Journal Notes

With any luck I’ll be able to turn in the last chapter for the second edition of the mail-order bride on the frontier book. The publisher hasn’t decided on a title yet, but they are always good at coming up with great titles so I have no doubt they will do the same for the next book. I met a gentleman a few days ago that had appeared on an episode of the program History Detectives and spoke about mail-order brides. He and his wife found several photographs of mail-order brides at an antique store and used them in the episodes. It seems like many great historical pieces are in private hands. I’d love to find such a collection in my travels – some wonderful artifact hidden behind a velvet photo of Dogs Playing Poker maybe. There was quite a bit of interest expressed in mail-order brides among the readers at the convention I attended this past week. I thought I’d share a bit of what I learned about the subject and included in the introduction of the new book. When gold was discovered in the far west during the 18th century, a billowing mass of humanity swept toward the setting sun with the swiftness of a tidal wave. Prospectors, businessman, and explorers came seeking a better way of life and the hope of amassing a fortune. No matter what riches were to be had or the endless territories yet to be conquered, unattached settlers who made the journey longed for a companion to share the new land. Due to the rigors of the frontier the males were in the vast majority. The few women that did migrate to points beyond the Mississippi were laundresses, cooks, or adventurers with no desire to wed, pioneers with children, or soiled doves.  The need for marriageable women in the west immediately following the Gold Rush was great. According to the October 6, 1859 edition of the Daily Alta California newspaper, it was estimated that there were 200 men to every women. At the close of the Civil War the need for men in the East was as pronounced. Capitalizing on that need on both sides of the country were mail order bride publications. Women and men in search of a spouse placed advertisement and corresponded with individuals they hoped would agree to marry them. The couples could exchange as few as three letters before accepting a proposal. Others choose to write one another for several years before committing their lived to the interested party. Prior to 1865, the cost to mail a letter more than four-hundred and fifty miles was $.22 from where the correspondence originated. Many of the mail order brides were at least that far away.  Women en route to the place where their future husbands were located carried the few personal belongings they owned in a trunk or satchel. An additional dress, bed clothes, lace collars and cuffs, (used to wear over an old dress for a Sunday church service), a family Bible, photographs, and a book or two were all they usually brought with them.
Brides who consented to move west to wed endure a difficult journey whether traveling by stage, with a wagon train or by steamship. The desire to be a wife and have children was so overwhelming women happily agreed to make the strenuous one hundred and twenty nine day trip from Independence to San Francisco. Wagon trains and stagecoaches were hot and crowded and the vehicles easily overturned. Sea travels wasn’t any more comfortable and could be dangerous as well. Mail order brides boarding steamships on the East Coast ventured up the Pacific for a trip that lasted more than three months. Between 1852 and 1867, one hundred and sixty steamships burned, two hundred and nine blew up, and more than five hundred and seventy vehicles hit an obstruction in the water and sank.  The popularity of two mail order bride catalogues, Matrimonial News and the New Plan, sparked entrepreneurs to tap into the market and create their own publications. All were devoted to the proposition that every man should have a mate. Traditionalists criticized the patrons that employed the unconventional method of selecting a spouse. Prospective brides and grooms defended their decision to court via mail with a quote all the matrimonial newspapers and magazines carried. “Correspondence between intelligent young ladies or gentlemen cannot fail to sharpen the wits and brighten the intellect and is an excellent discipline for the mind. It is an educator in many ways, and the practice of friendly letter writing should be encouraged.”
More than one hundred and sixty years after the first mail order bride was sent for, the method of choosing a life partner is still being used. Hearts West II contains stories of the origin of the practice, the romantic unions that came about as a result, as well as the disappointments and desertions. As I mentioned, the title of the book will not be Hearts West II. I’ll keep visitors to the site updated on the change.

Cowboy True worked at the Rocking R Ranch. He was tall and thin and always wore a big smile. His hair was messy and his cowboy boots were always dusty. He spent his days rounding up cattle and taming wild stallions. Cowboy True was a friendly fellow. He liked to make up games and play with the children who lived down the road in a small town called Sweet Water. He had a way of making folks laugh and feel happy, and he never passed up a chance to do a good deed or help out any of the townspeople who might have needed it.

