A paper written by Diane Elliott, for presentation to the annual Gallatin Historical Society conference in the year 2002 [about 4,000 words], To be read by Marjorie Smith

ELECTA BRYAN PLUMER: Just the facts folks

or

THE GREAT MONTANA LOVE STORY

The story of Electa's husband, William Henry Handy Plumer, has been told till it's fair worn a groove in our psyche; nearly lost in the telling is the story of his wife. Eight years ago, after finishing another novel, a friend [Louis Schmittroth] asked how the project was going. I told him I was pleased with the manuscript, but as a first novel it just wasn't big enough to break into the market. He said, "Diane, perhaps it's time you wrote 'the great Montana love story', the story of Henry Plumer's wife."

I replied, "His wife? I didn't know he had a wife!"

He said, "Hardly anyone knows. And, by the way, Henry Plumer was never the head of a band of road agents. The Vigilantes hung an innocent man!"

"Yeah! Right! And peanut butter ain't made of peanuts," thought I. Nevertheless, the idea of a spirited young woman falling in love with a Jimmy Dean type bad boy in a raw wild-west setting appealed to me. And, I wondered, wouldn't his wife believe he was innocent? I re-read the vigilante apologists, Dimsdale and Langford, went on to read revisionists Mather and Boswell. Then I read historians Diefenback, Smurr and Burlingame who cast doubts on the existence of an organized band of cutthroats during Plumer's short stay in the Idaho Territory. Now captivated, I started digging: in the Beaverhead County Courthouse basement, in the Montana Historical Society Association's archives (MHSA), and in close to a hundred manuscripts, newspaper articles and diaries. By this time, I felt I knew Electa, and I could see Mr. Plumer through her eyes. I did not write the story of my first musings, but I gave voice to the woman I found. Electa was born on the 8th of May 1842 in Findlay Ohio to Mary May Johnson and James A. Bryan.

Today I share with you the "facts" of her existence as I've come to know them.

Electa's father, James Bryan and several relatives came from Pennsylvania to the western Ohio area in 1832 to farm north east of Findlay. To this country he brought his first wife, and 3 children, Daniel (7), James Jr. (2) and infant Sarah. Their last child, Mary, was born in 1835.

After the death of his first wife James married Mary May Johnson of Vermont (19 July 1836, Hancock County records). To them 3 daughters were born. Martha Jane (24 December 1840), Electa (8 May 1842), and in 1848 their youngest, Cornelia.

In reference to the information provided by the 1850 Hancock County Census, Historian and genealogist, Ruth Mather wrote, "that year they were a prosperous family with all the children, ranging in age from 3-year-old Cornelia to 26-year-old Daniel, living at home." And she notes that "James was civic-minded, riding four miles to vote in the presidential election between Jackson and Clay and banding together with three other families to build a log schoolhouse and hire a teacher."

After the death of his second wife, Mary May, James Bryan brought to live with them a forty-six-year-old woman named Mary Ann. Martha Jane was now eleven, Electa eight and Cornelia two.

In the winter of 1855, his health was failing, and although doctors were repeatedly called in, he died on the 5th of January. In the absence of a will, James Jr. was appointed executor of his estate. At the time of their father's death Martha had just turned 14, Electa was 12, and Cornelia was 6. His estate had accumulated debts against it which included a four-year doctor bill amounting to $65, a general merchandise bill of $13.99, as well as a bill in the amount of $10 for a coffin.

To Mary Ann, James Jr. awarded a parlor stove, a cooking stove with cooking utensils, four beds with bedding, a table and six chairs, six plates, six knives and forks, twelve spoons, one sugar dish, all the books, two spinning wheels, all the cloth and yarn, several looking glasses, six hundred fifty pounds of pork, one barrel of salt, one hundred bushels of corn and wheat, one cow, one calf, eleven sheep, three herds of hogs, and $100. According to court records, this property was given in order that Mary Ann would be able to take care of Electa and Cornelia. The rest of the personal property James sold at public auction to pay off the debts against his father's estate. Mary Ann was certain she was entitled to more. Since she and their father had never married, the children were just as certain she was not. Mary Ann hired a lawyer and brought suit against them. In the end, the court found in Mary Ann's favor, granting her, in addition to the personal property already given, one-third of the land and houses. On the 9th of April, 1857, Martha Jane married James Albin Vail. In the 1860 Hancock County Census is recorded James Albin Vail, school teacher, worth $400 in personal property, married to Martha Jane Bryan. Living with them was two-year-old Mary Eliza (named after Martha Jane's and James' mothers), baby Harvey, Cornelia and Mary Ann. I did not find the rest of the family listed in either the 1860 Ohio or Iowa Census.

