Hunt Denied Possession of Squires

[RMN, June 19, 1865, p. 3.]

Squires Claims Soule Fired First

This bit from Santa Fe Gazette was reprinted in a few local papers. The alleged statement of Squires, suspiciously detailed.


[Daily Mining Journal, June 14, 1865.]

Where Was Soule When He Was Shot?

The article in the RMN about the assassination of Soule says he was moving along Lawrence and was shot near F Street and Lawrence (15th and Lawrence). It also says he was shot in front of Dr. Cunningham's house, but that was at F and Arapahoe, according to Cunningham's ad (see below).

I guess I would like to know right where Soule was and which direction he was walking when he encountered the shooter.

Both of these intersections, currently, are some pretty dead locations, monuments to the ill-conceived post-modern development boom that reshaped downtown in the 1970s. There's very little going on along that section of 15th. Almost no destinations there for a citizen on foot. The view is dismal. There is the Fed Reserve Bank, taking up an entire city block right in the middle of downtown and fenced to the world. When trucks come and go there guards come out with shotguns and face the meager scattering of bystanders. Very welcoming. Isn't that what the Fed Center is for? Oh, that's right. The Fed is not a part of the govt., but a privately owned corporation. There is a parking lot, and the back of the new Four Seasons, six or eight stories of bare nothing. There is a black high-rise. On one corner, a failed and empty restaurant space. Jane Jacobs could use this section of town as an example of how bad urban planning kills a city for decades.

The Rocky plays up the angle of Soule's enemies from his Provost Marshall duties. Byers is playing games here, as always. Soule told Price and others he expected to be killed for his testimony about Sand Creek. And Chivington very publically endorsed the killing of "Indians and their confederates," reported in the same paper: http://pioneerplates.blogspot.com/2010/01/citizen-meeting.html





[RMN, April 24, 1865.]

Strange Timing

Just a little something I've never really considered before -- The proximity of Soule's assassination to this other event, the marriage of his young bride's mother (Sarah Coberly) to her second husband William Crull. I don't know, it's probably nothing. But it is somewhat weird timing. Then, rather than move back in with her mom in Huntsville, Hersa heads to Kansas to stay with Soule's brother. Perhaps there is an explanation in the letters, I don't know.

Hunting the Shooter

Squires would have been better off going north.


[DMJ, May 11, 1865, p. 3.]

..Not that he didn't escape in the end anyway.

The Photographic Album

[RMN, May 1, 1865.]

A "certain Photographic Album..."

Keep on Rockin'

[RMN, March 18, 1865.]

Live it up my friend, not much time left.

RMN Correction not an example of clear journalism

[RMN, Feb. 24, 1865]



I have very little idea what he's getting at, and I think that was the plan. Didn't mention the name of the prisoner? Indeed they did. It was the title of the article referred to in the correction.

Meanwhile, the Daily Mining Journal reports that Soule has been shot at several times.

The Rumor Mill

On Feb. 1, 1865 the RMN pokes fun at Indian rumors, forgetting that many such false rumors were credited by the paper over the previous year.





Also on page three of that issue we find the letter from the former Major Anthony turncoating on Chivington (which prompted the response from 'D.' on Feb. 4), as well as the order marking Soule's stint as provost marshal.



[RMN, Feb. 1, 1865, p. 3.]

News to White People: We're on Your Side

But Soule is like the whitest dude in town. He even rode a silver horse. That's seriously white.



[RMN, March 2, 1865, p.3]

"...half breeds, Indian traders and sympathisizers..." Some feel that Sand Creek was not just about wiping out the Indians there but about wiping out a whole way of life that had been established before the gold rush, in which white traders and ranchers on the Santa Fe trail interacted and inter-married with the Indians. That whole situation was disgusting to Byers and Chivington and their Brothers. Actions during the campaign, from the house arrest of Prowers to the murder of Jack Smith, tend to support the view that this unique sector of the regional culture was targeted along with the Indian camp.

Anthony fires first to spite Soule

This tidbit appears in a letter in the Feb. 4, 1865 News attacking Major Anthony's well-known tendency to change his tune back and forth between two seemingly incontrovertible positions. Anthony was the commander at Ft. Lyon after Wynkoop was sent away for jacking up the program. The anonymous writer 'D.' reports that Anthony was the first to fire upon some group of Indians (it's unclear to me which engagement the writer is referring to here, perhaps to the Sand Creek massacre itself), and did so to spite Soule. It seemed strange to some folks when he later spoke against Chiv/Sand Creek as the tide of opinion turned. Anthony is one of those epic bootlickers who doesn't seem to hold any of his own convictions. That made him the man for the job at Ft. Lyon in the fall of '64.

