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“Willie” [William Boerum Wetmore].

[Unusually long autograph letter, signed, by William B. Wetmore to his mother Sarah T. Wetmore on “the greatest adventure of my life (so far),” describing an attempted holdup and gunfight.] 

Camp in the field near River Bend, Colorado [Territory], 16 September 1873. 4to (12.5” x 8”). 22 pp. bound by cord at top edge, in ink, approx. 4400 words. 1 illustration (2.5” x 1.8”) in the margin of p. 5. “No. 1021” in the upper left corner of p. 1, suggesting that this is a retained copy. CONDITION: Good, old horizontal fold at middle, one short tear along upper edge of first leaf, partial loss to one word at lower right corner of p. 1, minor losses to corners of several pages, no other losses to the text.

A long and vivid wild west letter by a Lieutenant in the 6th Cavalry who fears for his life after seriously—but not fatally—wounding the gang-leader George Graham during a failed holdup and subsequent gunfight with Graham and his accomplices. Wetmore provides an extensive account of the melee (supplemented with a small diagram), as well as its aftermath. In addition to the narrative of the fight, he offers a fascinating appraisal of the nature of society and ineffectual protections of the law in the west.  

Born in New York City to a distinguished military family, William Boerum Wetmore (1849–1919) graduated from West Point in 1872. Following graduation, Wetmore was promoted to Second Lieutenant of the 6th Cavalry and performed frontier duty at both Fort Riley (1872–73) and Fort Wallace in Kansas (Feb.–July 1873), then at River Bend, Colorado Territory until October 1873, his post at the time he wrote this letter. As detailed here, Wetmore was engaged in a violent encounter on September 10th, 1873 with a gang of outlaws attempting to rob an Army Paymaster, during which Wetmore shot the gang’s chief, the notorious ex-Cavalry officer George Graham (1839–1874). Graham had served as an officer in the Civil War and later with the 10th Cavalry in Kansas (1866–70). He was breveted a major for his service in 1868 at Big Sandy Creek in Colorado Territory when some 100 Native Americans attacked the 10th Cavalry. However, in August 1870 he was court-martialed for selling government horses, assault, and hauling a “notorious prostitute” to Fort Hays in Kansas. His conviction on some of these charges spelled the end of his military career. Graham next moved to Salt Lake City, where in 1871 he was charged with raping a twenty year-old Mormon girl named Ellen Adams, who then gave birth. During the legal proceedings, the girl’s stepfather showed up with a gun at the courthouse and fired two shots at Graham, but missed him. Graham subsequently fled Utah after three men posted bail for him, and returned to Leavenworth, Kansas, where in July 1871 he was arrested for stealing a horse. After being imprisoned for the robbery attempt documented here, he escaped from the Colorado Territorial Prison on September 24th and disguised himself as an African American using burnt cork, but was recaptured two days later. After escaping from prison again in 1874, he was gunned down by townspeople in Rosita, Colorado after a number of robberies in the town. 

Writing a week after the attempted robbery and gunfight, Wetmore informs his mother that “so many important events have been transpiring lately & I have been kept so busy that I have not had one moment to write to you about the greatest adventure of my life (so far).” He notes that on September 9th, which was election day, “all the ranchmen in the vicinity came to the station to vote,” and, as if foreshadowing the violence that would erupt the next day, he “knew many would come to camp & knowing [Captain John] Irwin would get drunk, [I] fully expected a row before night, especially as there was to be a dance at the station.” 

He writes that “George Graham was in camp, too. Roberti, the sutler, was going to give a dinner to several ranchmen who had been polite to him, and invited me.” At dinner, “John [Irwin] was slightly intoxicated” and “Graham got Irwin to order a horse for him, as he had important business to attend to, and had to catch the train to go to Lake.” Graham “drank with the ambulance driver [Miller] and got him drunk. This was to give us a drunken driver for the attack” (“ambulance” was a western term for passenger vehicle or wagon). A “slight row” occurs during the dance at the station: 

Graham was joking [with] Irwin about getting under the bed at Wilson’s ranch in that row there, & Irwin fired up and said he had a ball for him in his pistol at 15 paces. Graham went to Lake and after dark the ambulance returned here. Irwin started in with several women and men. I did not go. I have had enough of these dances. I intended to walk in by and by, so as to meet [Cavalry paymaster] Maj. Brooke. About an hour afterwards, Roberti and I walked in. I remember we were talking about carrying pistols and Roberti said he should take his off when he got it, and I said, “One never knows when it may be wanted, and I always feel safer with it. You may carry one for a year and the day you lay it aside will be the day you want it.” 

