice
boxes, formed by chopping the heart out of
cottonwood logs. There were four
or five of these, two of them in
and advanced state of decay. The re-
mains of two shovels, rusted, rotten and
decayed pieces of tin and fragments of iron,
evidently of frying-pans and kettles, were
found not far from the decayed sluice- boxes.
Near where these curious relics were found
was seen the former home of these mystic
rious and unknown pioneers. A few pine
poles, rotted by age and falling down, were
found leaning against sheltering rock, not
far from the creek. These had formed the
support to the rude miners home many
years before.
The strangest and most interesting feature,
about this camp was rude wooden cross
formed by pine poles tied together with raw
hide, and which stood upright against rock
not far from the ruins of the old cabin. On
one side of the cross, rudely cut into the
face of the moss brown granite rock, were
two letters, 81. NJ and the date, 1885,"
This had evidently been erected to mark the
grave of some unfortunate pioneer who had
died there thirty years before. The fate of
his companions can only be conjectured,
but from the appearance of the camp ground
and the broken tools and camp equippage it
is inferable that they fell victims to the
ferocity of the terrible Crows or Blackfeet,
or the Jealous Minnecouyeus or bloodthirsty
Uncapapas, who now follow the uncompris-
ing Sitting Bull.
Other positive evidence is being furnished
| from various sources. The Omaha Bee gives
the statements of Mr.. Witcher, one of the
Black Hills pioneers, who has been talking
with the Oldest settler of the upper Missouri
country, La Plant. La Plant asserts that he
visited the Black Hills twenty-five years ago,
and that white men had visited and explored
the hills before he went there. He says he
can lead the way to the cave where he and
/ his companions lived while exploring 'sthe
sombre elevations . and point to the names
and dates inscribed upon the rocks. There
is no room left for doubt as to the discovery
! of gold in the Black Hills as early as 1916.
Evidences are being discovered in the various
parts of that mysterious region. The mys-
terry about the matter is what became of
these early explorers. A party of ten started
from Fort Laramie in 1864, and were never
heard of again. La Plant knows of party
| of Choteau's men who went to the Hills in
1852, but who never returned. Judging
from the many discoveries recently made in
the valleys of the Black Hills, all the early
pioneer gold seekers met the same fate
death at the hands of the savages.
Now for Cheap Jet JeWelry.