An Excerpt From The Many Loves of Buffalo Bill
Introduction
“If he isn’t a pet with the women he ought to be.”
Female newspaper reporter, J.M.W. observation in an article entitled “Colonel Cody Talks” – 1894
A sea of elegantly dressed, excited guests lined the hallway of a refined hotel in Omaha, Nebraska. The buzz of conversation was deafening as they clustered into an opened door leading to a gigantic suite. Waiters in tails and white gloves weaved around the congregation carrying trays of champagne-filled glasses. It was the winter of 1877, and people from all walks of life were at the posh inn. Entertainers, businessmen and women, cattle barons, and politicians helped themselves to the abundance of wine and toasted one another’s good fortune.
The chatter and drinks were set aside when the guest of honor arrived on the scene. The entire room was galvanized into a tumultuous applause as 31 year-old William F. Cody entered and made his way through the crowd. He smiled appreciatively in response to the enthusiastic welcome. The 6’1 man was draped in a tuxedo-style waist coat, vest, and perfectly pressed trousers. (1)
His dark, curly, shoulder-length hair, thin mustache, and small goatee completed his handsome, polished look.
Beautiful women in taffeta gowns and lace bonnets jockeyed for a place beside him. He reveled in the attention and politely allowed one of the coquettish disciples to slide her dainty arm into the crook of his.
He held the audience that had gathered around him captive with his genteel manner and fascinating tales of life on the wild frontier. “I was fourteen when I signed on as one of the Pony Express riders,” William proudly announced. “They argued that I was too young for the job, but I insisted I could do it, and finally they gave me the shortest route, a ride of thirty-five miles with three changes of ponies.” (2) William explained to the crowd that he rode seventy miles everyday for three months. “When it became apparent to the men in charge that the boys could do better than forty-five miles a day the stretches were lengthened,” he continued. “The pay of the rider was from $100 to $125 a month. It was announced that the further a man rode the better would be his pay…. In stretching my own route I found myself getting further and further west. I never was quite sure when I started out when I should reach my destination or whether I should never reach it at all.”
William’s admirers gushed and commended him for his service. As he was graciously accepting the praise, his wife Louisa entered the room from an adjoining suite and faded inconspicuously into the crowd. She surveyed the inspired faces watching her husband, taking particular notice of the ladies flanking him on either side. The petite, porcelain- skinned woman fought to maintain her composure as one of the brazen females leaned in closely to William and whispered in his ear. He grinned a school boy grin and casually glanced around the room. His expression changed slightly when his eyes met Louisa’s. (3)
The occasion for the well-attended event in which the troubled couple were present was a farewell party for William’s theatrical troupe. The marriage, already strained due to months of separation, was further harassed by rumors of infidelity. Louisa had spent the better part of her relationship to William struggling with insecurities. (4) Vying for his attention was the vast, untamed plains, the love of adventure and scouting, and the intoxicating limelight. When they were first married, she tried to get him to settle into a predictable and steady lifestyle. William made a valiant effort. He purchased an inn in Leavenworth, Kansas and tended to the needs of travelers passing through. His overly generous nature nearly brought the business to ruin, however.
Guests with little or no money were allowed to stay at the hotel for free, and meals were included in the price. (5)
In addition to William’s abysmal business practices, there was an absent, far-off expression that lingered in his eyes. Louisa’s sympathy for his passion to travel was heightened by the many books on the subject of frontier life. Knowing he would never truly be happy as a landlord, she released him from the obligation of the inn and sent him back to work on the open range. In the decade since that time, William had been appointed Chief of Scouts for the Fifth U.S. Cavalry, won the Medal of Honor with George Custer, and hunted buffalo for the railroad which subsequently earned him the nickname Buffalo Bill. Along with those accomplishments William and Dime Novelist Ned Buntline formed a successful theatrical troupe with Bill Hickok and Texas Jack Omohundro called the Buffalo Bill Combination.
Reports in newspapers and magazines about William’s many heroic deeds helped make him famous from coast to coast. Such notoriety brought more demands on his time. Home and family were sandwiched between jobs such as scouting for the military and performances on stage and in lecture halls.
Louisa resigned herself to wait supportively in the background while William shared his exciting exploits with an adoring public, but she resented the overt attention of many of the women in his sphere of influence. He was a strong, resilient man against warring Indians, inhospitable terrains, and wild animals, but vulnerable to charming female supporters.
