Denver: Queen City of the Plains

Compared to the other major cities of the late 19th century, Denver was little more than an whiny infant back in '76. Denver's origins span back to 1858, when the first mining camp was founded at Cherry Creek. The actual city, previously a collection of smaller camps, wasn't even founded until April 1860.

What follows is a compressed historical account of Denver from it's beginnings through 1876. The Reckoning, the Great Quake, Indian uprisings and the continuance of the bloody Civil War have all had their share in shaping the Denver of Deadlands.

Gold Fever

Until the California Gold Rush hit America, Colorado was of little interest to anyone other than the Native Americans who lived in the region and the few trappers who decided to make their living there. The ground was too arid for farmers and a treaty with the natives made back in '51 assured them that no one would settle their land. Other than Fort Laramie and a few other military posts, Colorado was little more than an expanse of desert between the east and west.

Rumors of gold found by California-bound prospectors at Ralston Creek in 1850 quickly spread east, but few yet braved the long journey to Colorado. In 1857, soldiers led by Major J. C. Sedgwick were passing through the area when an Indian scout by the name of Fall Leaf chanced upon a few nuggets of gold in an area along Cherry Creek.

With Ralston Creek in mind, a prospector named William Green Russell began planning an expedition to Colorado. In June of 1858 the party, now numbering over one hundred, reached the junction of Cherry Creek and the South Platte. Their finds were small, and after some fruitless exploration in the area, most of the party left. Russell and a few others stayed, however, and quickly stumbled upon a larger find at Dry Creek's connection to the South Platte. Placer Camp, as it had been named, temporarily held the prospector's interest, but they soon left north in the hope of better finds.

Shortly after the Russell party departed, more gold-seekers from Kansas, having heard of Fall Leaf's find, happened upon Placer Camp. They settled down, and were soon joined by others. When the Russell party returned, having no luck to the north, a dozen or so cabins had already popped up around Cherry Creek and the South Platte.

Although many small towns were created in the surrounding area, most only existing in the eyes of their creators and inhabitants, two in particular paved the way for the future city.

The town of Auraria, founded by members of the Russell party and others from Lawrence, Kansas, was created in November of '58 on the southwestern side of Cherry Creek. A few days later an armed party led by William H. Larimer, Jr. jumped a mostly-abandoned site across the river from Auraria. To verify their claim, they quickly created the Denver City Town Company. The two sites became rivals overnight, both fighting for the same resources and business that would keep them alive.

Denver is Born

The first major business to locate itself in the area was The Rocky Mountain News. It's founder, William Byers, first located the newspaper in Auraria, but soon moved to the dry Cherry Creek riverbed between both towns to keep everyone happy.

The biggest upset to Auraria came when Denver City won the bid on the Leavenworth and Pikes Peak Express, bringing the first stagecoach connection to the area. Businesses, especially hotels and saloons, quickly sprang up around the terminal, hurting Auraria even more.

More people began flowing in to the area in '59, again drawn west by the prospect of gold. With no farms or industry in the area, many people made money off of transporting goods from back east, and shysters found a great place to earn a little money.

Auraria, hurting badly from lack of business and population, finally merged with Denver City on April 6, 1860, creating the combined city of Denver. Although only a couple years old and having few farms and no industry, Denver now boasted a population of almost 5000.

Trouble, Trouble and More Trouble

The next few years turned out fairly bad for everyone in the Denver area, both Native Americans and settlers alike. The Arapahos had long used the area around Cherry Creek as a campground, but had so far only objected slightly to the intrusion. Sight of them mingling freely and trading with settlers could even be seen up through the early 1860's. There were few problems between the two groups at first, but as the city began to grow, so did the problems.

Then, in late 1860, the Civil War began. Denver, still in Kansas Territory, had little in the way of local law support. With the outbreak of the war, the already mostly lawless city suffered even more from gunfights and killings. Most of the locals were from the North which helped to keep incidents down, but the fear of war was still present. To make matters worse, much of the local military, having previously been a major part of the law in the area, was now off fighting elsewhere.

As the war raged on, the government did their best to settle the dispute between the Indians and locals. Talks with the Native Americans began in 1860 in the hopes of gaining control of the Denver area and northeastern Colorado. A new treaty was finally signed on February 18, 1861, but many of the chiefs involved declined to sign. Ten days later Congress proclaimed the area Colorado Territory, in many ways solidifying it's claim to the area despite Indian protest.

Although the natives were generally peaceful, fearful settlers kept the tension between the two groups high. Bad hunting, both due to government intervention and over-hunting by settlers, drove many of the Native Americans to aggression. Attacks on wagon trains, hunters, and farms kept the two groups at each other's throat.

On April 19, 1863, things got even worse. Late at night a fire started in the middle of the downtown, destroying most of the business district. Brick buildings quickly replaced the ruins. A little over a year later, Cherry Creek flooded, destroying much of the city along it's banks, including the Rocky Mountain News building (which was, of course, built on the riverbed itself) and City Hall. The paper resettled elsewhere, and damaged buildings were rebuilt, but many people were left homeless for months to come.

When the Reckoning hit, spewing forth all sorts of evil into the world, tensions between the Native Americans and Settlers again reached a high-point. The whites blamed the Indians for the strangeness, and the Indians blamed the whites for angering the spirits. Open war broke out between the two groups, which the government had little control over thanks to the Civil War.

In a desperate move on the settler's part, Colorado's Third Cavalry, commanded by Colonel John M. Chivington and currently stationed in Colorado, readied for action. Despite the Cheyenne and Arapaho's neutrality towards the settlers, the cavalry made a surprise morning raid on a large camp at Sand Creek which many Indians from both tribes were staying at. No one in the camp was spared. This atrocity escalated the battle between the two groups, spurring already-angry natives to all-out war. In the following week a tribe of Arapahos led by the previously pacifist Chief Niwot razed nearby Boulder City. As time wore on the fighting weakened, both sides running low on war supplies, but Indian raids on mountain settlements and mining camps continued.

