(Owen Joshua Tolman’s account of several bear and wolf encounters. Owen Joshua is the son of Joshua Alvin Tolman and Mary Jane Gorringe.)
I was born December 15, 1880 in Salt Lake City in a little log cabin where the Walker building now stands. On a cold rainy day I moved to Idaho with my parents in the fall of 1881 with team and wagon. We were on the road for seven days and settled in the Goose Creek valley, now called Oakley. There were only a very few people living there at that time. The land was covered with sagebrush and grass. Flour and meat were very scarce tout there was plenty of wild game in the mountains. At times all there could toe found to eat was dried or fresh venison.
The people here had to dig a ditch with a shovel for eight miles to get water for watering their farms. Money was also very scarce. People were required to trade what they had for things that they needed. I was schooled in a little log cabin where you could get only an eighth grade schooling.
Hay was very scarce too. The stock had to roam the range to find food. I remember seeing lots of bones strung over the land from cattle that had died from the cold and hunger. Snow storms would come frequently ana the grass would toe covered with snow which had crusted over. This cold spell would last for six weeks and the cattle died by the hundreds. Since civilization the winters haven’t been so hard.
As time went on, more people came to settle in the valley until now we have good schools and good churches. A reservoir was built to store the water that came down from the mountains in early spring.
The Indians at that time were very hostile, but the whites were good to them, giving them bread and whatever they had. In time they found the whites were their friends. I have seen a great many changes in the little valley of Oakley.
We now have the lights, telephone, railroad, and good roads. The range being free to everyone’s cattle as well as sheep, there were many battles over the land. There was shooting going on. Two sheep herders were killed foy Diamond Field Jack. My uncle Bill Tolman was shot and wounded and a great many other herders were killed, also many sheep were killed. They would come in at night and shoot at the camps and the sheep. The herders used to move their beds away from the main camp and sleep on the ground. They would shoot at the cowboys when they would open fire on the sheep or camps. The government put the range under reserve and gave each man his allotment. This put an end to the trouble. Now cowboys and sheep herders sleep and eat together.
When I was fifteen years old my father had a small band of sheep and it fell to my lot to herd them. I used to take them in the west hills and herd them during the spring and summer months. I had a rifle, shot gun, and a twenty-two rifle. Squirrels, sage hens, grouse and deer were our game and occasionally a grizzly bear. I used to spend my time with my guns. Hunting and fishing were great sport in those days. We had all we could catch. We didn’t have to hold our fishing tackle with one hand and hang onto the willows with the other and peek around with the other eye to watch for the game warden to slip up on us. Now if you hunt deer, one shoots them, then ducks and watches for the game warden till his nerves get settled and then he dares to come from under cover.
We used to lamb our sheep in the Rock creek basin. The hills were high and steep and small. Creeks coming in from three directions, formed a large Basin. While we were lambing the sheep, the bears would come down at night and kill the old sheep and lambs. I had my brother Osborn with me once when he was twelve. I sent him home over the mountains after supplies. There came a big snow storm while he was on his way back. The snow was so deep in the high hills where he had to cross, it made crossing and traveling very slow. Night came and he got lost.
He couldn’t tell where he was going. Everything was white with snow and all looked the same to him, so he unpacked the horses, made a fire and camped for the night. The next morning he got his directions, found the trail and came into camp.
One night a grizzly bear came down off the high hills and killed several sheep. I told Osborn I was going to kill that old bear when I got through lambing. He laughed and said, “You couldn’t kill a bear.” “I said I could. He said, “How will you get to see it?” I told him I would lay on the trail on a moonlight night where he came off the high mountains.
One day we rode up the canyon and took the fork to the right which brought us on top where Mr. bear lived. During the day there had been a fire in some young pines. We were riding through these pines and noticed a big bear track and some deer signs. We followed the bear tracks a short distance when I heard something run ahead. I soon made for the outside of the brush but didn’t see anything come out so I sent my kid brother in with the dogs.
He hadn’t been in very long till I heard the dogs bark, then I heard my brother holler. I knew by the excitement of the dogs and my younger brother’s voice that something unusual was happening so I loped my horse over to the brush or timber. My brother came running out of the timber. I asked him what the matter was. He said there was a bear in there. I asked if he could see it. He said, “No, but it chased the dogs back and came as close as ten feet. The brush made it too thick to see.” I said, “Let’s go in and see what it is.“
He said, “I’m not going! You can go if you want to.” So I took the dogs and didn’t get far into the young pines till the dogs jumped the bear. The bear chased the dogs back to me, but the young pines and pine needles were so thick I couldn’t see anything, but could hear plenty. I decided it was a bear.