It's true that Soule 'commenced sympathizing' with the Indians. But only after he had 'walked through the fire.' Most of the rest of the officers at Ft. Lyon sympathized with Black Kettle's band as well, and are on record supporting Wynkoop and speaking out against the massacre, although none followed through in quite the same way when the shit was going down.

Maybe somebody knows who this 'D.' is, but I sure don't. It could simply be Byers making stuff up. It could be his co-editor John Dailey, who had enlisted in the 3rd. It might be Downing, whose opinion Byers seemed to value highly. It could also be Dee from What's Happenin for all I know. Later the Daily Mining Journal joked about tweedledum and tweedledee.

Shot at in the suburbs

The Feb. 24 1865 issue of the Journal is important. In it they lay out their opinion about Sand Creek and the subsequent investigation. They would like to emphasize that they think it's mighty fine to kill Indians, but that these particular Indians were unjustly slaughtered, mainly to benefit the careers of Evans and Chivington, and that the massacre set off a costly wave of violence that otherwise would not have occurred. Toward the end of the article they reveal something about Soule's assassination attempt history at this time:



Then on March 2 the RMN offers this curious response on page 3, with page 2 substantially devoted to their opposing view of Sand Creek and the investigation:

The Ponies

The Indian ponies were a primary focus of attention and a major source of controversy. Various factions among the soldiers connived to make off with sizable portions of the captured herd immediately after the massacre, the first attempt foiled by a do-gooder Lieutenant named Hewitt. Some or most of the Indian ponies may have been driven to a ranch north of Denver; many individual ponies were sold off by soldiers to ranchers along the road between Fort Lyon and Denver. (According to one source, one of these ponies went to Hersa Coberly.)

The profoundly bitter Capt. Soule as provost marshall spent a lot of energy trying to round up these horses, ostensibly on behalf of the US government, but mainly I think to deny the hundred days men any material gain from their campaign, which in his mind was illegitimate at the start and disgusting at the end. He was doing whatever he could do within his power. This effort to take back horses would have engendered a lot of resentment, especially as recruiting posters for the 3rd stated that soldiers would be entitled to any property taken from massacred Indians, including horses. That's to say nothing of the horses issued the 3rd before the massacre. The vast majority of those horses had not been returned by this time -- but the men had not been paid yet either.

The Rocky Mountain News, February 25, 1865 offered snidely:



And the ad in question:



[RMN, Feb. 25, 1865, p. 2]

Table of Distances

The misspelling in Hersa Coberly's wedding announcement is particularly curious considering the "Table of Distances" that the paper featured pretty much every day for years, right on the front page:



Click to view full size.

[RMN, 1865, p. 1]

On the Military Order in Denver, 1865

Click image to view full-size clipping.




[RMN, April 17, 1865, p. 3]


The papers concerned themselves primarily with the death of Lincoln through the week following April 15. RMN gives us a few hints as to some changes in the military order of things in town that week. Capt. Soule was Provost Marshall. On April 18 the paper printed General Order 60, which called for a day of mourning. On the 19 the paper reported the arrival of General Henry in town to take over his new post, and gives the impression of a suddenly business-like demeanor among the soldiers.



[RMN, April 18, 1865, p.2]




[RMN, April 19, 1865, p.3]

April 14, 1865

There are several items of note on page 3 of the RMN for this date. The following bit on Major Downing and the military's inquiry into the Sand Creek Massacre restates Byers' familiar editorial position on the matter. The military hearings took place first in Denver, with Soule and others testifying in February, then re-adjourned at Fort Lyon on March 20.



Then there is this cutesy bit about the Soule marriage:




That's more typical local-boy-gets-married fare, but certainly awkward here considering the well-known positions of Captain Soule and the paper.

Then a few other items:





[RMN, April 14, 1865, p. 3.]

What's up with the Masons?

The Resurrection of Hersa C.

More from the Rocky. On April 5 1865, the paper carried a notice of the wedding of Silas Soule and Hersa Coberly.



[RMN, April 5, 1865, p. 2.]

Kehler was the chaplain of the 1st Colorado. The notice is conspicuous in its blatant misspelling of the bride's name. Maybe the creative speller hopes to provide a little cover for his paper's having reported the same woman's death at the hands of marauding Indians in August of the preceding year:


[RMN, Special Edition, August 18, 1864.]