Rensselaer Union, Volume 9, Number 24, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 March 1877 — A Lively Town. [ARTICLE]

A Lively Town.

Yesterday afternoon this office waa visited by Harry Williams, an old Oomstocker, who has for some months past been ttying his luck in the Black Hills with good results. Mr. Williams is a keen observer of events, and does not require to be pumped to be induced to tell what he knows, “Tell us all about Deadwood, Mr. Williams.” “Deadwood may be considered a pretty lively town: that is, lively for a town of 2,000 inhabitants. Of course, it’s the central camp, where all the gambling, fighting and business is done. Everything goes on a grand rush night and day. There is no regularity about anything. A man opens a place of business and makes lots of money, then he gets the prospecting fever, starts for the gulches and shuts up his shebang. When a place is closed up it means that the owner is out digging, has been killed in a fight, or is ofi on a spree. We have no municipal government at all. Every man thinks he’s Mayor of the town. Every once In a while the boys call a mass meeting, draw up resolutions, etc., and decide to incorporate the town aiel have a Board of Alder men;’ but at the end of the week nobody knows what has become of the resolutions or the Aidermen. We start a new city government eveiy two weeks and bust one every week—if there is any.” “ How about the theater ?” “ Yes, we’ve got a littfe theater there, not nearly as well fitted up as your cockpit. The orchestra chairs are made of stakes driven into the ground, with a round piece of board about the size of your hand nailed on top. Admission, $2.00; reserved seats, $5. They run a sort of variety show.” “Many saloons there V “ Saloons all over the place, and whisky four bits a drink. They put two barrels up -on end, nail a board across for a bar, and deal it out. A miner who wants to treat pours some goid-dust on the barrel-head and says. ‘Set ’em up.’ They never weigh the dust. Sometimes a man won’t put down enough dust, but they never say a word; and if he’s a little tight and pours out ten or fifteen dollars’ worth, they never mention it. They have three faro banks running all the while. They don’t use checks for the boys; when they won a pile of checks they threw ’em all over the place, and some* were too drunk to handle ’em. So, the checks got played out. Now a man puts a little gold-aust in a dollar greenback and it goes for two dollars. Ten dollars’ worth of dust in a ten-dollar greenback goes for twenty, and so on. They never weigh dust at all, but guess the amount.” “Have you a daily paper?” “Yes, sometimes it’s a daily, and then when the compositors get drunk ft don’t come out for several days. If a man wants gun wadding he goes and pays four bits for a paper. Whenever they start a new city government they print a lot of ordinances; then there’s a grand rush for the paper. Sometimes it. comes out twice a week, and sometimes twice a day. “Much shooting?” “Oh, yes; the boys are all on the shoot. Every man carries about fourteen pounds of firearms hitched to his belt, and they never pass any words. The fellow that gets his gun out first is the best man, and they lug off the other fellow’s body. Our graveyard is a big institution and a growing one. Sometimes, however, the place is right quiet. I’ve known times when a man wasn’t killed tor twenty-four hours. Then perhaps they’d lay out five or six a day. When a man gets too handy with hisshootin’ irons and kills five or six, they think he isn’t safe, and pop him over to rid the place of him. They don’t kill him for what lie has done, but for what he’s liable to do. 1 suppose that the average deaths amount to about 100 a month; but the Indians kill some.”— Virginia (Wev.) Chronicle.