The Hardin tribune-herald. [volume] (Hardin, Mont.) 1925-1973, 1938-01-07
Bamaack Citizens 'Fumbled the Ball' i'm Their
First Strength Test With Plurnrmer Gang Toughs
BY ELMO

N entirely different story OF
~ Montana's beginning would have
LASH" have come ona to to the her m Sn:
tains almost a year sooner, II
the good citizens of Bannack in jan
uary, 1863, had not "fumbled h BALI
in their first test Of strength with
Plummer's t0ughs. The U of good
point in a case Of cold FLOODED murder
equal to that in which George Ives,
the following December at Alder gulch,
killed the German, Thiebalt, and paid
the death penalty assessed by a double
jury, backed by the miners of the gulch.
But in this first test of strength at
Bannack only one of IL jurors had the
courage to vote a verdict of guilt and
the death penalty. The result was to
release two murderers to further crime
and to encourage the Plummer band
to greater outrages, writing the bloody
the Ives trial and execution and the
determination OF the o agents by
the VigilanteS.
Squaw Wife Fled
Charley Reeves, n of Plummer's
band, had a squaw he had bought from
abuse, in January of 1868, she fled to
the tepee of Indian friends near Ban
mack. Reeves tried to use force to re-
turn her to his camp. An old chief in
terfered and thrust Reeves from the
tepee:
ner in crime, Augustus Moore, fired
into the tepee, Wounding an Indian.
Later, up town, they were joined by
William Mitchell, and the three went to
the Indian camp and fired at the tepee
several times, killing the old chief, a
zette, who had come to the camp to
learn the cause of the first shot. Two
other white persons, drawn to the camp
by curiosity about the original shoot
ing, were seriously wounded.
When the murderers were told they
had killed white men, Moore, n a pro-
fusion of profanity, claimed that they
had no business to be there"
Alarmed at the indignation they had
aroused in Bannack, Moore and Reeves
fled toward Rattlesnake butte and
joined Henry Plummer, who had gone
ahead to provide for their protection.
A mass meeting of citizens next
morning set a Gordon of guards. to pre-
believed still in camp. When it was
learned they had gone, a party. COM
posed of Lear, Higgins, Rockwell and
Davenport set out on their track. Sur
rounded in a dense thicket IL miles
from town, the men refused to sur
render. It vas an impasse. The GRIM
inals could not leave. The four-man
posse could not take their prisoners.
Finally, the men surrendered when the
posse assured them they could have a
trial by jury. The toughS had a terror
of the justice of miners courts, where
the men of the whole community con-
stituted a mass jury
While a messenger went for men
needed to conduct the trial, Plummer
secured exoneration of all connection
with the affair by pleading fear he
would be punished for a murder COM
mitted some time before. ostenslbly. IN
self-defense, a case which had u
Citizens Armed to the Teeth
On the morning set for the trial
some 400 people gathered in and around
a large log building, armed to the
teeth with guns and knives. Friends of
the prisoners were lavish in their
threats. Guns we're discharged and pro-
family was rife. 1t was generally ap-
parent that the trend Of opinion, how
ever, was strongly against the prisoners:
A quiet determination was manifested
by the leaders in the preparations for
When the court was formed a motion
This brought a violent commotion
among the toughs, who insisted on the
jury trial that had been promised. It
was evident the majority sentiment
favored a miners court. A battle was
imminent.
Nathaniel P. Langford saved the day,
however, with an appeal for a jury
trial. He reminded the assembly that
a jury trial had been promised. He
asked for observation of American ira