Denver had grown amazingly. There was now no “Auraria”; all was Denver City—and what had been known as “Western Kansas” and the “Territory of Jefferson,” was the Territory of Colorado. On both sides of Cherry Creek many new buildings, two and three stories, some of the buildings being brick, had gone up; potatoes and other produce were being raised, and the streets, busier than ever, were thronged with merchants and other real citizens, as well as with miners and bull whackers.
Mr. Baxter took Davy over to see the lots that they had bought for the sack of flour two years before. Then, the lots had been out on the very edge of town; now they were right in the business district. The Jones family had not cared for them; had sold them for a mere song and had pushed on to “get rich quick” mining. The Joneses had gone back to the States, poor; but the lost lots were being held by the present owners at $1000 apiece.
Mr. Baxter made good his promise, and Dave found a niche (which appeared to have been made especially for a red-headed boy, with spunk, who could read and write as well as take care of himself on the trail) in the Elephant Corral. This was a large store building and yard for the convenience of merchants and overland traffic. It dealt in flour and feed and other staples consigned to it, and was headquarters for bull outfits arriving and leaving.
The war excitement continued. Colorado, like Kansas and Nebraska, sent out its volunteers in response to the calls of President Lincoln. Mr. Baxter tried hard to be accepted as a chaplain, but the examining surgeons refused him, he confided to Davy, because he had a “bum lung.”
“So, Davy boy,” he said, “you and I will have to fight the battle of peace, and win our honors there, at present.”
They heard that Captain Brown had been made a general, and Billy Cody and Wild Bill, too, were serving on the Union side as scouts and despatch bearers in Kansas and Missouri. As for Davy, he pegged along, rooming and boarding with Mr. Baxter, doing his work at the Elephant Corral and studying evenings.
Meanwhile, the staging and freighting across the plains and to Salt Lake continued, when not interrupted by the Indians. The Butterfield “Southern Overland,” through Texas and New Mexico and Arizona to California, which had been carrying the Government mail for two years, had to be discontinued on account of the war and the Apache Indians; and the contract was given to the “Central” route, operated by Russell, Majors & Waddell. This meant $400,000 a year from the Government, and it looked as though the Central Overland, California & Pike’s Peak need no longer be called the “Clean Out of Cash & Poor Pay”; but soon the word came that the whole line had been bought in by a big creditor, Ben Holladay.
Great things were expected of Ben Holladay. Dave had seen him once or twice—a large, heavy man, with square, resolute face; clean-shaven cheeks, and gray beard. He was a veteran freighter and trader on the plains, and had been in business in Salt Lake, California, St. Louis and New York, and was a hustler. He hastened to increase the service of his stage line. No expense or trouble was too much for him. The line was known now as “Ben Holladay’s Line,” and “The Overland Stage.” The old route north from Julesburg and around by Fort Laramie was changed to a shorter route (the route which Mr. Baxter had helped survey for Russell, Majors & Waddell at the time when he picked up Dave at Laramie), which from Latham, sixty miles north of Denver, veering northwest crossed the mountains at Bridger’s Pass for Salt Lake. At Salt Lake the celebrated Pioneer Stage Line continued with passengers and mail and express for Placerville, California.
The very fall after Dave arrived in Denver Mr. Creighton finished his telegraph line into Salt Lake City, and won the $40,000 a year prize offered by the Government. The California company met him there; the first message was flashed through from coast to coast (“The Pacific to the Atlantic sends greeting,” it said; “and may both oceans be dry before a foot of all the land that lies between shall belong to any other than a united country”); and, as Captain Brown had predicted, the Pony Express must stop. The Holladay stages carried the mails.
Every morning at eight o’clock sharp they left Atchison below St. Joseph on the Missouri River; at Latham the Salt Lake coaches proceeded on to Salt Lake and the Denver coaches turned south to Denver—and usually got in with such regularity that Denver people set their watches by them! There never had been such a stage coach magnate as Ben Holladay. His six- and nine-passenger Concord coaches were the best that could be built—and on the main line alone he used 100. His horses were the best that could be bought—and of these and of mules he had, on the main line, 3000. His drivers were paid the best salaries—$125 and $150 a month. And for carrying the mails he received from the Government $650,000 a year. When, several times a year, he went over his whole lines he travelled like a whirlwind and caused a tremendous commotion.