Description
Book SynopsisHanded down through his family over the past century and faithfully transcribed here, William D. Street’s story of frontier life is as rich in history as it is in character, giving us a sense of what it was to be not just a witness to, but a player in, the drama of the plains as it unfolded in the late nineteenth century.
Trade Review"An exciting narrative of frontier Kansas."—Kansas History
"A very interesting, highly readable memoir. Seasoned American historians would find this piece to be quite valuable, and this is a fantastic and engaging read for the general public as well."—The Chronicles of Oklahoma
"Rich in everyday Kansas life on the farm, a covered wagon train experience, the military, and the last Indian raid in Kansas."—Valley Falls Vindicator
"William D. Street’s memoir of life on the central and northern Great Plains as a teamster, soldier, homesteader, trapper, buffalo hunter, scout and cowboy is about as exciting as it gets for a vivid, page-turning reminiscence of the Old West. This is an important and highly recommended memoir."—John Monnett, author of Tell Them We Are Going Home: The Odyssey of the Northern Cheyennes
"Twenty-Five Years among the Indians and Buffalo offers an interesting, highly readable, and informative personal narrative covering events and experiences of real significance for early, post–Civil War settlement of Kansas and the Great Plains. The narrator, Bill Street, who goes on to become a Kansan of some notoriety in the latter part of the nineteenth century, recounts in great detail his experiences as a teenage muleskinner in the 1860s, a trooper in the Nineteenth Kansas Volunteer Cavalry involved in the famous Winter Campaign of 1868-69, a homesteader and town builder in Jewell and Decatur counties, a High Plains hunter and trapper, a cowboy, and more. This is a significant contribution to the literature in the tradition of many other ‘eyewitness’ accounts from the nineteenth century."—Virgil Dean, editor of John Brown to Bob Dole: Movers and Shakers in Kansas History
"Twenty-five Years among the Indians and Buffalo, the memoir of William Street’s exciting decade on the Central Plains during the 1870s, is a treasure house for those interested in the history both of Kansas and of the American West. During this seminal decade of westward expansion, Street was an Indian fighter, a soldier, a buffalo hunter, a trapper, a homesteader, a town founder, and a cowboy. (Like Jack Crabb in Thomas Berger’s great novel, Little Big Man, Street seems to have been an active participant in nearly every occupation of the Old West.) Recorded in the early twentieth century, after Street had become a newspaper editor (which perhaps explains the clarity of his engaging prose), we gain new ground-level insights into activities, since mythologized, that were quotidian events for Street and his contemporaries."—Jim Hoy, author of Flint Hills Cowboys: Tales from the Tallgrass Prairie
Table of Contents
- Introduction, Richard W. Etulain
- Editor’s Foreword, Warren R. Street
- I. Early Years in Kansas: 1861–1867
- 1. Boyhood Becomes Early Manhood: 1861–1867
- 2. Frontier Teamster: Summer 1867
- II. Nineteenth Kansas Volunteer Cavalry: 1868–1869 Winter Campaign
- 3. On the March to Camp Supply: October–November 1868
- 4. The Balance of Forces on the Plains: 1868
- 5. Custer at the Washita: November 1868
- 6. Winter March from Camp Supply to Fort Cobb: December 1868
- 7. Arrival at Fort Cobb: December–January 1868–1869
- 8. Winter Camp at Fort Cobb: January 1869
- 9. Winter March to the New Fort Sill: January 1869
- 10. Fort Sill. Exploring the Wichita Mountains: January–February 1869