From executive documents such as The Report of the Secretary of the Interior, MHSA, we learn when, in 1862 the Reverend Reed, pastor of the Methodist church in Epworth Iowa, was appointed Indian agent to the Dakota Territory by the Lincoln administration, Reed offered James Vail and his family (which now included Electa) a position managing the experimental farm.

We can know the geography of Electa's life through government records, journals and diaries. Here are housed the writings of Agents Vaughn and Reed (who replaced Vaughn) as well as those of Government farmer James Albin Vail. Agent Vaughn had the farm built in the hope of turning the Blackfeet into farmers. He leaves us a detailed accounting of that adventure which includes instructions to the builders hired to erect the farm buildings and it's palisade. Between the writings of Agent Reed and Government farmer Vail we get a picture of the trials they faced undertaking the enterprise. Thus we have accurate pictures of the abode they found on their arrival at the Government farm in July of 1862 and the life they lived during their sojourn there.

Reverend Reed wrote that the Vails took passage on the Emilie (a side wheeler built by Captain Joseph LaBarge) and that he came up the Missouri on the Spread Eagle. Francis Thompson wrote in his memoirs that he first met the Vails on board the Emilie. All reports mention the fact that these ships left St. Louis for Fort Benton, and leave the impression that the Vails took passage from St. Louis.

I found the dimensions of the Emilie in the History of Early Steamboat Navigation on the Missouri River: The life and adventures of Joseph La Barge, by Hiram Martin Chittenden. Henry L. Armstrong, Schwinden Library Photo archivist, sent me plans for the Bertrand, suggesting that the boats were very similar in design, Thus we know the lay of the ship that carried them to Fort Benton.

From the accounts of Martha Edgerton Plassman, Frances Thompson, and Major John Owens, we can build a picture of an Electa, about five feet tall, soft light brown hair, attractive, plain of dress, a devout Methodist, and a well-read school teacher who was a delight to converse with.

The Emilie left St. Louis 4:30 pm on the 14th of May 1862. She arrived at Fort Benton about 2PM on the 17th of June 1862. In the journals of Harkness, Thompson and an unidentified traveler as well as in a letter written by Sam T. Hauser to his daughter, dated 20 May 1862, we have a record of sorts from which to reconstruct the trip.

From diaries of men including John W. Grannis, N. H. Webster, James Henry Morely, and David Bailey we get a picture of the pilgrims traveling through the Government Farm. And from the writings of Granville and James Stuart, as recorded in The Montana Frontier 1852-1864, we find a frame that places at least the parameters of time when Mr. Plumer would have been in the Territory and at the Government farm.

Of all the works I reviewed I most trust the information I found in official records and in unedited diaries. As prime examples of relevant entries from the diaries, I offer the following excerpts from the Stuart brothers. "SEPTEMBER 10. [1862] Granville and Woody started to Hell Gate to try and organize our county government, Granville having been elected county commissioner at our election last July, and Frank Woody having been elected auditor. I gave bonds and took the oath of office, having been elected sheriff of Missoula county, Washington Territory. J.S."

"On our way to Hell Gate at Beaver Dam hill we met two fine looking young men. One of them said his name was Henry Plummer, the other was Charles Reeves. Woody and I told them who we were. They were from Elk City on Clearwater, and inquired about the mines at Gold creek and at Beaverhead. They rode two good horses and had another packed with their blankets and provisions. We liked their looks and told them that we were only going down to Hell Gate and would return to Gold creek in a few days and asked them to return to Hell Gate with us and then we could all go up the canon together. They accepted our invitation and in a few days we all went up to Gold creek together...." [G.S.]

"SEPTEMBER 18. Woody and Granville arrived from Hell Gate accompanied by two lower country-men. We played poker last night. Worden was winner. I lost twenty-two dollars. J.S."

