Following Jack Slade's Stagecoach Trail
From Julesburg, Colorado, to Virginia City, Montana.
By: Candy Moulton 08/01/2008
Freight, Farm and Folly
Slade’s violent tendencies eventually became too much for his employers, and they relieved him from his duties. Jack and Virginia Slade left their home at Virginia Dale and moved west, where Jack operated an independent freight line in the Fort Bridger area for a time. But Slade may have wanted a new start, for he and Virginia soon headed north to Virginia City, Montana, a place he had first visited as a freighter for Russell, Majors and Waddell. This town is one of the West’s greatest treasures. Preserved for years by private owners, many of the important 19th-century buildings were later purchased by the State of Montana and are now managed by the Montana Historical Society.
Slade quickly established a freighting enterprise in the Virginia City area and also began operating a dairy farm along the Madison River. When drought overspread the isolated areas of Virginia City and nearby Nevada City, which then had a combined population of thousands who were looking for gold in the Alder Gulch area, Jack Slade volunteered to take a wagon train across the country and through Indian lands to get supplies.
Crossing a territory where there were no bridges across rivers—indeed not much of a road or even a trail to follow—took Slade and the volunteers who went with him roughly five months to travel from Alder Gulch to Fort Benton on the Missouri River, and then return with supplies for the town. This undertaking, completed in early November 1863, made Jack Slade a real hero in the eyes of the people who called Virginia City and Nevada City home.
Hailed a hero, Slade had a brief period of quiet living before he squared off in an argument with a local lumberman. Bystanders kept the situation from turning to gunplay, but a vigilance committee had already been formed in the community, and those men kept a close eye on Jack Slade. Eventually, they sent him a message to leave town. Before doing so, Slade resorted to his old ways: getting drunk; becoming loud and obnoxious; accosting men, possibly a woman; causing a milk wagon to overturn and spill its load; and with others, he shot up the town.
The people in Virginia City refused to put up with this kind of behavior. The vigilance committee, known as the Committee of 100, took Slade into “custody” in the night hours of March 10 or March 11. They sent him to the judge, whom he tried to shoot using a formerly concealed Derringer. Warned to leave town permanently, Slade may have finally realized he had placed himself, yet again, in an extremely dangerous situation. What he likely did not recognize was the fact that this time would be his last.
Angry miners came to town, but members of the Committee of 100 took Slade into custody once again and hanged him before Virginia could be summoned from the ranch. (Remember Williams, who Slade went the rounds with in Julesburg? He was the leader of these vigilantes.)
Virginia later claimed her husband’s body and set off to take it to his hometown of Carlyle, Illinois, for burial. She got as far as Salt Lake City, Utah, when the deterioration of the improperly preserved body led her to inter the remains in the city cemetery.
Almost certainly, Jack Slade’s best days were when he was organizing freight operations, both along the Central Overland Trail from Julesburg to Fort Bridger, and later in the Virginia City area. When challenged with a big operation, he set aside alcohol and his temper, demonstrating capable leadership. But his two-sided personality also turned to violence as he used both his fists, and more often his guns, to settle any issue, staking a reputation as one of the West’s toughest toughs.
Could he stroll into Virginia City today, he’d almost certainly invite you to join him for a drink at the Bale of Hay Saloon or to enjoy a show at the adjacent theater.
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