At about 2:30 AM (now September 10th), Maj. Brooke arrives: “He got into the ambulance and John [Irwin] kept him waiting a long time, blowing to the people who were leaving the dance. He filled the ambulance chuck full with all sorts of people, much to Brooke’s disgust.” The ambulance was coming from Fort Wallace in Kansas and was making its way to the camp of the 6th U.S. Cavalry, where Brooks was to deliver pay to those stationed there. 

Wetmore then describes the activities and robbery plan of Graham and a man named “Dick,” who was in fact John Dyck (a former station keeper of the No. 1 stage station on the Atchison Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad): 

Graham there [Lake] met Dick. They went to bed apparently. Stealing from the house well-armed, they stole two horses and came to the Bend. The road crosses here, and to get over the bed, it runs down a steep bank to the sandy bed and up on the other side. The plan of attack was to shoot the driver as the ambulance descended…Then two loads of buckshot sent inside would settle us, & the money could be easily carried off. We did not take this road, however, as we went on another road to leave Mrs. Walk and another woman there.

Graham and Dick, seeing their movements, relocated themselves for the attack. “The wagon that had been in use for ice, with [a] detail of men, caught up with us. As we stopped it passed on, so that at the time of the attack, it was not over a hundred and fifty years or so ahead.”

Wetmore identifies the people both inside and outside of the ambulance, and supplements his description with a drawing (on page five), identifying each person present with a number. He exclaims: “Just think—driving along quietly, never thinking of danger and the next moment who knew which one of us might be dead!” He describes the action that erupts and leads the ambulance mules to briefly stop: “First thing we knew ‘Halt’ and a shot! Dick (8) tried to seize the reins and fired at the driver (No. 1). Graham (No. 9) fired into the ambulance. How we escaped I don’t see. The buck shot just jumped around merrily. The mules turned around sharply to the left.” At first, when he heard the shot at the driver, “I did not know what was up…[I] thought we were running over something in the road, or shooting at something. I never once during the whole time had the slightest fear. We were packed so tight we could not move. (Mrs. Roberti’s two children were in also.)” Everyone bent forward in the ambulance to avoid the gunfire. He remarks: “I only once remember thinking of danger when, as I stooped forward and found my head behind someone’s back I thought—well, a bullet must hit me in the body before the head.” After the mules started moving again, “a gun was fired at the window. Just then a man appeared at the window (9) [i.e., Graham]”: 

Quick as a flash, I drew my revolver and fired at this figure just as it disappeared from view, by the ambulance driving past. I was on one knee when I fired. My report hadn’t stopped ringing when ‘bang’ in came another load from outside (No. 11), entering the ambulance from behind and taking John in the back. We drove on rapidly. The 2 men stopped, giving up their game. The man on the left of the driver (No. 2) said he saw them and to give him my revolver. I handed it to him, and he fired one shot back. We did not know how many were attacking us and our safety was to get out of the way. We could not have halted as they could have got at us more easily.

After driving a short distance, they encounter the ice wagon, which had halted; they stop and get out. “I went to [the] head of mules but nothing was to be seen around. I wanted to take one man and run on to camp for help, but someone inside said, ‘For God’s sake, don’t leave us.’” Wetmore and Major Brooke nevertheless board the wagon and ride to camp. Once they arrive, the “assembly” is sounded and Lieut. Chickering starts out to hunt for the bandits, “moving the troops forward in a skirmishing order, so as to beat the ground.” The wounded are attended to, which includes Mrs. Roberti, who was shot through the hand, and Irwin who had “about 12 shot in his shoulder behind, and thought he was dead.” Irwin “had been drinking. That, together with fright and the wound, almost finished him.” Roberti, Irwin, and Brooke all had guns in the ambulance but were unable to use them in the fight. Wetmore notes that “in these rows” “it is not the careful aim and long sight that tells, but a ‘quick draw’ and ‘line shot.’” He comments that he can “fire very good line shots off-hand. It is that kind of shooting too that tells in duels. I was very cool throughout the whole affair and was complimented on it.” He remarks that he could probably have “got both men if the ambulance had not been crowded.” 

About sunrise a soldier rides into camp and announces: “Lieut. Chickering wants the ambulance sent at once. Graham is shot and dying by the side of the road.” Wetmore writes that he was at first surprised, “yet when I thought of the man, I did not consider it so improbable.” Graham, he gathers, was shot “clean through the body, and said it was the first shot that struck him (which was mine).” “[Graham] stooped some, when struck, but his last shot was fired, after he was hit. He had walked some 50 yards afterwards, and fallen in a dying condition. They say he was very weak and all thought him dying. His clothes were covered with blood.” Graham was taken to the station and remained there until he was taken to Denver in the company of a guard. In a striking passage, Wetmore notes: “How he had lived with the wound he has is a mystery. If I had known what would happen, I would have gone over when they found him and blown his brains out. A great many say I ought to have done so. Even the U.S. Marshal in Denver… This man swears he will be revenged, and the first chance he gets, he will kill me.” 