Denver was in a bad situation with little hope for salvation. If guerrilla attacks from angry Sioux weren't enough, Denver was beginning to feel the pains of not having any railroad connections with the rest of the continent. After much debate, locals decided that the railroad situation was, at the least, something they could change.

Building the Iron Snake

In 1866 the Union Pacific, although still far behind in it's completion of a transcontinental railroad, had decided on passing the railroad through Cheyenne rather than Denver. This was a major blow to Denver; the cost of shipping things out on wagons was becoming too much for the still-small town to handle, and a railroad was the only real solution. Denver residents, knowing they wouldn't be able to survive as a city without a railroad connection, called a public meeting on November 13, 1867. During the meeting, the decision to build a railroad north to Cheyenne was reached.

Work on the railway began on May 18, 1868. Work went at a feverish pace, and, with the help of Union Pacific backers, the road was completed on June 22, 1870. The UP, it's troubles growing steadily worse with time, still managed to make the connection at Cheyenne upon the DP's completion. Then, in August, the Kansas Pacific gave Denver a direct connection to Kansas City and St. Louis. Despite attacks from Native Americans, bandits, occasional strangeness, and the beginning of the "Great Rail War," Denver now had it's own rail connection to the east.

With the coming of the Great Quake and subsequent ghost rock rush, Denver grew from a small mining supply town to a full-blown city. Denver's location made it a prime spot for people to gather their supplies before heading east to strikes in the Rockies or west to the Maze. Additionally, Denver's new railroad connections placed it as far west as one could travel on train. With all the incoming business brought by the rush, many prominent businessmen who had moved to Cheyenne back in 1867, including innkeeper Barney Ford and gambling tycoon Edward Chase, moved back to Denver. Denver's new-found wealth also led to the Denver Pacific buying out the Colorado Central, a competing railroad based out of the nearby town of Golden. With the addition of the CC's land claims, the DP was able to build a web of railways around Denver, up into the Rocky Mountains, and to many other nearby towns and cities. Bela Hughes, president of the Denver Pacific and in charge of the Holladay Overland Mail & Express Co. in Denver (originally the Leavenworth and Pikes Peak Express), was now in a position powerful enough to take full control of both companies. Hughes, Denver's first and only rail baron, was now one of the most powerful men in the booming metropolis.

Denver Expands

Denver was now set to become one of the most influential cities in America. Business, wealth and population all fed off of each other; the more immigration to the area, the wealthier the locals became and the more business boomed, which in turn drew more people to the Queen City of the Desert. There seemed to be at least one train entering or leaving the city at any moment, downtown was constantly bustling with people, and the major players in Denver politics and business were increasing their hold on the city. By 1876 the city had over 30,000 permanent residents, plus thousands more "jus' passin' through."

Among the changes taking place in the city following the railroads was crime and it's prevention. The Pinkerton Detective Agency set up shop shortly after the first train steamed in to Denver, and in 1874 the Denver Police Department, headed by Chief of Police J. C. McCallin, was officially created. US Marshals, fearing the Confederates might take an interest in Denver, began patrolling the city heavily in the early 1870's. However, the lawlessness which fed off the chaotic environment of the city proved to be too much. Shoot-outs between the law and criminals, criminals and criminals, Northerners and Southerners, and just about every other combination possible were occurring on a daily basis and steadily getting worse. With problems beginning as early as 1870, residents began moving out of the city towards the safer suburbs springing up nearby.

The exodus of people from central Denver to the suburbs led to the development of a streetcar system; most people worked downtown, a trip which proved difficult from their homes in undeveloped areas around the city. The Denver Horse Railroad Company, soon renamed the Denver City Railway Company due to it's use of mules along with horses, began in downtown Denver in 1871. Although the first rails only serviced a small area along Larimer street, they quickly began spreading to more outlying areas, along which the first streetcar suburbs were built. In 1873 a second line was built, and by 1876 streetcar rails criss-crossed the city and the new residential towns surrounding it.

In early 1876, Colorado Territory was officially made a state with Denver serving as it's capitol. The South, not wanting the trade center to be under complete control by the North, followed suit by declaring Colorado as a Confederate state. Although Colorado had basically been a Union territory from the start, the current stalemate in the war was enough to allow the Confederates to push troops up into Colorado, which the Union countered with it's own small detachment of soldiers. Although no major battles have so far occurred between the two forces, troops from both sides have made raids against targets in Denver. Deserters from both sides often end up in Denver, adding to the confusion, and half of the trains chugging through the city are (un)knowingly bound for destinations on both sides of the battlefront.

In the first few months of 1876, a couple other important incidents occurred. On May 4th, Police Chief McCallin was murdered by a group of bank robbers. City Marshal David J. Cook took over the office, and an investigation into the murder was started immediately. However, the case was settled on the 13th when all four men were found hanging from the rafters inside the bank the incident had occurred in. A week later the Denver Pacific number 7, a large and experimental train that had just been outfitted to run using ghost rock, exploded a few miles outside the city on it's maiden voyage. All 78 passengers booked on the high-profile run were killed.

Despite the added troubles of army conflict, Denver is continuing to maintain it's place as the trade and travel center of America. So far nothing has been able to stop the Queen City, and it looks like it will continue to grow in the years to come. Only time, of course, will tell...

Deadlands Denver

Preface
Welcome to Denver
Queen City of the Plains
Denver As It Is