"SEPTEMBER 20. Played poker, lost eighteen dollars. Granville and Reece Anderson mended Plummer's double-barreled shot gun, which he had broken off at the grip. coming through the timber from Elk City. Reece forged four strips of iron about five-eighths in. wide and three and one-half in.long and Granville set them into the gunstock on top and bottom of the grip, and screwed them down solid so that the gun stock was stronger than before it was broken. J.S."

"SEPTEMBER 22. Woody and York started to the gold placer mines near Beaverhead. Plummer [sic] and Reeves went with them. I played poker and won one hundred fifty-two dollars. Ed. and Freeman House were the victims. Granville found the out crop of coal in Pikes Peak gulch. J.S."

"SEPTEMBER 30. Woody returned from the Beaverhead mines. He reports that nearly everybody is making money over there. Everybody excited." [G.S.]

"NOVEMBER 15. Major John Owens, Major William Graham, and C.C. O'Keefe arrived from Fort Benton." [G.S.]

"NOVEMBER 23. "...Most of Fisk's train is located here [Bannack] and quite a number of others among them, Henry Plummer, Charlie Reeves, Louis Cossette, the Burchett family, and Buz Caven, his charming wife." [G.S.]

On 11 January 1863 a record of payment to Plumer and Cleveland in consideration of labor performed at the Government Farm for two months in 1862 was made in the amount of $20 per month and equaled $51.00.

In his Reminiscences of Four-Score Years, published in Massachusetts Magazine in 1912 and 1913, Francis Thompson wrote extensively of Electa Bryan's marriage to Henry Plumer. "June 20th, 1863. All the inmates of the fort assembled in the best room to witness the marriage by Father Minatre of the St. Peter's mission, of Miss Electa Bryan to Mr. Henry Plummer. The pretty bride was neatly gowned in a brown calico dress, and was modest and unassuming in appearance. The dapper groom wore a blue business suit, neatly foxed with buckskin wherever needed, a checked cotton shirt and blue necktie. The best man was the tall and graceful Joseph Swift, Jr., who wore sheep's grey pants foxed and patched with buckskin, a pretty red and white sash and a grey flannel shirt, and was under the necessity of wearing moccasins both of which were made for one foot. Being a leader in Blackfoot fashions he wore no coat. Want of more modest and better material is presumably the reason that the Reverend father suggested that I act as a substitute for bride's maid, but I meekly obeyed his order, and my moleskin trousers, neatly foxed in places which came to wear, a black cloth coat and vest and buffalo skin shoes made up my wedding gear. The ceremony was long and formal. Immediately after the wedding breakfast of buffalo hump and bread made of corn meal ground in a hand mill, the happy couple left in the government ambulance drawn by four wild Indian ponies, for Bannack city, the new metropolis."

Ah, what detail this man gives us. How authentic he makes the scene appear. Unfortunately, my research turned up no information to match the event he described. The Reverend Jay H. Peterson, Vicar General, Diocese of Great Falls-Billings wrote, "Our archivist searched our records from St. Peter's Church, and we did not find a record of the wedding between Wm. Henry Plumer and Electa Bryan in 1863.... Also, Father Mennetre (or anything like that name was never listed as having preformed any services at St. Peter's during those years... I am quite confident that the wedding in question was not a Catholic wedding, I doubt that it took place in St.Peter's Mission Church, because record keeping is very important and not likely to be neglected. Knowing that neither party was Catholic strengthens this suspicion, and a priest who is acting in conformity with church law and civil law could not officiate validly.... if it was a long ceremony, then it was probably not Catholic, because in those days they stuck pretty much to the Latin ritual, and it was quite succinct." However, Father Hruska, the pastor at the parish in Fort Shaw said, "...it was entirely possible that a priest would have preformed a civil ceremony without recording it in a Catholic register".

On the other hand, Mark C. Shenise, associate Archivist to the General Commission on Archives and History, The United Methodist Church, sent me The Doctrines and Discipline of the Methodist Episcopal Church 1860, published by Poe & Hitchcock, in which is a very long wedding ceremony. And he told me they often granted limited authority to one 'in the field' to perform weddings, baptisms, funerals and hold Sunday services. By his account, James Vail could very well have officiated. On a lesser note, Thompson is the only one to ascribe such rude attire to Mr. Plumer. All others have dressed him rather dashingly in white shirts--broad coats--bold capes.

