Glacier County chief., 1939-09-08
Mystery of Burnt Creek Bar Massacre and Gold
From Diggings i'm Montana Clings With the Years
By EDNA LAMOORE WALDO


Who killed the party of Mon
tana miners at Burnt creek bar in
the Missouri river in August,
1868? And if this was just an
other Indian massacre, as was pop
ularly supposed at the time, who
got the 100000 in gold dust that
the mackinaw boat was carrying?
Why did Chicago detectives come
to Bismarck, Dakota, as late as
1886, to investigate the mystery?
And why do dredging crews still
occasionally seek to penetrate the
heavy layers of Missouri silt that have
been washed over the spot?
1t is well known, of course, that the
Indians were particularly hostile that
them all over the plains of Dakota, in
revenge for the Minnesota massacres
of the previous year, and had driven
the main body of the Sioux to the
Missouri. Steamboats, had been fol-
lowed by war parties all the way from
Yankton to the mouth of the Yellow
stone. Farther upstream, many mack
NAV party had had brushes with the
redskins on the lonely reaches between
the Montana diggings and the several
military and trading, posts. But the
savages. had not yet learned much
were various predatory white men
along the river who kept in touch with
the returning mackinaws. Too, there
were several aspects of the Burnt
Greek affair which put it in the class
Twenty miners, it is agreed, en-
barked from Fort Benton early in July
for the usually swift mackinaw Voy-
age back to the states They were &C
companied by a woman with baby
tion they had built a small cabin on
their flat-bottomed boat. known
around the Bannack diggings as men
who had made their stake in rich
placerS, the miners were said to have
a large amount of gold dust in their
100000 in carefully plugged augur
holes in the stanchions of the boat.
Beside the usual equipment, they car
ried a good-sized swivel gun.
Land at Fort BerthoId
Landing Aug. 8 at Fort Berthold-
midway between the mouth of the Vel
lowstone and the later site of Bis
marck-the party purchased supplies
and stretched their legs. They were
warned by F.. F.. Girard, the post trad
er. that it would be dangerous to try
to pass through the Painted Woods
ported large bands OF Sioux encamped
in the timber bends on both sides OF
the river. The miners held a consul
tation and decided that this was only
an excuse to hold them at the post,
where they would have to spend their
money; one old man, gray-haired and
dressed in black, was said to b ave
demonstrated with the others, but to
no avail. 1t was reported that an extra
passenger, a French-Canadian EN-
ploye of the American Fur company,
Joined the party for the. down trip.
There the mystery begins. Who was
the old man in black, SO often re-
ferred to in later versions of the story?
Did the Canadian go only as a pas
senger or was he the emissary OF Fort
Berthold associates, interested IN the
gold? And how did everyone at Fort
Benton as well as at Berthold know
so much about the gold, anyhow?
After a night near the ruins OF old
Fort Clark, the maCklnaW party mead
ed downstream toward the Square
Ruttes and the Painted Woods. Before
dark, all lay dead on the Burnt Greek
bar.
.Rumors flew up and down the river,
from one wood camp and trading post
to the next: steamboat men and re-
turning miners carried the news 10
st. Louis and back again to Benton.
The first and most obvious conc4l-
SION OF course, was that the hostile
Sioux had wantonly killed the whole
crowd. Others decided that the Arl-
karaS, or ReeS, the very ones who had
the run of Fort Berthold. had done
the deed. Later, when small quantities
of gold dust began to appear, the SuS-
picion grew that white men had m
stigated the crime in order to obtain
the gold which, they felt sure, the In
dams would discard.
Mysterious Man in Black
Interest centered around the old man
in black who was variouSly described as
a priest or medicine man, as the cap
tain of the boat, as the bearer of a
charmed life. He was so brave that the
Indians would not kill him his
body was never found and SO on.
There was much speculation. too, about
the extra passenger, either the French
Canadian already referred to or a Ger
tain Hudson's Bay company man from
Winnipeg, known to have large
amount of gold soon after the trag-
edy But as the years went by, the
feeling persisted that Fort Berthold
itself held the key to the mystery, since
it was at that post that most OF the
recovered dust was spent. 1t would
not have been the first time, frontiers
men reflected, that white depreda-
lions had been covered up by Indian
burnings and killings.
So isolated was the tlmbered region
where the massacre took place and so