The Montana Stranglers in Dakota Territory

by Ron N. Berget

Overview

The saga of The Montana Stranglers in Dakota Territory embodies the violence and vigilantism of the Old West

In the early 1880s, desperate characters left over from the fur trade began robbing arriving settlers in the wilderness of Eastern Montana and Northwestern Dakota Territory. Gangs of horse thieves sprang out of camps from the Musselshell in Montana, along the Missouri into Dakota Territory, up into Mouse River-Dogden Butte country and ending at Turtle Mountain. Cattlemen and homesteaders formed vigilance committees, including Granville Stuart's Montana Stranglers, resulting in the violent death of fifty-four people from September 1883 to December 1884. They weren't all guilty and there were probably more. Author Ron Berget shares this thoroughly researched, true story of the Montana Stranglers' bloody pursuits throughout the northern plains.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781439676356
Publisher:	The History Press
Publication date:	10/03/2022
Series:	True Crime
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	176
File size:	5 MB

About the Author

Ron Berget grew up on the Crooked Lake mentioned in this book. With a fish and wildlife management degree from the University of North Dakota, Ron went to work with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Devils Lake, North Dakota, and later Hagerman National Wildlife Refuge in North Texas. He left the USFWS to attend and graduate from Dallas Theological Seminary. Ron pastored churches in Minnesota for several decades and is currently Asia director of a worldwide pastor training organization.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements 7

Introduction 11

1 Francis Gardipee: Métis Mail Carrier Turned Horse Thief 17

2 Edmund Hackett: The Crony Capitalist 32

3 Flopping Bill Cantrell: Plainsman / Thief Killer 46

4 Horse Thieves Dancing an Air Jig 58

5 Horse Thieves and Vigilantes in Dakota Territory: Fall of '83 to the Summer of '84 69

6 The Montana Stranglers in Montana 79

7 The Montana Stranglers in Dakota Territory, Part 1: Through the Bad Lands to the Missouri River 101

8 The Montana Stranglers in Dakota Territory, Part 2: Mouse River and Back Home 119

9 Unhappy Endings 137

Epilogue 145

Notes 147

Bibliography 161

Index 167

About the Author 175