The party was in full swing, and Louisa helped herself to a glass of wine and occasionally chatted with a guest or two. The evening progressed without a clear opportunity for her to be in William’s immediate orbit. The festivities slowly wound down, and one by one the guests said their goodbyes and left the hotel suite. Undaunted by the late hour, William continued to hold court with the actresses that had been with him throughout the night. Eventually, they too realized it was time to go and bid farewell to their host by kissing him on the cheek. Louisa’s eyes were glued to the scene. She was shocked by such a public display and even more so when she saw William return the women’s kisses. (6)
Louisa pushed through the dwindling group of party-goers and marched over to William. He could see she was upset and attempted to calm her distressed demeanor. She disregarded his attempt to talk to her and loudly scolded him for his insensitive behavior. A hush fell over the room, and only Louisa’s heated words rose above the quiet. William handled the intense, embarrassing exchange with as much dignity as he could. After she spoke her mind, Louisa stormed out of the room. William watched his wife walk away; then turned his attention to the uncomfortable guests and he wished them well as they made their way out.
Looking back on the incident years later, William didn’t understand why Louisa objected to the entertainer’s simple gestures of appreciation. “I do not think most wives would have felt a little angry to know and hear her husband in an adjoining room on Sunday morning, drinking beer and kissing theatrical girls of his company,” he wrote in his memoirs. “I think they would have been rather proud of a husband who had six or seven months work with a party of people who were in his employ, to know and feel that they were on a kindly footing…. Not one of them got up and kissed papa goodbye, but all four of them rushed up and kissed papa, their old manager, goodbye….” (7)
The Codys made the trip from Omaha to their home in North Platte, Nebraska with barely a word spoken between them. Each was occupied with their own thoughts. William was only 19 when they met, but he’d already lived more life than most men twice his age. Louisa liked that about him, and although she would never readily admit it, she knew that was a big part of what drew other women to him as well.
William Frederick Cody was born on February 26, 1846, in Scott County, Iowa near the little town of LeClaire. His parents Isaac and Mary Ann had seven children total, four girls and three boys. Isaac was an adventurer at heart and, in 1850, set out for California to take part in the Gold Rush. After hearing stories from prospectors returning from California about how difficult it was to find gold, Isaac decided against going west. He decided instead to relocate his family to a homestead near Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.
The first visit to the fort stirred a desire in Bill to travel and explore unsettled lands. “The Cavalry – or dragoons as they called them then,” William wrote in his autobiography, “were engaged in saber drills, their swords flashing in the sunlight. Artillery was rumbling over the parade ground. Infantry was marching and wheeling. About the Post were men dressed all in buckskin with coonskin caps or broad-brimmed slough hats – real Westerners of whom I had dreamed. Indians of all sorts were loafing about – all friendly, but a new and different kind of Indians from any I had seen. Kickapoos, Possawtomies, Delawares, Choctaws, and other tribes of which I had often heard. Everything I saw fascinated me.” (8)
The pull to leave home and head west was great, but Mary Ann convinced the seven-year-old boy to content himself with life on a farm until he was a bit older. Life in the Salt Creek Valley wasn’t without excitement. Bill grew up in the midst of Indians and the wild life of the plains as well as in the very thick of the early fights that occurred between Northerners and Southerners over the question of slavery.
Isaac Cody took a firm stand against slavery and was persecuted for his position. Southern sympathizers threatened his life and that of his family if they didn’t leave Kansas. Isaac refused to go, and as a result his wife and children were forced to hide from groups sent to kill them. Bill, who was an expert with a gun by that time, thwarted an attempt by opposition leaders to steal his prize pony and shoot his father. Isaac was stabbed shortly after the incident, however, and eventually died from the wound.
“I was only eleven years old,” William later wrote, “and the only man of the family. I made up my mind to be a bread winner.” (9)
Young William found work with the freighting company Russell, Majors and Waddell. He helped herd the extra cattle that followed the wagon trains en route to deliver supplies to soldiers in the field. The route originated in St. Joseph, Missouri and ended in San Francisco. William was exposed to a life of danger as the train was often assaulted by Indians and outlaws. He frequently had to help defend the cargo, shooting it out with Cheyenne, Arapaho, and Sioux braves, or highway robbers.
