Democratic Sentinel, Volume 18, Number 12, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 April 1894 — A Western Heroine. [ARTICLE]

A Western Heroine.

' Not all the heroism of which Western women are capable comes along the line of startling reforms or new departures in customs of living. The every-day experiences of many a frontier woman are not less notable. Such was the case with Mrs. McLean, who, with her busband, settled on the Nebraska frontier early iu the ’7os. Her bravery is yet told of by the cattlemen who then drove their great herds up through the Platte bottoms. Her busband had with great difficulty gotten together a bunch of cows, about fifty in alb and was endeavoring to start a little herd in order to rescue his family from the poverty which hung over the claim. Mrs. McLean had the herding of them, as well as the care of tbe house. One day, when her husband had gone twenty miles to the store, she was compelled to leave the cattle grazing while she looked after a sick baby at home. Suddenly she saw two men ride from behind the hills and start the cattle off full canter, abducting the whole bunch. She wasted not a minute, but, mounting her bronco, was after tbfem. The men evidently thought themselves undiscovered, ana in the bustle of hurrying on the stofk did not hear the pattering hoofs o: the pursuer’s pony as she came emtering up behind. Suddenly one c! the men gave a yell and tumbled ba kward off his saddle, with the noise of a lariat tight around his thros b. Frightened, the other turned to see a furious woman facing him, sa s a writer in the St. Louis Globe-1 jmocrat “What are you doinj ?” she demanded, fiercely. “Who are you?" he : esponded, with equal gruffness. “I own these cattle, and you have got to help me drive tiem back where you got them. ” As she held a cod ed revolver to* ward his head he dec ded to submit, and, with her following closely, rode around the scattered nerd and turned their heads homeward. For three miles the stock was ijrlven, and then, with'a warning not to look backward, the depredatof was dismissed. He fled without a backward glance. His companion, qhoked to death and with neck broken, was found on the prairie, but there was never any Inquiry as to the manner of his taking off. It was enough in those days, as it is now, to know that he had been engaged in cattle stealing. For such the prairies have scant pity.