Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1888-09-06
INACCESSIBLE ANIMALS.
Herds Beyond the Reach of Venture
some Hunters.


Wild Progeny of the Plumber of Nor
mon Cowboy Assassins.
MEEKER, Col.-Seventy-fi five miles mort til
west of this place is the most wonderful
cattle ranch In the world. Within
space of five miles In length and a half
mile in width roam herd upon whose
sides the branding iron has never bsen
placed and around whose horns the iaIiet
has never been frightened. But score
or even fewer OF them have ever seen
man or horse or other animal of their
kind, and in truth, their kin, except at
distance of nearly 800 feet high above
them. The Ute Indians call them ''p'chek
up," or red buffalo. And yet if an Indian
who has seen them should be asked about
If, he would laugh and shake his head, and
all the Information obtainable would be:
''P'chek-up; 'em red; no ketch EN-"
There are more than eco of this herd, and
yet no man owns them; nor is there
man, white or black Or copper colored,
who has ever been able to possess single
noof of these fat and tempting beeves.
The cattle are in q prison. Out of it
there is one method of escape, but to
travel that road means death to the ad-
venturesome one. There is no way TO get
In except it be by the use of a rope
thousand feet in length. As the Indians
say:
Heap see m; no ketchum; no come
away
On the two long s1des of the oblong
space IN which these cattle roam rise
precipitous and even conceived rocks for
500 or 600 feet, yawning, black and in
surmountable. At either end seethes and
rushes the Yampa or Bear river. For
miles above and for miles below it plum
ges and stumbles on in it's headlopg haste
ID reach the arms of its parent. the
scarcely less tumaltuous but deeper Green
river. Like the wonderful fat-top noun
tains of Colorado, this
HOME OF THE IMPRISONED HERD
has no likeness in the world. 1t recalls
in its accessibility the marvellous stories
of the valley of verdure into which
Mayne Reids Adventures only found
their way by the assistance OF the bal
lon.
cattle came there is as strange ss their
existence is curious. Fifteen years ago
when the government troops were pur-
suing the Mormon murderers of the in
nocent victims of the Mountain Meadow
massacre, the Danites, or avenging angels
OF the Mormons fed for their lives into
what was then literally the wilderness. A
few of those who had been the blindest
oil Of ha
carnate, whose hands were red with the
blood of women and children, found in
their wanderings pretty valley on a
stream which flows from the Wasatch
range into the Green river. They stuck
their stakes, built their camp fires, end
during the night their sagacious leader
had vision which told him there to stay.
They could hardly have chosen in al U ali
more fertile or more isolated spot
They called it Ashley, and about them
have since gathered more of their sect.
until where the refugees posted their
picket of guards on the lonely nights of
the first summer Las grown thriving
village. tt Is 40 mites from the Union
Pacific railroad south and las miles north
of the Rio Grande Western. Until within
five years il has been isolate entirely. b 1T
now it is but 80 miles from the Utah
reservation, and furnishing supplies for
the agency forms quite business for the
community.
1t Is tenet of the Danites, that robb
ing or theft from gentle is no crime.
SO it was thought to be only a cunning
trick, when John Wyckliffes, one of the
Mormon settlers of the new town. and his
three SONS made q pight sortje On Henrys
Ford, in Wyoming. and carried away 800
head of cattle ranging there. This was
in 1877. The owners of the cattle dis
covered the loss of their stock few days
aJter they were gone, and started in pur-
suit. The Wyckliffs had their friends
stationed along the trail, and were warn
ed by signals of the coming of the pur
suers. Accordingly they drove the cattle
"a fast as they could, eastward, across
Green river ard up the Bear with the in
tention of reaching the Elk mountain
country in northwestern Colorado, where
they wo1id be
PERFECTLY SAFE FROM DETECTION
and their stock could secure the most
sueculent Of rood.
The thieves and the stolen herd had
reached mesa Of inviting grass at sun
down one day, and halted to camp for
the night. A terrific storm arose. The
lightning flashed necessarily and the
thunder pealed and crashed with unin-
permitting fury. The four men desper-
ately held the terror striker cattle by
riding about them constantly. But the
wild fearfulness of the terrible storm ex-
cited the bruses beyond measure. They
surged and ginned, every moment grow
ing less subj cot to control. All at once,
as if by some mad impulse, they STAN
peded.
A stampede of cattle by day is calculat-
ed to strike terror to any heart, least
there should be some human being in the
pathway. A STAN pede by night, and dur
ing a furious thunder storm, with the
lightning revealing the huge mass of
frenzied brutes, hurting itself on lik.
living catapault, frantic with fear, and as
resistless as the storm itself, is one of the
most appalling spectacles, All thu mad
might of frenzied animate force is arous-
ed, and self-dsstroying as well as destroy
ing all ia their way, they rush On until
they fall dead-like or plunge into some
abyss.
John Wyckcliffe and his sons moi their
fate amid the lightning's glare and the
thunder's roar. They endeavored to head
off the STAN impeding herd. Instead they
and their horses were swept on, and
driven, in the terror to escape the charge
of maidened animals. over the brink of
the awful preciplce which fro~ns up from
the waters of the Bear. After them
plunged the whole frignt-crazed herd,
and down to the bottom of the fearful
fall went horses and riders and horned
creatures.
Out of this plunge of life to what was
seemingly certain death for all, a few of