To date Electa's departure from Bannack, I return again to Thompson. He wrote, "I find this entry in my diary. 'On Sept. 2nd, 1863, Mrs. Plummer left by overland stage for the States.' This was the last time I ever saw her". Elsewhere, Thompson says Mrs. Plumer left to visit her family in Iowa and she told him her husband was to follow in the Fall.

Martha Edgerton Plassman wrote that she first saw Mrs. Plummer on the 7th of September at the Snake River Crossing when Mrs. Plummer was pointed out to her father, Sidney Edgerton, by the leader of their train.

In the Beaverhead County courthouse, in the Bannack Records I found an entry dated 14 September 1863. On that date is recorded the sale by Plumer of his house on Yankee Flats to his brother-in-law, James Albin Vail. " ...being property occupied by Me as a residence and lying adjoining the property of Henry Zoller..." By all accounts Plumer continued to eat there, possibly to live there. Also Young Joseph Swift and Thompson took their meals with the Vails, Martha doing the cooking. James engaged in a bit of mining.

For the Government record, Gad. E. Upson (Agent Reeds successor) recorded the rehiring of Mr. Vail, and has him again working the government farm by 1 January 1864. Also, included in the report is James A Vail's report of 1864. On or before the first of the year Mr. Vail was back at the government farm, his wife and children remained safe in Bannack.

Thompson's last note on Electa reads, "Mr. Plummer, sometime before his death had deposited with me quite a little sum of money. After consulting with Judge Edgerton, Mr. Sanders and some others, I paid from this fund for a coffin and the expenses of a decent burial, and the remainder I sent by draft to Mrs. Plummer in Iowa. I never received any reply to my letter telling her of Mr. Plummer's death or whether she ever received the remittance, I do not know".

The 1870 Dakota Territory census provides record of a girl child, Rena, age 6, birthplace Iowa, living in the household of James and Martha Jane Vail.

This does seem a bit odd. Although Electa was in Iowa in 1864, the Vails were reported in Government Records to be living in the Montana Territory in 1864.

Valerie Lewis (third great-granddaughter of James and Martha Bryan Vail, through their son Harvey) wrote, ".... I do have a copy of a 12 page, letter (no date on the letter) by James Vail to Harvey Vail [apparently in response to questions Harvey asked of him] listing some of the Vail family history. In the letter it states "we went to Marion Iowa in Oct. 1860. I (James) taught school 18 months when I received a commission in the Indian Department to accompany the Government Agent to the Blackfeet Indians located at the head of the Missouri River. We went up the river on a steamboat. (The letter does not mention that Electa went with them). Our stay there was not very pleasant or safe. We came home in 1864. Your sister Rena was born at Marion [Iowa] Dec. 2 1864. In 1865 we removed to Nebraska forty miles above Omaha. Two years later we went to Dakota and took a homestead under the United States laws. We stayed there until 1875 when we removed to this place (it does not say where 'this place' is)."

Harvey would have been nearly 5 at the time Rena was born and close to thirteen when she died. His sister Mary Eliza would have been 7 and 15 respectively, and still alive when the questions were asked, and the letter written.

James Vail planted the fields at the Government farm in May and June. Again they flooded. On 11 July 1864, "James Albin Vail of the Sun River Reservation Choteau County, Montana Territory did sell unto F. M. Thomson of Bannack City Beaver Head County, Montana Territory ...one undivided 11/6 of five hundred feet comprising Number one ... Each way next to discovery Claim,..also discovery Claim on the Sadies Lode situated in BeaverHead County,...also one house and Lot situated on Yankee Flats, south side of the street next door to Henry Zollers residence in Bannack City." [Beaverhead County Court House Records] Although, in his letter to his son, James attributes the name James to his father, we have documentation that his father was Joel Vail, a physician, married to Eliza Albin, who died when James Albin was two. The discrepancy may be attributed to a mistake or a miss-memory. His mother then married John W. McCaughty, Farmer. In 1850, when James was 12 years old, he had three half siblings, 6 year old Ann E, 4 year old William B. and Baby Sabastian.

Arthur Harris, in response to an item running in the Saturday Evening Post titled Vigilante and ending on this note,"Electa Bryan Plumer passes forthwith into Montana mythology...No man knows what happened to her." wrote,"I will tell you what happened to her. Mrs. Plummer's brother-in-law, Mr. Vail, left Montana and with his family, his wife and two children Mary and Harvey, located on a homestead near Vermillion on the Missouri River in what is now South Dakota but was then part of Dakota Territory.