- 11. Fort Sill. Indian Legends: January–February 1869
- 12. Fort Sill. A Soldier’s Discontents: January–February 1869
- 13. March from Fort Sill to Fort Hays: February–March 1869
- 14. Fort Sill to Fort Hays. Joining Custer’s Command: February–March 1869
- 15. Fort Sill to Fort Hays. Custer Pursues Medicine Arrow: February–March 1869
- 16. Fort Sill to Fort Hays. Custer Declines to Attack: February–March 1869
- 17. Fort Sill to Fort Hays. White Captives Released. Troops Eat Their Mules: March–April 1868
- 18. Mustered Out. Following the Family Westward: March–April 1868
- 19. Homesteading in Jewell County: May 1869
- III. Frontier Patrols With the Kansas State Militia: 1869–1870
- 20. Company D Patrols North Central Kansas: May–October 1869
- 21. Contacts with Settlers and Kansas Geological Survey: May–October 1869
- 22. My First buffalo Kill: Fall 1869
- 23. Discharged from the Militia and Trapping Beaver: November 1869
- 24. Hunting and Trapping Forays: Winter 1869–1870
- IV. Jewell City Beginnings: 1870
- 25. The Buffalo Militia and Fort Jewell: Spring 1870
- 26. Jewell City Celebrates the Fourth of July: May–1870
- 27. Organizing Jewell County: July–September 1870
- V. Settling Smith County: 1870–1872
- 28. Locating Townsites for Gaylord and Cedarville: September 1870
- 29. The First building in Gaylord: 1871
- 30. Organizing Smith County: Fall–Spring 1871–1872
- VI. Following the Frontier West to Decatur County: 1872–1873
- 31. Exploring Decatur County: Fall–Winter 1872–1873
- 32. Homesteading in Decatur County: Winter–Fall 1873
- VII. Hunting and Trapping Adventures on the Great Plains: 1873–1874
- 33. An Omaha Indian Buffalo Hunt in Northwestern Kansas: October 1873
- 34. On the Range for Buffalo, Beaver, Otter, and Wolves; October –November 1873
- 35. More Hunting Adventures: November–December 1873
- 36 Buffalo Camp on the Republican River: December 1873
- 37. Beaver Trapping Tactics: January–March 1874
- 38. Hunting and Trapping on Big Timber Creek: March#8211;April 1874
- 39. Hunting Buffalo on the State Line Trail: April 1874
- 40. A Prairie Storm Scatters the Horses: April 1874
- 41. Two Lance’s Lakotas Visit the Camp: May 18774
- 42. Buffalo Hunting on the Republican and Big Timber: June–August 1874
- 43. A Friendly Parting of the Ways: August–October 1874
- 44. A Moonlight Hunt on the Republican: October 1874
- 45. Buffalo Camp on the North Fork of the Republican: October 1874
- VIII. Life With the Lakota: 1874–1875
- 46. A Visit from Sitting Bull and Big Horse: November–December 1874
- 47. Lakota Neighbors on the Republican: December 1874
- 48. Lessons in Tribal Justice: January 1875
- 49. Storms in Eastern Colorado: January 1875
- 50. Taking Hides to Julesburg, Colorado: February 1875
- 51. Accused of Stealing Indian Ponies: March 1875
- 52. Hired to Recover Stolen Horses: March–April 1875
- 53. Cheyenne Massacre on the Middle Fork of the Sappa
- IX. On the Trail of Horse Thieves: 1875
- 54. Captured by Horse Thieves: June 1875
- 55. Hunting Down the Outlaws: Summer 1875
- 56. The Fate of the Horse Thieves: Fall 1875
- X. Two Years as a Cowboy: 1876–1878
- 57. An Introduction to Cattle Herding: Spring 1876
- 58. Herding for High and Mayfield and the Adair Brothers:April–July 1876
- 59. Riding for Quinlan and Montgomery and Elwin Webber: Summer–Fall 1876
- 60. A Big Roundup on the Smoky Hill River: 1878
- 61. Driving a Herd on the Great Texas Cattle Trail:July 1878
- 62. Giving Lessons to Greenhorns: August 1878
- 63. Headed Home to a Crisis: August–September 1878
- XI. Cavalry Messenger and Scout: 1878
- 64. In Pursuit of Northern Cheyenne Bands: September–November 1878
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