Cowboy True did a lot of helpful things for people. One day he would carry the Widow Martin’s groceries home for her. On another day, he might sweep the steps out in front of the Sweet Water Mercantile for the store’s owner, Mister Hamilton. Cowboy True seemed to be the most helpful around Christmas time. He liked the holidays best of all because the town would be full of happy people needing help carrying Christmas gifts from store to store.

Every Christmas Eve, the people of Sweet Water would have a Christmas barn dance. Everyone in town and at the Rocking R Ranch would get dressed up and go to the dance. The townspeople would sing Christmas carols, exchange presents, and eat a lot of Christmas cookies and cakes. People would come from miles around to celebrate the Christmas season.

One Christmas Eve, Cowboy True finished up his chores, washed his face, tried to comb his messy hair, saddled up his horse, placed his special Christmas gifts in his saddlebags, and rode off of for the barn dance.

Four teams of tired, uninspired horses pulled a line of buckboards filled with coffins over the dry, dusty terrain twelve miles outside of the village of San Juan Capistrano. The wagon drivers and a dozen other men riding with them stared soberly out at the land. Ahead in the near distance they could see a smattering of dead bodies strewn across the semi-desert floor. Misshapen dead horses, bloating in the heat, lay beside their lifeless owners.
As the buckboards inched closer to the carnage, the vehicle’s wheels cut through clotted blood pools spread over the ground. The drivers slowed the teams to a halt and without speaking the men on board the wagons began unloading the wooden crates. Their busy hands then lifted the bodies off the hard earth and placed them in the caskets. All of the corpses were wearing badges, five of the men were deputies and one was Los Angeles Sheriff James R. Barton. Each of the lawmen were riddled with bullets, they had been stripped of their belongings and their right eyes had been shot out.
The objective of the slain posse, dispatched on January 22, 1857, was to track down a cattle rustler and horse thief named Juan Flores. Flores’s criminal activities began in 1855. He had run rough shot over a stretch of Southern California that extended from Sacramento to the San Joaquin Valley. Along the way he recruited more than 50 outlaws to assist him in the looting and killing of ranchers and their families. When Sheriff Barton learned of Flores’s hideout he wasted no time organizing volunteers. The experienced lawman believed he could apprehend the murderous bandit. He had no idea when he was riding hard towards the area where Flores was last seen that he was riding into an ambush.
Once the Sheriff’s body and that of his deputies were secured in the coffins the boxes were stacked inside the buckboards. Another posse was sent out to find Flores and bring him to justice, now not only for his existing sins, but for the brutal slaying of Barton and his men. The search for Flores was the largest manhunt in Old West history.
Juan Flores was born in 1835 in Santa Barbara, California. His parents were well respected members of the community and proud of the handsome son they believed would grow up to be an exceptional man. It is not known what prompted Flores to abandon the high hopes his mother and father had for him and embark on a life of crime. Historians suggest that the Floreses were a struggling family of farmers and that Juan aspired for a more affluent lifestyle. He was not opposed to achieving his goal illegally either. He left home at 17 and joined a gang of ruthless cattle rustlers made up of American drifters, Mexican bandits, ex-convicts, fugitives and army deserters.
Cattle was a critical element of the West’s economy. California grown beef used to supply the growing population of prospectors and immigrant families and it increased daily in price. Because of the escalated cost the territory was infested with bands of cattle thieves committing depredations upon the ranges. Ranchers not only had to worry about bandits stealing from them, but hungry and desperate Native Americans as well. Some cattle owners lost their entire herds to either the Indians or the rustlers. Flores rode with a bandito bunch that raided cattle farms around the area of Rancho Santa Margarita. He primarily focused on stealing horses and was eventually arrested for the offense in 1856. He was tried and convicted and was ordered to serve his time in the jail at San Quentin. Flores was bitter over his circumstances and restless with the wait inside a cell. Anxious to be free, he teamed up with a hundred other inmates in a massive jailbreak. The plans were thwarted before the prisoners were able to flee the premises, however.
Flores was discouraged, but not defeated. With the help of several fellow outlaws, his second attempt to bust out of prison was a success. The elaborate escape involved overtaking the crew onboard a ship docked at the wharf at Point San Quentin. The inexperienced bandit sailors steered the vessel out of the harbor amidst a barrage of gunfire from prison guards and law enforcement. The lawless crew navigated the ship through the open waters, making it to the Contra Costa shoreline where they docked. The men then split up and went their separate ways.
Law enforcement combed the hills around Santa Barbara looking for Flores and the others, but the felons could not be found. Flores had managed to allude the lawmen making his way to San Luis Obispo. Once he reached the picturesque town, the ambitious renegade immediately began enlisting a host of like-minded criminals to join him in his illegal ventures.
