The Vigilantes of Montana, Part 3

The Murder of Nicholas tbalt (1863)

Although people disappeared, were robbed, were found dead, or had narrow escapes, nothing happened to cause men to band together until Nicholas Tbalt was murdered. Nick's murder in early December 1863 was the catalyst that led to the trial of George Ives and ultimately, the formation of the Vigilance Committee.

He was by all accounts a sweet youth, probably in his late teens, with a gentleness of soul. Although his parents were killed by Indians on the journey West, he refused to hate all Indians, and forgave those who killed his mother and father. He was sent to collect some mules from pasture by his foster father, William Clark. He reportedly paid the rancher for the mules' pasture and started home again.

When he failed to return, Clark and a friend went looking for him, but did not find him. About ten days later, a saloon keeper brought in a frozen corpse that he had found while hunting prairie chickens. It was too badly nibbled by small animals and birds to be identified except by a pocket knife that a storekeeper had loaned to Nick and recognized. By signs on the corpse, he had been shot in the head, then dragged while still living to the place where he had been found.

Clark and Nick's other friends buried the boy in the Nevada City burying ground, then went to ask questions. The questions led them to arrest George Ives, Long John Frank, and George Hilderman for the murder.

They brought the three to Nevada City (in the Nevada Mining District) for a trial that lasted three days and, Frank and Hilderman turnng state's evidence, ended in the conviction and hanging of Ives, banishment for Hilderman, and freedom for Frank.

(Next: Forming the Vigilantes)

 

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