In a series of extended passages, he explores the situation he finds himself in ‘out west,’ where the law does him very little good indeed: 

Now, remember, by letting him live, I virtually give him another chance at my life at a future day (when this will have to be fought over again). I might just as well hand him a pistol and say, “Here, take another shot.” Again, the law does not protect one at all. It will, after I am shot, but not before. Here is a man going to shoot me, the most that can be done is to bind him over to keep the peace. How does that save me; he can shoot if he wishes for he is free. Nothing to prevent him. All that can be done is, after I am hit or killed, the law will punish him; but what good does that do me then? The thing therefore rests with me and my safety will be to kill him first and therefore the first time I ever set eyes on him in afterlife, I fire. I will give no warning as that may give him time but must get the drop no matter where or when. Out here I will be justified, but suppose this happened in New York. All would say it was murder. Yet what am I to do? If I don’t fire, he will (for we know here what sort of man he is)…how can I save myself? I go to the police—all they can do is to bind him to keep the peace, but does that stay his pistol ball? No. This is something to think about as law is wanting somewhere. Talk as you please, give me lynch law or none. I would rather have my life in my own hands, for it is safer. When you depend on [the] law, it often fails to aid you. I think probably in New York I could prove it “justifiable homicide” yet it would be hard, for it would seem curious to walk up to a man and shoot him down without saying anything and the world would not know Western ways. You can see now my mistake in letting him live, an action that I will regret all my life. No more welcome news could be received than to know my antagonist was dead. 

He notes that his mother might think it “curious” that he associated with such a man, and chalks this up to the stark differences between social conventions in the east and those in the west: 

we out west here meet all and see all and know everyone, and it is difficult to avoid any particular one. You meet a herder and he takes a drink with you, or a gambler and nothing is thought of it. It is the custom and one man can’t buck against it. Same way, no matter who you meet or pass on the prairie or road, you always bow, or say “good-day,” or give some sign of recognition. This to men you never saw before and never will see again. The same way I am out on the prairie I come to a ranch; I am invited to sit down to supper with the cattle drivers and herders and there take my supper and talk with them, and all that. That I would not do East; it is the free way out here. If I wished to associate only with the high toned, like those at home, I would find none. Remember, on the plains, the life is wild and the customs, manners, and men are different. There are no degrees or grades in society. The country is not old enough for that yet. Some time I had no one here to speak to (as you know).

In one surprising passage, he describes his antagonist in somewhat positive terms: “although Graham was a gambler, in many ways he was an agreeable companion (having no other), as he was fond of hunting &c., so was I and often we went out together.” Nevertheless, Wetmore was “cautioned in Denver about him,” and he remarks that he was “always on my guard and although I thought he would cheat at cards and all that, did not think he would come down to direct robbery.” Indeed, he notes: “it now appears that he was head of the band of horse thieves that have ranged from [Fort] Wallace to Denver and have been troubling the county for some time. We have not legal proof but are pretty sure. On paper I can’t go into particulars of what we have found out from the circumstances that have occurred at different times.” Indeed, as Heidi Crabtree has detailed, “[t]he consensus was that Graham had been part of a gang that may have been involved in a rash of burglaries the previous summer” (one such robbery involving a county treasurer and his wife). He writes that he knows “all in Denver,” and that “many I may bow to in the street, etc., are probably nothing but gamblers. But, as I tell you, here things are different from the East and must not be looked upon in an Eastern point of view.”

He returns to the immediate aftermath of the robbery. One Brooke Francois, a member of Wetmore’s company—“disgusted with what he had seen, and want[ing] to leave as soon as possible”—comes to his tent (apparently on the morning of September 10th) and requests leave to take the 8:30 AM freight for Denver. “I understand [Francois] says he is going to find out why Irwin let such a man in camp and he also saw something of life here.” He writes that “the news flew over the wires and Denver was quite excited over it as they knew all the parties well.” Wetmore sent his mother an Extra as well as a Rocky Mountain News (of September 11th, 14th and 15th). (He offers a correction to one newspaper: “That about my having a pistol ‘by accident’ is wrong. The description is good. As the papers give so much I don’t dwell on [the] attack.”) 

