37° 



RECREA TION. 



old Virginian stock, John F. Yancey was 

 early introduced to frontier life. An uncle 

 of his had been a well-known trader in the 

 great Southwest, of which Independence 

 was the port of entry. His superb outfit, 

 of over ioo pack mules, was well known in 

 that country — Mexico they then called it — 

 and he both made a large fortune and lost 

 his life in the adventurous business before 

 John Yancey was born. Undeterred, how- 

 ever, by the dangers of the West young 

 Yancey, in 1851, then but a lad of 16, made 

 his first trip, going far into Mexico. In 

 1854, after sampling the alkali in what are 

 now a dozen different States, he drifted in- 

 to Beckwourth Valley, California, and put 

 up for a few days at the " House " of Jim 



TASWELL WOODY. 

 Forty-niner, now camping with Yancey. 



Beckwourth, the famous scout and ex- 

 Crow chief. 



When Yancey entered the door Jim was 

 playing poker with a stranger, who, on a 

 flush, put it up to $200. Jim raised to $500. 

 The stranger called and Jim laid down 2 

 pairs of queens. 



The incident was curious because Beck- 

 wourth so rarely played, and because it 

 showed the scale on which the early Cali- 

 fornian conducted all money matters. 



Beckwourth drank seldom and little. He 

 was simple in his tastes and habits and 

 straightforward and gentle in his manner. 

 Occasionally when much interested in the 

 talk he spoke rapidly, " like he was hot." 



In general Yancey corroborates the 

 story, as published in Bonner's " Life of 

 Beckwourth," and especially lays stress on 

 the fact that Jim was the biggest liar West 

 of the Mississippi. Nevertheless Yancey 

 attests the truth of some of the most in- 

 credible parts of Jim's history and supplies 

 some personally descriptive information 

 that, strangely enough, was omitted by the 

 historian. 



Beckwourth, he says, looked like a mu- 



latto, or might have been an Indian, but 

 for his kinky hair, which he wore at full 

 length. He was about 5 feet 11 inches in 

 height, and had enormous chest and shoul- 

 ders, with muscular strength to match, for 

 he weighed 190 pounds, in training. He 

 was a man of reckless courage, a fair re- 

 volver shot, an expert with knife and rifle, 

 and had a weakness for getting married. 

 The quickness of all his movements was his 

 most remarkable attribute. This applied 

 also to his running, for he had legs like 

 those of a deer and lungs like those of a 

 greyhound. He was never beaten in a 

 foot-race and Yancey gives full credence to 

 the story that Beckwourth once, when pur- 

 sued by the Sioux, ran 95 miles in 24 hours. 

 According to Taswell Woody, a common 

 report is that Beckwourth moved to a 

 ranch South of Denver, in 1864, but in 

 1867 became possessed of a longing to see 

 some of his old time Crow companions: 

 and setting out North he joined a band of 



J. H. MOORE— "OLD PIKE." 

 Came to Montana in 1865. 



his old tribe near Clarke's falls of the Yel- 

 lowstone. The band was almost immedi- 

 ately surrounded by a Sioux war party and 

 every one, including Beckwourth, killed by 

 their relentless foe. 



Yancey doubts this story because he 

 himself lived among the Crows, from 1871 

 to 1877, and heard nothing of it. Many of 

 the older people talked about Beckwourth, 

 their former chief; but by the younger 

 generation he was quite forgotten. So 

 much for a race that has no system of 

 records. 



Yancey believes Beckwourth died on his 

 ranch, near Denver, in 1867; being then 

 over 70 years of age. Among the Crows 

 he saw an Indian, named Crazy-Head, who 



