The daily morning journal and courier., 1900-05-19
MEACHER'S STRANGE END
4 WESTENER s RElIINISC CENCES
 OF THE .
Career Ofthe Brave Irish Soldier In This
Country.

In the early sixties W, B. Napton was
 a pioneer arrival at Virginia City, Ne
 vada He had brought with him, by
 way of the Missouri river, the material
 for a quartz mill which was operated
 for time on a Montana mining prop
 erty. MT Napton is brother of Dis
 trict Judge Napton of Deer Lodge coun-
 ty, Montana. He is resident of Mar
 shall Missouri. His valuable chapter, contributed herewith to the Standards s
 stories of early Montana days, is a
 sketch of General Francis Thomas
 Meagher, with whom Mr. Napton was
 well acquainted
 One of the most accomplished and in-
 teresting men l ever met was Brigader
 General Thomas Francis Meagher, who
 gained distinction in the civil war as commander of the Irish Brigade" talk
 ing an active as well as a conspicuous part in nearly every one of the great
 battle fought by the Army of the Poto- mac.
 I first met General Meagher while he was governor of Montana in 1865. He was not only affable and distinguished
 as a soldier, but he was also greatly gifted as an ora tor and writer. He was man of superb physique, erect figure, stately carriage, and, withal, one of the most scholarly, forcible, pleasant and agreeable public speakers I ever listened to. His career is well known to all who are familiar with the events of the civil war, and he is remembered by all the old soldiers as the gallant commander of the Irish brigade, which suffered such fearful loss at the battle of Fredericks
 burg. on the Rappahannock. Bearing 'the white mans burden in that bloody engagement was a very serious, trying and disastrous load, as shown by the official reports. General Meagher's off, cial report shows that the brigade went into action with 1,200 men, and that on the following day only 2S0 reported un- der arms ready to renew the battle, so that more than 900 had been slain or wounded
 The first time I ever met the general he was delivering an address to the people of Virginia City, Montana. one evening in August 1865, just after nightfall, he having reached the city that day to assume the duties of gover- nor of the territory Virginia City was then the most populous and thriving place in the territory, and Alder Gulch. on which it is situated, was producing placer gold in fabulous quantities. The entire gulch was being turned over by pick and shovel aand hydraulic nozzle for ten miles or more in length and from 100 to 800 feet in width. The ground was carefully worked over from rimrocS to rimrock from surface to bedrock, the latter frequently forty feet below the surface. The claims were 200 feet up and down the gulch, but their owners in some instances worked them jointly, including several claims in one management. One company employed a hundred men or more paying them from $6 to $15 a day, those who under stood running blind drift receiving the highest wages. This company was said to have cleared $150,O00 in the sum mer of 1864. Torun a blind drift through water sand and gravel needed the skill of the most expert miner, the tlmbers having to be driven ahead of the exca- vation and so braced as to prevent cav ing as the work progressed.
 The city contained 5000 or 10000 in- habitants, the most bustling, energetic, | restless mass of people imaginable. Up and down the gulch for ten miles was a continuous row of miners cabins, one or more on each claim. Above the line of | cabins on the mountain side a we'll graded toll road had been made the en- tire length of the gulch Over this road | passed every day a train of burros | packed with mail, express matter and | the like, and conveying supplies of vart- ous kinds to the miners. Sunday was | the business day of the cty--the miners [ would quit work for business and recre- ation.
 It being announced that the governor would arrive on a certain day on the overland coach from Sale Lake, q com mittee appointed went down the stage line for some distance to meet him and | escort him to the city and arrange for a speech.
 The weather was suspicious. The typical August weather in that region is peculiarly pleasant during the long twilight A large crowd assembled on { the square to hear Meagher. It was composed largely of his native country men and Missourians, the latter at that date making up perhaps one-half of the population of the territory and face tiously dubbed "the left wing of Prices army"
 The speech, although a fine one, was somewhat of disappointment to DOT ton of the audience, being conservative in tone for one who had just emerged from the great civil conflict. The gen. eral proclaimed with great force and but in elegant, musical lan- guage that the war over, and that the people of the south should be allowed to resume their former relations to the federal government. The soldiers on both sides had shown great endurance and courage and made a record for gal lantry and soldierly qualities unexcelled, If indeed equaled, by any people on the earth" He regarded the famous rebel leader, Stonewall Jackson, as the great est military genius developed by the but the entire nation north and south, he said, had gained imperishable had reached high standard among the military nations of the world for martial spirit,svigor, cour- age, strength and prowess. During the winter of 1865 l was min Ing and operating quartz mill in the : of Virginia City, when some business matter called me over to Hele