The most savage of all of Flores’s recruits was 20 year-old Andres Fontes. Fontes claimed he was driven to a life of crime by Sheriff James Barton. The two had been in love with the same woman when Barton accused Fontes of stealing a horse to get rid of him. Fontes spent two years in prison and vowed to kill Barton when he was released. His hatred for law enforcement and bent toward lawbreaking made he and Flores natural allies.
Bandits were drawn to Flores’s charm and criminal vision. He organized and led more than 50 men on numerous cattle rustling raids. It was an easy transition from cattle rustling to robbery for Flores. He organized the looting of small towns, stage holdups, and the ransacking of prospector’s camps. He and his men also kidnapped lone travelers and held them for ransom. Dead bodies were often times left in the wake of the mayhem. Residents in mining communities throughout the state were petrified of the fugitive. Flores fueled the fear with bold, public acts of violence. In late 1856, the bandit and his gang snatched a German settler off a trail outside of San Diego. They demanded the victim pay a hefty sum for his release, but the settler refused. Flores made an example of the man in the town square. With hundreds looking on, he shot the stubborn emigrant to death.
With the help of his love interest, Chola Martina, Flores and his desperados invaded the homes and businesses of two well-known mercantile owners in San Juan Capistrano. One of the men was murdered trying to protect his property. News of the outlaw’s continual vicious attacks prompted Los Angeles Sheriff Barton to form a posse and set out after the murderers and thieves. Barton had been informed that Flores’ band was some 50 men strong, but he believed the number had been exaggerated by hysterical crime victims. The Sheriff’s underestimation of the strength of Flores’s gang resulted in his death. One of the men that gunned down Barton was Andres Fontes. At last he had his revenge.
General Don Andres Pico, a prominent Los Angeles land owner, ranger and the brother of the last Mexican Governor of California, took charge of forming a posse after the slaughter of Barton and his deputies. Pico pulled together a 51 man army of Mexicans and Americans to go after Flores. Pauma Indian leader, Manuelito Cota in Temecula, joined the General in his efforts. Manuelito recruited 43 Indians for the task. A group of enraged citizens in the San Diego area made up a third posse out to track down Flores. Pauma scouts ventured ahead of the posses to look for clues as to where the bandit might have fled. The location of Flores camp was finally narrowed down to the mountains around El Cariso. With the assistance of one of Flores’s former gang members, Pico’s Californians, as they were known, were able to find the exact location of Flores’s cabin hideout. The Californians attacked the shelter under the light of a full moon. The desperados inside fired on the posse killing or wounding many of their pursuers. Some of the bandits were shot while trying to make a run for their horses, others were captured unharmed and some managed to get away. Juan Flores and Andres Fontes were two who escaped.
Flores and Fontes were lost in the smoke of gunfire and vanished into the tangled mountain thicket. General Pico sent for reinforcements and shortly after his supply of guns, ammunition and men were replenished, he continued the pursuit of the outlaw. On February 1, 1857, a faction of the posse headed by Doctor J. Gentry from Los Angeles, cornered Flores and two of his companions near Santiago Mountain. The bandits shot it out with the posse members, but realizing they were outnumbered they surrendered. Flores and his diminished band of followers were escorted to a nearby ranch were they were placed under guard in a weathered adobe building. The prisoner’s stay was meant to be temporary. Given Flores’s previous success at escaping his captures, the authorities wanted more law enforcement on hand to escort the criminal to the Los Angeles jail.
In spite of the precautions taken, Flores wriggled out of his cuffs and broke out of the crumbling, clay holding cell. Posse member’s tempers flared at the news that Flores had gotten away. General Pico ordered his deputies to immediately put to death the members of Flores’s gang that were arrested with him. Pico then helped enlist more than 120 men to join the manhunt to find Juan Flores. For eleven days, one of the largest posse assembled in the Old West searched the territory along the Los Angeles River between San Juan Capistrano and Temecula.
Almost 24 hours after Flores had escaped he was stopped by two armed sentinels patrolling the grounds at a Simi Valley ranch. He lied about his identity, but his suspicious behavior led the guards to take him to the ranch owner to be questioned further. The land baron recognized the bandit and informed his men that the scoundrel in custody was none other than Juan Flores. Flores was taken to Los Angeles where he was tried and sentenced to death. After his trial ended on February 14, 1857, a hostile crowd surrounded the jail demanding the notorious outlaw be turned over to them. They wanted Flores hung at that moment. On February 21st the criminal was turned over to the enraged mob and they led him to the gallows.
Before the noose was placed around his neck, Flores’s arms and legs were bound and his eyes were covered with a white handkerchief. He whispered a few last words and then the trap door was sprung. He did not die instantly. The fall was shorter than planned and the rope was a bit too long. After a gruesome six minute struggle it was over. Flores was 22 years-old when he died.