There was a large snow bank just above me so I decided to get on the snowbank and send my dogs after him and then shoot him when he came out. Then I wouldn’t have to get into close quarters with the bear.
I sent the dogs out. They would just go to the edge of the snow drift and stand there and bark. With all the persuasion I would give the dogs they wouldn’t go any farther. I finally got courage to go as far as the dogs and climbed up a small tree and kept hissing the dogs on.
Finally I saw the brush move and commenced firing where I saw the pines move and managed to shoot the bear through the leg. When I shot, my brother climbed a tree to see if he could see me. He had just got up the tree when the bear came out of the small pines where the trees were large and farther apart. He was following my brother’s track.
My brother said, “There he is smelling around on the ground. He’s under the tree looking up at me. Come down and kill him. He can’t hurt you. He’s only a small one.”
I told him to get down and catch him. He said he was too big for that. I kept on the snow bank until I came to the south end of the pines. I figured if I could get in the larger timber I would stand a better chance of seeing the bear without getting close. But the bear beat me to it. He smelled me and started to come my way. My brother yelled that he was coming right at me.
When he came through the pines he had a large log to jump over. He had his mouth open and I shot him in the mouth and broke his neck which brought him down.
My, brother yelled, “Whoopee, we got a bear!” And down the tree he came.
This being my first bear to bag, I got a little shaky after it was all over. I could feel my knees knock together at the thought of what would have happened if I had missed the bear.
The big yellow dog always liked to hunt, and would watch where the gun was pointed, then run straight to the game. This time he got close before he saw the bear, and let out a tremendous yell and started to run backwards. When he turned, he fell over a sagebrush. That night the dog was very nervous and would start barking at every little sound. This dog’s name was Tige and he got so that he liked to hunt bears as well as deer.
On the range were many wild horses and in the spring of the year we would chase them back into the high hills where the snow was deep and rope and tie them down until we would get what we wanted. Then we made rope halters and broke them to lead and ride pack. They were un-branded and belonged to the man that could catch them. This was a great sport and pastime.
While in the mountains we used to set snares on trails where the horses crossed creeks, then give chase and got them started. They would soon get wise to the snares, then we would have to get a new place to set our snares. Sometimes we would leave the ropes set at night and one morning we had a big deer by the horns.
Fishing was great sport too. The next summer my uncle, A. A. Tolman, was herding sheep in this part of the range. He didn’t have a gun in camp so one day he went over to where there was another man herding sheep and ate dinner and borrowed his gun to kill himself a deer. When he got ready to return to his sheep his neighbor went as far as the top of the ridge with him. They visited for a short time then Alexander started down through the pines. His dogs went ahead of him and jumped a grizzly bear with cubs.
The bear took after the dogs. They ran back to my uncle and kept on going and left him to battle with the bear. When the bear came up close to him he shot the bear in the head. The bear fell to the ground. He saw the bear getting up so he threw in another cartridge, pulled up to shoot but the cartridge didn’t go off. He cocked the rifle to shoot again. When he raised it to his shoulder the bear hit the gun and broke the stock off and knocked it out of his hands. The brush was so thick he couldn’t run, and had to stay and take it.
The bear got his head in her mouth. He could hear bones in his head cracking. He had broken his jaw. She cut a gash over the top of his head. You could lay your two fingers in the opening. Another crossed the back of his neck. His left arm was chewed, his left leg was also chewed and there was a hole in his stomach and you could see his entrails. He lay still and she thought she had killed him.
She covered him up with leaves and started to leave. My uncle thought she had gone and started to get up and no sooner had he made a wiggle than the bear came back and gave him some more, covered him with leaves, and left.
This time he lay still till he was sure she had gone, then he got up and started for the top of the ridge where he had left his friend. He was very weak from excitement and loss of blood. He made one yell and lay down.
His friend’s boss had just arrived. When they parted to go to their sheep they heard the shot and heard him yell. They went to his aid and found him in a very bad shape. This happened along about two o’clock in the afternoon. One of them went for a doctor and got back some time during the night. He was laid up for months and came near dying. He took pneumonia after his bear wounds began to heal.
We went in after the gun and it looked like some one had taken a rabbit and beaten it to pieces on the trees. It made one nervous to see where they had their wrestle. The least noise made us look for the old bear.
I took the herd when A. A. Tolman got chewed up. It was a very dry fall and there weren’t any berries for the :bears to eat. So they would come into the sheep.