"This was in the first of the '70's. His farm touched that of my father and the two families were neighbors for several years. Mrs. Plummer made her home with them and taught school part of the time in the neighborhood. Later she married a farmer who lived in that section, a widower with two young girls. His name I cannot recall. She probably lived there during her life but this I do not know as my parents moved from that part of Dakota to the Black Hills in 1879. "Mr. Vail and family and Mrs. Plummer were regular attendants at church and Sunday School, Mr. Vail acting as superintendent of the latter. Their baby died there. Its funeral being the first I ever attended. I mention these things to convince you I am not wrong about what I say. I was of course only a mere child at this time but remember them clearly...."

Mr. Harris makes no mention of Rena.

By 1865 Electa was teaching in Emory South Dakota. And ten years after the death of her first husband, on the 19 of Jan in 1874, Electa married an Irishman by the name of Maxwell; a widower with a son and five daughters. She raised his children and they had three sons, one died in infancy.

Her two youngest step-daughters, Mrs. Stafford and Mrs. Slattery, wrote to David Hilger, then librarian, MHSA, "...Mrs. Plummer left Bannack, Mont., six months after her marriage to Henry Plummer, going to her old home near Cedar Rapids, Ia. When Mr, J, A, Vail and his wife, Mrs Plummer's sister moved from Bannack, Mont., to near Vermillion, Dakota Territory, where they lived for several years, Mrs. Plummer made her home with them when not engaged in teaching school. ".... She was the mother of two boys, Vernon Maxwell, ...and Clarence Maxwell,…

"She never spoke of her life in Montana, and I know but little of it. She never returned to Montana after leaving there,... "She was a fine, noble woman, and we children were indeed fortunate to have so kind and good a mother to take the place of our own mother, whom we lost when we were very young."

On the 9th of May in 1912 The Wakonda Monitor published the following obituary.

"A deep feeling sadness rests on the community on account of the death of Mrs. Maxwell which occurred at her home in Wakonda early Sunday morning.

"She had been a great sufferer of rheumatism for several years. Ten weeks ago she had the misfortune to fracture her hip from the effects of which she passed away May 5. 1912. "She was buried Monday in the Wakonda Union cemetery, Rev. T. J. Tresidder officiating.

"...Mrs. Maxwell was an unusually devoted wife and mother and a member of the Congregational church. Her home life was her delight and it was there that her tender womanliness and loving sympathy were best shown. "The loss of her gracious presence will be long felt in her wide circle of friends but her memory will be a perpetual benediction...."

From the Obituary of her second husband, James Maxwell, we learn that he was born in Ireland on June 19, 1832, and died on Sept. 13, 1913. He left Ireland for the United states at the age of 18. He married Christiana L. Hanna in 1856 and they had six children. In the fall of 1866 Mr. Maxwell relocated his family to the Territory of Dakota and settled on a homestead near Jefferson in Union county. His first wife died on July 29th, 1871. That fall Mr. Maxwell purchased and removed the family to the Vermillion area. On Jan. 19, 1874 Electa married Mr. Maxwell in 1880. The following excerpt from Mr. Maxwell's obituary will ring a resonant bell with the followers of Mr. Plumer's diverse interest in a variety of occupations and investments. "In 1880 Mr. Maxwell bought a half interest in the Big Sioux Grist Mill at Jefferson and after operating this mill for a few years he traded the same for a half section of land in Hansen county, and after farming the same for a few years, moved to West Bend, Iowa, and from there again came to South Dakota and took up his residence in Wakonda where they resided until Mrs. Maxwell's death".

So there you have it, the facts. If they seem sketchy it is because they are sketchy. I did find many more references to Electa, but they are all based on either speculation or second and third-hand accounts, and I question their veracity. As to the reliability of found information one must always look to the motivation of those telling the story, and consider the vicissitude of memory 50 years after the fact. Even birth, marriage, death "records" and obituaries can be in error. A good historian would be pushed to cross-validate each assumption.

However, I am not an historian, I am a novelist. It is my job to take the sketch and create characters within it who can plausibly transcend the minutia and render a compelling story. In the end, if I'm successful, I will uncover a truth greater than the sum of the facts.

END