The daily silver state. [volume] (Winnemucca, Nev.) 1903-1907, 1903-09-18
CALAMITY JANE
CONE TO HGR RGMHRD


The body of Calamity Jane was
recently placed in Mt. Moriah ceme-
terry in Deadwood. beside the bones
of wild Bill Hiekok. her friend of
long ago, whose murderer she prompt
ly caused to be lynched, twenty-four
years ago.
Somewhere in North Dakota lives 4
daughter, her only child, but she was
not at the bedside Of her mother, says
an eastern exchange. 1t was so be-
cause of the wish of the mother, who
long ago sent the girl away that she
might find that culture which she her
self could not grasp. So when friends
begged her to tell her daughters name
and home during Calamity James"
last sickness, the broken down pio-
neer said:
Would yer hev me shame my wi
daughter? She'd wish she heden't seen
this ugly face. Let her be-"
And indeed there was no trace in
her cross-lined leathern features to
to the little Missouri girl who went
over the mountains to Nevada forty
years ago. 1t was circumstances that
made of Martha Canary, Calamity
Jane" the reckless vice-hardened, gen.
erous man-woman of twenty-five.
Calamity Jane" was but ffty-one
years old when she died. But in those
years the real wild west was born and
died. Its passing left her forlorn, and
she was not sorry to go after.
1t was not because of desertion by
her parents that Martha Canary was
left a lone girl in the mining camp of
Virginia City. Nevada, in 1862. Short
ly after their emigration from rrince-
ton, Mo-, an Indian war separated the
child from her parents. She fell into
the hands of an evil woman, who al
lowed her to select what she would
from the rough life of the camp. 1t
was horseback riding and crack pistol
shooting first and not many years af-
ter, the girl sat on saloon bars and re-
called men with songs and stories. 1t
was about that time that the real In
dian fighting began, and the girl was
eager to display the horsemanship
and Workmanship, her virtues. She
applied at a number of posts, attired
- -a,z 1oe0,o che f1,,.I Dnn uyhapa
she was not known to be a woman.
General Crook accepted her as a scout,
and she was happy. For a time she
served under Colonel William F. Cody,
buffalo Bid and that soldier. her
lifelong friend, recently said of her
record as a scout:
Though she did not do a mans
share of the heavy work, she had
gone in places where old frontiersman
were unwilling to trust themselves,
and her courage and good fellowship
made her popular with every man in
the command. In her neat scout uni
form Martha Canary, of those days,
was not the Calamity Jane of today"
She was at the camp where she had
spent much of her girlhood, o the
site of Butte, Mont, when an appeal
came from Deadwood for troops. She
was then twenty-five years old. When
the troops marched to Deadwood to re-
llieve a party of miners surrounded by
Indians the girl scout was in the van.
1t was not alone a matter of driv-
ing away the Deadwood Indians-the
whole northwest was in arms, and ev-
cry mile of the way to Deadwood had
to be guarded and many of them
fought for. When at Goose Camp, S.
D.. a small detachment under Captain
lEgan was surrounded by a large band
of redskins. They had the soldiers at
their mercy, with the relieving troops
too far in the rear. Martha Canary
rode into the midst of a group of In
dams who were about to make away
with the wounded captain. Before
the Indians could realize what had hap
pened she had swung the captain to
her saddle and dashed away amid the