I remember one evening I came into camp just at dusk, I saw a bear eating mutton. He had taken it out of a tree, torn the sack, and was helping himself. He saw me about as soon as I saw him and was soon in the timber.
One night about eleven o’clock the dogs began to bark and came into the tent and got on top of the bed. They were so scared I couldn’t get them out. I heard the dishes rattle and the dutch oven lid come off. It was so dark you couldn’t see two feet ahead of you so I just stuck the gun out the tent door and pulled the trigger. It was a black powder gun and it made an awful noise and flare in the night. The bear let out a big roar and I could hear him going through the timber.
Next morning when it came light, I could see a big track in the ashes about ten feet from the tent.
The same fall there were four bears came into one of my herds. The herder was on Pike’s peak between the head of Rock creek and Goose creek. The herder’s name was Archie Wallis. He was from Tennessee and was a herder of little experience in the wild mountains. I went to his camp the next morning. He said, “You will have to get you a herder. I can’t stay any longer. There were four bears came into the sheep and walked on their hind feet and slapped the sheep right and left; killed several and some of them had patches of hide knocked off their backs a foot square.”
He said the dogs got on top of the bed. and wouldn’t get off. He didn’t have his tent set up. The sheep milled all around the bed and the bears were as close as twenty feet. It was a bright moonlight night and he was afraid to shoot for fear he might wound one and the bunch would tackle him.
That fall when the first snow came, I went on a bear hunt, set my camp at the head of Big Cottonwood road near where the ranger station now stands. The next morning I started my hunt at daylight. I started up the creek and didn’t go far until I found a large bear track that was leading into the timber south of the ranger station. I followed the track into a thicket of young pines and underbrush. I got only about 100 feet in the brush when the bear jumped, but didn’t get to see him. I followed him all day in this one patch of brush. He found I was following him and he wouldn’t come out. He would travel in a circle and cross our tracks. Night had overtaken me. So I went back to camp.
The next morning I saw his track where it left the timber and followed it for several miles across two canyons. I came on to the ridge where the bear had crossed. I looked across the main fork of Rock creek. To the west I could see a fresh mound of dirt just under the top of the ridge. I knew the old bear was fixing to hole up for the winter. It was too late to go over that night as the sun would soon be down. So I made for camp.
The next morning I took a saddle horse and started for the main fork where I had seen the new mound of dirt, tied my horse up and took to foot. The snow was quite deep and one could travel with little noise. I crawled up where I could see, over there lay the grizzly bear.
He raised up facing me and I shot him between the front legs just below his neck. He made for me all snarled up. I jumped to one side and shot him through the heart as he came over the dump and was dead. The gun was so close to the bear that the powder singed the hair, where the bullet went in.
One summer I was herding sheep on the south fork of Snake River on what they called Red Ridge, just below where Bear Creek empties into Snake River. I was riding the range and saw two cub bears playing on a meadow. I took down my rope and caught one of the cubs. He started to bawl. His mother was near by in the brush. She came rushing out.
My horse was so scared he started to run and buck. He threw me off. I had the rope tied to the harness, of the saddle. The horse went to camp with the cub tied to the horn of the saddle.
The herder got on his horse and came to see what had become of me. He found me in a tree and the old bear on the ground and wouldn’t let me come down. She figured I had her cub, so she would try to climb the tree. I got a long dry limb and when she would try to climb the tree I would punch her in the nose.
The herder had his gun and shot the old bear.
I spent two summers and one winter in Wisconsin with sheep. During the first world war (about 1915-1916) the sheep fed north from camp across a large clearing. A large timber wolf came out of the brush and killed a sheep. I went five miles to get a setting of traps to try and catch Mr. wolf.
I went out next morning to look at my traps and found a big timber wolf in my trap. He was in two traps, one on his front foot and the other was on his hind foot. I saw he couldn’t get away so 1 went to camp and got my pack horse and a forked stick and went back. I put my rope on his neck and stretched him out so he couldn’t jump, then took the forked stick, put it against his neck, and forced him to the ground. I placed my No. ten on his head so he couldn’t get up, then took a buck-skin string out of my pocket and tied around his lower jaw, then around his upper jaw, so lie couldn’t bite. Then I loaded him on the pack horse.
Off to town I went. I took him to Rhinelander. I rode up Main street and started back but didn’t get very far until the streets were blockaded with people. I couldn’t get through the crowd. You could hear all kinds of remarks. I heard one woman say to another woman, “How did he get him on there without getting bitten?” Then one man said, “He’s got his mouth tied.” “Yes, but how did he tie his mouth without getting bitten?” “Oh, he is from the west— he can do anything.”
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