Moore who stood by, on hearing this, called to Reeves and Forbes who were standing in another part of the room,
“Boys, they have shot Carrhart,” and with an emphatic stroke of his fist upon the counter, he added with an oath, “Let’s kill ’em,” simultaneously raising his pistol and firing at both Sapp and Banfield. Russell at the same moment seized his arm, with a view to prevent his shooting, and in the struggle misdirected his aim. Meanwhile, Reeves fired at Banfield, who dodged under a table and crept out of the back door with a shot in his knee. Sapp, wounded in the little finger, also retreated under the fire of the road agents,—a friend, Goliah Reilly, rushing to his assistance, who also, upon turning to escape, received a bullet in his heel.
George Carrhart was a fine-looking, intelligent, gentlemanly man. He had been a member of the legislature of one of the Western States. Whiskey transformed him into a rowdy, made the company of ruffians congenial, and led him on to his unfortunate fate.
Dick Sapp was a brave, generous young man, very popular with the people. The next morning, accompanied by several Colorado friends, he returned to Skinner’s saloon. Skinner, who had seconded without participating in the attempt of Moore and Reeves to kill him the evening before, when he saw him enter, was alarmed for his own safety, and sought to propitiate him by inviting him and his friends to drink with him.
“No,” said Sapp, “I want none of your whiskey. Last night I came here unarmed to indulge in a little game of poker, and you all tried to kill me. Now I’m here to fight you all, singly, and I’ve brought some friends, to see that I have fair play.”
Moore and Skinner apologized, and begged him to overlook it; but Sapp refused to accept their apologies, and left. Afterwards some friends of Moore and Skinner, at their request, went to Sapp, and with no little difficulty effected a reconciliation.
Poor Banfield entrusted the care of his wound to an unskilful physician, and died soon after, for the want of proper treatment.
Early in the Spring of 1863, Winnemuck, a warrior chief of the Bannacks, and his band of braves, camped in the sage brush above the town. One of the citizens of Bannack made known the fact that he had been informed by a white lad, whom he had met at the time of his escape from these Indians several years before, that they had slain his parents, and captured two sisters and himself. The elder of the sisters died of harsh treatment. A white girl who had been seen in Winnemuck’s band, was supposed to be the other. A few citizens met at my cabin to devise means for her ransom, as any attempt at forcible rescue would provoke the Indians to violence. Skinner called the roughs together at his saloon. They decided that the circumstances were sufficiently aggravating to justify the slaughter of the band, and made preparations for that object. Meantime a half-breed apprised Winnemuck of his danger. Nowise alarmed, the old chief ranged his three hundred warriors along the valley, where they could command the approach of an enemy, however formidable. So confident was he of victory in the threatened encounter, that he promised to follow it up by a general massacre of every white person in the gulch. Fortunately at this time, whiskey came to the rescue. The leaders got drunk, the allied citizens were disgusted, and a murderous enterprise that would probably have cost many lives was abandoned. In pursuance of the arrangements first made at the meeting in my cabin, Mr. Carroll, for a very small consideration, effected the ransom of the little girl, and took her to his cabin.
The inadequacy of the price roused in all a suspicion that the Indians intended to recapture the child. Carroll was enjoined to secrete her against such a possibility. The Indians loitered around his cabin, and finally made an attempt to carry her off. An alarm was given, the citizens and roughs rallied, the Indians released the child, and ran to escape the attack of the citizens. In the mêlée, Hayes Lyons, one of the roughs, fired at and wounded an Indian who was on the retreat, and who at the time was shouting “good Indian,” to intimate his friendly disposition. “Old Snag,” a Bannack chief, who had come with his band into town a few days before, and who when the alarm was given was in Carroll’s cabin, now came out, and was talking with his daughter, when Buck Stinson, another of the ruffian gang, without the least intimation of his design, walked close beside him, and shot him in the side and head. The old man, who had always been friendly to the people, fell dead in his tracks; and Skinner, with savage brutality, came up and scalped him.