Hundreds of excited children, with hard-earned nickels and dimes clutched tightly in their fists, exchanged their money for a ticket at Saturday matinees across the country in the 1940s. The chance to see singing cowboy Roy Rogers, his horse, Trigger, and leading lady Dale Evans come up against the West’s most notorious criminals brought young audiences to theatres in droves. And, in the process, it elevated western musicals to one of the most popular film genres in history.

Roy Rogers and Dale Evans were the reigning royalty of B-rated westerns for more than a decade. They helped persuade moviegoers that good always triumphs over evil in a fair fight and that life on the open range was one long, wholesome sing-along. Together, the King of the Cowboys and the Queen of the West appeared in more than 200 films and television programs.

Roy and Dale made their first pictures together in 1994. The film, The Cowboy and the Senorita, brought an estimated 900,000 fans to movie houses in America and began a partnership for the couple that lasted fifty-two years. The chemistry between Roy and Dale was enchanting, and together they were an entertainment powerhouse. In addition to their films, they had popular radio programs, comic book series, albums, and a long list of merchandise (including clothes, boots, and toys), all bearing their names.

Roy and Dale were successful individuals, as well, Dale, a talented singer-songwriter, performed with big band orchestras, shared the stage with Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy, and penned many popular tunes, including the song that would be Roy and Dale’s theme, “Happy Trails.” Roy was a co-founder and member of the group the Sons of the Pioneers. The band made a name for itself singing original country music songs, including “Cool Water” and “Tumblin’ Tumbleweeds.”

Roy Rogers and Dale Evans were married in 1947. As a couple they were consistently ranked in the top ten among the western stars at the box office. They costarred in twenty-nine movies and recorded more than 200 albums together. In 1951, they parlayed their fame to the small screen, appearing in a half-hour television show aptly called The Roy Rogers Show.

When they weren’t working, the western icons spent a great deal of time visiting children in hospitals and orphanages. They were dedicated Christians who sought to serve the hurt and needy. They would later be recognized by national civic organizations for their humanitarian efforts.

Roy and Dale’s off-screen life was filled with a great deal of love and happiness. They had nine children, whom they adored and showered with affection. Their family was no stranger to tragedy though. One child, Robin, died of complications associated with Down syndrome. An adopted daughter, Debbie, died in a church bus accident when she was twelve; their adopted son, Sandy, suffered as accidental death while serving in the military in Germany. Robin’s death inspired Dale to write Angel Unaware, the first of her more than twenty books.

After the couple was semi-retired from the entertainment industry, they greeted fans at the museum in Victorville, California, and enjoyed life with their children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. Thousands of western enthusiasts and fans alike now make the pilgrimage to Branson, Missouri, where the Roy Rogers-Dale Evans Museum is currently located. They come to get a glimpse of their heroes’ six-shooters, boots, costumes, and other personal artifacts on display.

The Rogers family’s collection of priceless items elicits fond memories of an inspirational pair who used their immense talent to encourage moral and spiritual strength. The artifacts draw visitors back in time to when knights of the American plains yodeled, wore white hats and fancy boots, and thrived on defeating the outlaws and rescuing the defenseless.