EDUCATORS’ PERSPECTIVE
Wild West Finance: The Johnson
County Range War (Part 2)
By Brian Grinder and Dan Cooper
In “The Johnson County Range War: Part
1” (Financial History, Issue 133, Spring
2020), we explored the wild enthusiasm
for open range cattle ranching in
the American West, which drew massive
amounts of cash and capital from
Europe and the East Coast. The prospect
of annual returns in excess of 25% for
an investment perceived as riskless was
too good to be true. The drought during
the summer of 1886 followed by a brutal
winter forced investors to face reality, and
many withdrew from the business. As
conditions worsened, tension increased
between large ranchers and homesteaders.
The ranchers took matters into their own
hands when local courts failed to convict
accused cattle rustlers. Blood was shed in
Central Wyoming when Wyoming Stock
Grower Association (WSGA) ranchers
hanged Ella Watson and Jim Averell for
cattle rustling. The violence then moved to
Johnson County.
John Tisdale urged his team up out of
Haywood Gulch. He was heading back
to his homestead south of Buffalo, WY,
the seat of Johnson County. His pregnant
wife and his sons awaited him. Tisdale had
gone to Buffalo to stock up on supplies
for the winter and to buy Christmas presents
for his family. While there, he either
overheard someone talking about him or
heard a rumor that deeply troubled him.
He postponed his trip home for a couple
of days and was seen in several saloons
drinking. This was uncharacteristic of Tisdale.
For some reason, he was afraid to
head home. Tisdale purchased a doublebarreled
shotgun before leaving Buffalo
and kept it on the wagon seat beside him.
As he started up the hill, an assassin
stepped out from behind a clay abutment
and shot Tisdale in the back, killing him.
The gunman then hid Tisdale’s wagon at
the base of the gulch and shot the horses.
Tisdale’s body was discovered later in the
day after another early morning traveler
“Somebody said to Andrew Bell that they heard Miss Molly Wood
was engaged to marry a RUSTLER. ‘Heavens, Andrew!’ said his
wife; ‘what is a rustler?’ It was not in any dictionary, and current
translations of it were inconsistent. A man at Hoosic Falls said that
he had passed through Cheyenne, and heard the term applied in a
complimentary way to people who were alive and pushing. Another
man had always supposed it meant some kind of horse. But the most
alarming version of all was that a rustler was a cattle thief. Now the
truth is that all these meanings were right. The word ran a sort of
progress in the cattle country, gathering many meanings as it went.”
informed Buffalo Sheriff Red Angus that
he had heard gunshots in the gulch.
Two days later, on December 3, 1891, the
body of Ranger Jones was found lying in
his buckboard a few miles south of where
Tisdale met his end. The killing occurred
a few days before Tisdale’s murder. Both
had been dry gulched, shot in the back.
Apparently both Tisdale and Jones
had information about an earlier failed
ambush that took place in Hole-in-the-
Wall country where homesteader and
former ranch hand for the large cattle
interests Nate Champion had moved 200
cattle to the open range. Robert Tisdale
(no relation to John Tisdale) was also
grazing about 2,000 cattle there and was
not happy with Champion’s intrusion.
When Tisdale angrily pulled his cattle out
of the area, some of Champion’s cattle
were caught up with his herd. Champion
pursued Tisdale’s herd and audaciously
cut out his cattle along with their
unbranded calves—mavericks.
On the morning of November 1, 1891,
four gunmen stormed the small cabin
where Champion and Ross Gilbertson
were sleeping. Two of the gunmen crashed
through the door and demanded that the
occupants of the cabin give up. Champion
reached for the gun under his pillow as he
yawned and asked the intruders what they
— Owen Wister, The Virginian
wanted. Gun fire was exchanged. Neither
Champion nor Gilbertson were hit, but
Champion inflicted a mortal wound on
one of the intruders, who ran away holding
his stomach. The intruders panicked
and fled, but not before Champion got a
good look at them. One of the intruders
was former Buffalo Sheriff Frank Canton,
who now worked as a range detective for
the WSGA. Canton was later named a
primary suspect in the killings of Tisdale
and Jones.
After the incident, Champion went to
see John Tisdale to enlist his help in the
imminent battle with the big cattle ranchers.
He probably also spoke with Jones,
Tisdale’s neighbor, about the incident,
sealing the fate of both men.
Anger at the legal system, frustration
with rustlers and homesteaders and fear
of exposure in the recent deaths of Tisdale
and Jones drove W.C. Irving and
Major Frank Wolcott, both members of
the WSGA, to concoct an invasion of
Johnson County. WSGA President John
Clay thought the idea was insane 1 but did
nothing to impede planning. During the
invasion, he found it convenient to be in
Chicago “on business.”
The invasion plan included hiring gunmen
from Texas and transporting them to
Wyoming by secret express. The invaders
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