During his first trip with the company, he stopped an ambush by Indians encamped west of Fort Kearney near Plum Creek. William spotted the outline of an Indian and his headdress against the backdrop of a full moon. “I knew well enough that in another second he would drop one of my friends,” he remembered in his memoirs. “So I raised my Yaeger and fired. I saw the figure collapse, and heard it come tumbling thirty feet down the bank, landing with a splash in the water.” By the time the train returned to Fort Leavenworth, news of William’s exploits had reached his family, friends, and neighbors. A reporter with the Leavenworth Times interviewed the boy and published a story about him which proclaimed William Cody to be the “youngest Indian slayer on the plains.”
Having proven to himself and his elders that his future lay in being a frontiersman, he returned to the plains. Among the varied events he experienced was losing a caravan of goods to the Mormon leader Lot Smith and his followers, meeting and spending time with celebrated scouts and Indian hunters Kit Carson and Jim Bridger, as well as trapping beaver and mink along the waterways in the Rockies. While tending to his traps on Prairie Creek, he came face to face with a bear that had killed one of his oxen and a bull. William shot the bear, saving himself, his partner, and their livestock from further attack.
On one occasion William broke his leg during a hunting expedition in the wilderness and was forced to hold up in a cave for more than twenty days waiting for help to arrive. After a stint riding for the Pony Express, he took a job supplying meat for the Kansas Pacific Railroad as a buffalo hunter. In an eighteen month period he killed 4,280 buffalo. He then joined a campaign with Wild Bill Hickok to track down warring bands of Indians and subdue them. At the conclusion of that venture, he offered his expertise to the government and became a guide for the Ninth Kansas Cavalry.
In 1861, William enlisted in the Army. He was 18 years-old. (10)
During William’s long absences working for the military under General Phil Sheridan in the Indian wars and eventually reenacting his life on stage across the country, Louisa maintained their home and cared for their children. Occasionally she would attend one of Buffalo Bill’s show. William appreciated Louisa’s presence at his performances. He made a point of locating her in the audience and calling out her name. “He came forward, leaned over the gas footlights and waved his arms,” she recalled. “Oh, Mamma!” he shouted. “I’m a bad actor!” The house roared. Will threw her a kiss and then leaned forward again while the house stilled. “Honest, Mamma,” he shouted, “does this look as awful out there as it feels up here?” Once more the house chuckled and applauded. Someone called out the fact that I was Mrs. Buffalo Bill. Once the crowd realized that it was indeed William’s wife he was addressing, the audience cheered and tried to coax Louisa on stage. Embarrassed and nervous, she refused. It wasn’t until William held his hand out to her that she relented. “Come on up. You can’t be any worse scared than I am,” Louisa recalled William saying. (11)
“Someone placed a chair in the orchestra pit,” she added. “Hands reached to help, and I was boosted onto the stage, and Arta after me. I was plainly frightened and it showed. ‘Now you can understand how hard your poor old husband [he was 26 years-old] has to work to make a living’!” William boomed. The audience again applauded and William joined them. “After that,” Louisa reported, “whenever I went to see my husband’s show, I chose a seat in the farthest and darkest part of the house. But it did little good. For invariably Will would seek me out, and call ‘Hello, Mamma. Oh, but I’m a bad actor’.” (12)
Both Louisa and William remembered those moments with great fondness. As his theatrical career advanced, William concentrated less and less on wife and home. He was preoccupied with creating a bigger program that celebrated the history of the frontier and becoming an international showman.
Louisa was loyal to Cody and, according to a close friend, “loved him more than most women loved their husbands.” She demonstrated her deep affection for him by spending hours making the elaborate costumes he liked to wear. She was an exceptional seamstress and made the patterns, selected materials, and stitched together the fringed jackets and gauntlets that became William’s trademark. She tried to make him understand the great need she had for him to want to be with her more. She felt if he truly grasped her longing he would be more inclined to turn down the advancements made by other women.
The tension between William and Louisa continued long after the stormy, uncomfortable scene at the farewell party in Omaha had past. For the bulk of their marriage, Louisa fretted over the women who flung themselves at William, the expense of his various love affairs, the potential scandal, and the alienation of affection that followed.
The many loves of Buffalo Bill Cody threatened not only to break up his marriage, but several of William’s friends predicted Louisa’s intolerance of his roving eye would ultimately “bust up the Wild West.”
