Cattle Trails of the Prairies by Charles Moreau Harger

Cattle Trails of the Prairies

A single horseman was dispatched on a lonely ride across Indian-infested prairies to send every herd he could encounter to the new shipping place. He went southwest, crossing the Arkansas River near the site of the present city of Wichita, thence into the Indian Territory. It was some time before he found any of the straggling herds, and when he did he could with difficulty induce the drovers to believe that they would be treated with respect and fairness, so used were they to the violence of the old course. However, many were convinced, and a herd of nearly two thousand head, belonging to some Californians, was the first to break the northern end of a trail over which so many million restless hoofs were destined to travel. About thirty-six thousand cattle, one percent of Texas’ supply, reaching Abilene that season, and every drover went back well pleased with the facilities afforded. The first shipment from Abilene was made September 5, 1867, and was celebrated by an excursion of Illinois stock dealers coming in a special train to see the start. Money was lost on the year’s business, both from damage to the droves by floods and Indian raids, and because of the prejudice in the East against Texas beef, then considered by many too wild for use.

The Range Rider by W. Herbert Dunton, 1913

The movement was started, and 1868 saw a general friendliness for the new market among Texas stock owners, and a northward drive that exceeded seventy-five thousand head. But the succeeding year, 1869, showed a greater increase, and one hundred and sixty thousand cattle came tramping up like a horned army from the ranches of the South.

By this time well defined trails had been located, and for two decades those trunk-lines connecting the great producing and consuming points held their supremacy. The most famous of these was the” Trail.” It was named after Jesse, an eccentric frontier stockman, who was the first to drive over it. Chisholm lived at Paris, Texas, was a bachelor, and had many thousand head of cattle on the ranges in the southern part of the State. Later he removed to New Mexico, and died a few years ago, leaving almost uncounted droves upon his ranches. There was through Texas, reaching down from the Red River, the irregular “Southern Texas Trail,” ending at the north near Cooke County. From the Red River, Chisholm broke the way to Kansas, riding ahead of his herd and selecting what seemed the most favorable route. He forded the Red River near the mouth of Mud Creek, followed that stream to its head, kept northwest to Wild Horse Creek, to the west of Signal Mountains, and crossed the Washita at Elm Spring. Due north took him to the Canadian River, after leaving which he soon struck the Kingfisher Creek Valley. This was followed to the Cimarron. Touching the head of Black Bear and Bluff Creeks, its next considerable stream was the Salt fork of the Arkansas, which was crossed at Sewell’s Ranch. Sewell was a Government post-trader, who was a favorite with the Indians, and had two large ranches in the Territory.

Coming into Kansas near Caldwell, the course was a little east of north, crossing the Arkansas near Wichita. Here was the famous ‘‘First and Last Chance saloon, with its sign-board facing two ways to attract the cowboys coming up across the Territory and those returning from market. Thence the trail turned northeasterly, striking Newton, and so on over the divide between the Smoky Hill and the Arkansas to the prairies south of Abilene. Following Chisholm's track came thousands of herds, and the trail became a notable course.

From two hundred to four hundred yards wide, beaten into the bare earth it reached over hill and through valley for over six hundred miles (including its southern extension) a chocolate band amid the green prairies, uniting the North and South. As the marching hoofs wore it down and the wind blew and the waters washed the earth away it became lower than the surrounding country and was flanked by little banks of sand, drifted there by the wind. Bleaching skulls and skeletons of weary brutes who had perished on the journey gleamed along its borders, and here and there was a low mound showing where some cowboy had literally “died with his boots on.” Occasionally a dilapidated wagon-frame told of a break-down, and spotting the emerald reaches on either side were the barren circle-like “bedding grounds,” each a record that a great herd had there spent a night.

The Cattle Trail, 1905, courtesy Library of Congress.

This image available for photographic prints HERE!

The wealth of an empire passed over the trail, leaving its mark for decades to come. The traveler of today sees the wide trough-like course, with ridges being washed down by the rains, and with fences and farms of the settlers and the more civilized red-men intercepting its track, and forgets the wild and arduous life of which it was the exponent. It was a life now outgrown, and which will never again be possible.

Dividing honors with the Chisholm was the “Old Shawnee Trail” This led to the lesser Northern shipping-point, opened about the same time as Abilene -- Baxter Springs. This city was on the then just completed Fort Scott & Gulf Railroad, and was located in the southeastern corner of Kansas. The trail left the Red River near Snivel’s Bend, about forty miles east of the starting-point of the older course, and ran nearly parallel with its rival for about a hundred miles. Here was a connecting trail running into the Chisholm at Elm Spring. The Shawnee then bore northeasterly on the north side of the Shawnee Hills, crossed the Canadian and North Canadian near the Sac and Fox Agency, then passing through the Creek reservation forded the Arkansas west of Forts Davis and Gibson. Turning more easterly, it passed west of Vinita and so on to Baxter Springs. This trail, called from its passing through the Shawnee Indian country, became as well worn as the older one and was equally well-known. Both were barren as city streets and were marked by the whitening bones of four-footed travelers who had died on their weary journey.

Between the two main trails was the “Middle” or “West Shawnee Trail,” leaving its namesake near the Canadian and going nearly due north until it struck the Arkansas, up which valley it followed into Kansas. Up the Whitewater Valley, then north and east, crossing the Cottonwood and along the Neosho and Clark’s Creek valleys, ending at Junction City, twenty-five miles east of Abilene. In later years the Chisholm Trail gave off a western shoot which left it near Elm Spring, and passing near Fort Reno, went on northwest into western Kansas, striking Dodge City on the Arkansas, also northeast to Ellsworth, on the Smoky Hill. With the settling up of the country, cattle were driven farther and farther west, until this “Western Chisholm Trail” came to be the chief thoroughfare for herds detained either for market directly or for maturing in the bracing air and pastures of Wyoming and Montana. Individual drovers often varied their course from the beaten roads, but for the most part the traffic of the cattle days followed the greater lines as the bulk of commercial shipments is now made over a few prominent railroads.

Along the trails ranches were started, where lands could be secured on either side suitable for the purpose, and northern Texas, southern and western Kansas, and later on, portions of the Indian Territory, rivaled the Gulf region in the production of marketable animals.

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