He writes that “there was some fear that some of this band might try to assassinate me for wounding their chief and at night when my dogs growl, I often wake up and grasp my pistol. But what is life without excitement!” He explores his emotions at present:

There is something so thrilling, so fascinating in the idea of danger to feel that at any moment you may be attacked that it sets me wild. While the powder was burning, I was perfectly cool; but it was afterwards, when riding with one party, that I would get nervous for fear something might happen in another direction, and I would lose it. I wanted to be everywhere and because I could only be in one place at a time, I was wretched. 

To his surprise, his actions have won him the affection of many in Colorado Territory:

I can’t tell you how many compliments I have received up and down the road from…LL. Worth [Fort Leavenworth in Kansas] to Denver. I have made my name and even the workmen on the road and the trains all seem to pay me honor for my coolness and bravery and for shooting such a villain. 

Less than a month after the incident on September 10th, Wetmore became Aide-de-Camp to Bvt. Major General John Pope at Fort Leavenworth. He ends the letter on a triumphant if ironic note: “De Russy says I made a ‘ten-strike.’ McLellan also congratulates me on my shot. I am sorry you were worried. Don’t trouble yourselves about me. I had a streak of good luck, that is all. Poor Grandmama. I can see her now. I’ll be home in December, if not shot before." 

Wetmore was an Aide-de-Camp to General Pope from October 1873 to September 1875, and also served as Acting Aide-de-Camp to Bvt. Major General Miles (1839–1925) from August to December 1874. During this time he commanded an Expedition to Indian Territory and saw action on August 30th 1874 in the Battle of Red River, for which he was brevetted First Lieutenant and Captain. After taking a leave of absence for a world tour (from Sept. 1875 to Oct. 1876), he resigned from the army in December 1876. From 1879 to 1882, he served as a Cavalry Major for the 9th Regt. of the New York State National Guard. After his military career, he collected coins and art and became a noted numismatist. He also became a prominent businessman and investor in mining operations and real estate development in Colorado and surrounding regions. Wetmore had real estate holdings in both Herington and McPherson, Kansas. His marriage to Annette Butler in 1882 resulted in divorce, following which he married Katherine Havercamp. He raised the “Wetmore Regiment of Pennsylvania Volunteers” in Philadelphia for the Spanish-American War (1898) but had to disband it, as preference was given to the National Guard who filled up the state’s entire quota. Wetmore died in Allenhurst, New Jersey in 1919.

In Not a Soldier, but a Scoundrel: The Lives and Deaths of George W. Graham, Heidi Crabtree offers further context for Graham’s actions and also provides more details of the attack. She explains that Graham had tried to live at the post at River Bend, but Capt. John Irwin soured on the cashiered civilian who called himself ‘Major’ and helped himself to meals and a bed. Irwin told Graham to stay away from the post, and eventually ran him off. Graham in turn threatened a nasty revenge; it was later alleged after the attack that he had been going around Denver announcing that he “would soon be heard from.” On September 17th (seven days after the attack), it was revealed that Graham had resorted to robbing the U.S. Paymaster after his plan to abscond with $800,000 from the U.S. Mint failed. Graham’s partner-in-crime Dyck fled after the failed robbery, and after an unsuccessful manhunt locals believed that he made his way to the border. When Graham was unmasked (the bandits conducted the attempted robbery masked), the officers apparently aghast as they recognized his face. Graham had been found lying on the ground near Big Sandy Creek—the same creek where he had earned his brevet. A number of premature obituaries for Graham sprang up in papers after he was wounded. Crabtree notes that “[i]f Wetmore, the only armed member [not true, as noted here by Wetmore], had not had that weapon the whole team may have been slaughtered, with Graham and Dyke committing cold-blooded murder for a total of $2000.”

Neither OCLC nor Google yield any traces of this narrative, which seems to be unpublished.

A full-throated and apparently unpublished account of the rough-and-tumble Colorado Territory scene in the 1870s, as experienced by a noted U.S. Cavalryman.  

REFERENCES: Crabtree, Heidi M. Not a Soldier, but a Scoundrel: The Lives and Deaths of George W. Graham (Self-published, 2015), pp. 65-84; Konstantin, Phil. “This Day in North American Indian History” (Sept. 2012) at American Indian online; “William Boerum Wetmore correspondence” at the University of Kansas; “William Wetmore’s Traveling Desk” at Coin Books online; “Wetmore, Maj. William Boerum (1849-1919)” at Newman Numismatic Portal via Coin Books online; “Maj. George Wallace Graham” at Find A Grave online.

Item #7831

Price: $2,750.00

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