Sheep wars: Difference between revisions

Sheep Wars

"The Plains Herder" by N.C. Wyeth, 1909.
Date	1870 - 1921
Location	Western United States
Deaths	~54

The Sheep Wars^[1][2], or the Sheep and Cattle Wars,^[3][4] refers to a series of armed conflicts in the western United States, which were fought between sheepmen and cattlemen over grazing rights, from about 1870 to 1921. Sheep wars occurred in many western states though they were most common in Texas and the border region of Wyoming and Colorado. Generally, the cattlemen saw the sheepherders as invaders, who destroyed the public grazing lands, which they had to share on a first-come first-serve basis. Between 1870 and 1921, over 120 battles occurred in eight different states or territories. At least fifty-four men were killed and some 53,000 sheep were slaughtered.^[5][6][7]

Wars

Texas

Cattle ranching was already a well established trade by 1870, when sheepherding was starting to become popular in the Old West. Because of this, whether in West Texas, or elsewhere, many cattlemen had close relationships with local government figures and they were able to use this influence to their advantage. According to one Texas historian, "In court action, the cowboy [cattleman] usually won." The sheepherders were always considered the weaker, or lesser, of the anagonists. They were often advocates of the free grazing on public land, while the cattlemen typically fenced off the territory, despite whether or not it was public or private land. There were many reason why a cattle rancher would build fences, mostly it was to mark boundaries, prevent rustling, and to keep other people from grazing their animals there. Furthermore, there was also the threat of sheep scab. Building fences across the range infuriated the sheep herders, as well as open range cattlemen, so conflicts like the Fence Cutting War became almost inevitable. One of the earliest sheep wars was fought in 1875, in the Charles Goodnight range, along the Texas-New Mexico border. Later, sheep wars occurred in the central and West Texas counties of Schleicher, Nolan, Brown, Crane, Tom Green and Coleman.^[8][9]

On March 9, 1881, the state of Texas passed a law which authorized the appointment of sheep inspectors, who were to quarantine sheep infected with scab. However, the law only drove the sheepherders "under cover." There were also laws passed that prevented sheepherders from grazing on public land entirely. Enforcement was largely ineffective though, because there were no representatives of the General Land Office in West Texas. In April of 1883, another law was passed that called for sheepherders to present a certificate showing that their herd had been inspected for scab before crossing any county borders. The sheep wars in Texas ended in 1884 when cutting fences became a felony. West Texas also experienced a land rush, around the same time, which sealed off many sheep and cattlemen from accessing public land. In some cases, sheepherders were forced to cut fences and cross into private property in order to reach public land but, eventually, "a type of code was evolved that required the herder to drive his flocks at least five miles a day on level terrain or at least three miles a day in rougher country [when crossing private land]." Compared to other American states, the level of violence in the Texas sheep wars was minimal.^[10]

Arizona

Of all the range wars in American history, the Pleasant Valley War was the most costly. It was fought between the families of John D. Tewksbury and Tom Graham. Though both the Tewksbury and Graham families were cattle ranchers, the former supported the sheepherders when they began entering Pleasant Valley in 1885. Additionally, the appearance of large flocks of sheep on public land, that had been previously used exclusively for cattle, was unnerving for many cowboys so they "began to unite in defending their range against the sheep." The two families had been feuding for at least three years prior but the first bloodshed wasn't until 1885, when the J.D. Tewksbury leased a herd of sheep from the Daggs brothers and had it driven into Pleasant Valley by a Basque sheepherder. Somewhere along the trail, the sheep herder was ambushed an killed by Andy Cooper, a member of the Graham faction and associate of the Hashknife cowboys, who were also in conflict with sheepherders. In 1886 Arizona, it was illegal for sheepherders to move their herds within two miles of cattle grazing land and the Mogollon Rim was an unofficial border in which no sheep was permitted south of. Pleasant Valley was located beyond the border, so, when the the Daggs brothers and the Tewksburys began moving in sheep, the local cattle ranchers, such as the Grahams, resisted violently by attacking the sheepherders. In February of 1887, an Ute shepherd was killed and beheaded about two miles north of the Graham Ranches while he was driving some of the Daggs' sheep through the area. Though no one was ever charged, Tom Graham is believed to have been responsible. The United States Army later dispatched Indian scouts to follow the murderer's trail and, according to some, the tracks led to Tom's cabin.^[11][12]

The situation escalated into a gunfight at the Middleton Ranch on August 9, 1887.^[13] The ranch was owned by a man named George Newton, who was a family friend of the Tewksburys. Members of the Graham faction and some Hashknife cowboys were out searching for Mart Blevins, dead or alive, and they assumed the Tewksburys knew something about his disappearance. The group included five men and was led by Hamton Blevins, the son of Mart and the half-brother of Andy Cooper, who killed the Basque sheepherder. Three of the other men were the Hashknife cowboys John Payne, Thomas Carrington and Robert Glaspie. The final man was another cowboy named Tom Tucker. There were six men occupying the Middleton Ranch when Blevins' party arrived, three of whom were Tewksburys. At first, the Blevins' party approached the ranch house and requested food for the night but, at some point, they rode off and began shooting towards the house. However, other accounts say that the first shots were fired from the men inside the house. When the battle was over, Hamton and John Payne were dead without loss to the Tewksbury's side. Tucker and Glaspie were also wounded and Carrington "escaped with his clothing perforated by a bullet." A clear defeat for the Graham faction, the war turned into a long series of revenge killings and had little to do with sheep after the first encounters. By the time the war ended, in 1892, about twenty-five people had been killed, including all of the Graham family and most of the Blevins and the Tewksbury families.^[14][15][16]

See also

• Las Cuevas War

References

• Hanchett, Leland J. Jr. (1994). Arizona's Graham-Tewkesbury Feud. Phoenix, Arizona: Pine Rim Publishing. ISBN 0-9637785-3-6.