In the Hollywood West, justice was swift, often misguided, and arrived with an angry mob. The vigilantes had a rope, found a tree, and administered the sentence to the outlaw. There was no conviction just a body swaying in the breeze a few minutes later.
That’s the Hollywood version. The true version of frontier justice did include a few lynchings, most notably Charles Woodard in Casper in 1904.
Most of the time, there was a trial, usually with a two-man team of prosecuting and an equally sized team of defense attorneys, with a 12-man jury. Although in Wyoming, you found a few women on juries beginning in the territorial days.
A trial in Lander in June of 1908 defied all the Hollywood misconceptions.
On December 18, 1907, Charles Pease was in charge of a sheep camp owned by Richard Barrass on Beaver Rim near the town of Hailey.
Pease was a well-known and respected sheepman. He was just 33 years old.
Working for Pease was a young herder, Elmer Stalcup, just 19 years old.
Like many young men in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Elmer came west for adventure. Unlike many of the other drifters, he didn’t have much of a family, just a half-sister living near Lincoln, Nebraska.
Wind River News – December 27, 1907
STALCUP CONFESSES
To Shooting Chas. Pease over Game of Cards.
Tells Story of Murder While Standing at the Side of Frozen Remains of His Victim.
“The trouble began over cards and whiskey, like lots of trouble begins,” said Elmer Stalcup on Sunday morning as he stood beside the body of Charles Pease, the man whom he had murdered, at the undertaking parlors.
When the boy made this remark he outwardly showed as little concern as to the results of his crime as had he been carved out of stone, and much less than the coroner’s jury and the few other men who were in the room at the time. Stalcup claims to be but nineteen years of age, and while he refused at this time to tell where he is from, he told Will Cole, for whom he worked several months last year, that he had been a bootblack in Chicago.”
The early winter of 1907 was mild. Ranchers and sheepmen continued to graze the area with high temperatures reaching almost 50 and lows hovering just below freezing. It was an ideal start to what promised to be a mild winter.
Once December 13, the weather began to change. A 25-mile-per-hour wind started blowing from the northeast. The general direction of the wind along Beaver Rim was from the northwest.
On the 15th, the temperature began to slide. Snow arrived on the 16th with continuing strong winds. By the 17th, it was below zero, and there were 14 inches of snow on the ground. Lander recorded 27 below zero on the 19th.
At the sheep camp where Stalcup and Pease were tending the herd, it had been an equally warm, pleasant winter. The sudden arrival of snow and cold temperatures had them drive the flock to draws where the pregnant ewes could find protection.
With the sheep safely positioned to ride out the storm, the two men decided to ride out the storm in their own way. They crowded into a sheep wagon with a couple of bottles of whiskey, a kerosene lamp, and a deck of cards.
A sheep wagon is tight for one man; for two to arrange themselves around a card table took some doing. Pease sat on the bed while Stalcup balanced himself on the opposite side of the table on a stool.
Wind River News – December 27, 1907
“According to the statement of Stalcup they had been playing cards and drinking all night, and had both undressed to go to bed in the sheep wagon, where they had been playing cards, when they quarreled as to the paying of the money lost by Pease during the night, and in the language of Stalcup “when he (meaning Pease) reached over for the g—d— knife on top of the cupboard I fired, my life was against his.”
Stalcup then dressed, caught a horse, rode over to a neighboring camp several miles away, where he told John S. Swaim, the herder, that he was on his way to Lander; that Charlie was with the sheep, and had a dog, and made the statement “that many a fellow had been killed for less than that,” which remark the herder did not understand at that time. In coming to town Stalcup saw Frank Koehler, the range foreman for Barrass, at a distance, but evaded him and came on to town, where he arrived during the afternoon. At Lander he sold the horse belonging to Barrass to W. L. Vaughn and the saddle belonging to Pease, and proceeded to get drunk on the proceeds, and when he was arrested at the Capitol Hotel that night in a drunken condition he had spent $15 of the money drinking and treating chance acquaintances.”
After the shooting, Stalcup displayed all the traits of a guilty man trying to hide what he’d done. When he went to “Big John” Swaim’s wagon, he led the other herder to believe that he was just heading to Lander and that Pease was fine back at his camp. His avoidance of foreman Frank Koehler on the trail to Lander was another damning incident.
Stalcup’s life before arriving in Wyoming might have been an indicator of his strange behavior.
Wind River News – December 27, 1907
“The composure with which he answered the question asked him while standing beside the frozen body of the man he had three days previously shot down, after playing cards and drinking with him all night. He showed no animosity toward the man, whom he claimed was a poor loser when losing at cards, but admitted that when the trouble took place that he was more excited than was the man he had killed.”
It was a strange testimony from a man who literally helped the proverbial “smoking gun.”
Koehler rode by Stalcup and found the dead body of Charles Pease in the sheep wagon.
A coroner’s jury of E.D. Fanning, Jesse Mortimore, and Will Coles was sworn in and departed for the 35-mile ride to the murder site. They interviewed Swaim and Koehler.
Wind River News – December 27, 1907
“The jury found the remains lying on the bed which had not been slept in, in the wagon with only the underclothes on. The position was as though he had been shot while sitting on the side of the bed and the head had fallen backward on the pillow. The pockets of his clothes had been searched and letters and cards were about the floor and on the seats. Firmly held in the right hand of the dead man was a butcher knife, and on the bed, pointing upward from beneath his knees which were elevated, was an old Winchester rifle, which had no stock. In the rifle was four loaded cartridges, three of which were in the magazine and the other ready for use. At a distance of several feet from the door in front of the wagon on the snow, was an empty shell, of the same size as was found in the gun. The cards with which they were playing were all practically in a bunch on the floor, with the exception of one which was outside, and some distance from the wagon. When Stalcup was searched there was no weapon found on him, but he had a check made out to Pease for $25 in his pocket and a leather cardcase or pocketbook, whose ownership the officers are anxious to determine.”
Sheriff Stough asked Stalcup if he wished to make a statement. Stalcup declined, saying he didn’t care whether he did or not. He did agree to go to the coroners’ offices where Pease’s body was lying and would answer questions from Coroner Schoo.
Wind River News – December 27, 1907
“On arriving at the undertaking parlors he was taken in where the remains were laid and was told by Coroner Schoo that he was not compelled to make any statement, but if he wished to do so the jury would hear it. Of all of the questions asked either by the County Attorney Vidal, and E. D. Fanning, he only refused to answer one, and that was as to the position he held the gun when he did the shooting.”
Stalcup told Vidal, Fanning, and Schoo that the trouble began over cards and whiskey, the classic source of many fatalities in the American West.
Wind River News – December 27, 1907
“In answer to a question by Coroner Schoo, Stalcup said that the shooting took place about 7 o’clock, and that neither had been to bed, but that both had undressed and were ready to go to bed. They had been playing cards and had drank quite a little bit. Both had written out orders for $50, which they were playing for.
When asked what caused the shooting, Stalcup said: “I won, that is all there is to it. We were playing stud poker and bet $25 on a high spade. Charlie said ‘get out of here you g— d— s— of a b—, you will not get anything.
Charlie had just turned back the covers, when he reached over to get the g— d— knife on the cupboard, and I fired, my life was against his. I then caught a horse, went over to another fellow’s camp, about five or six miles away, and saw the foreman, but did not meet him. Never had trouble with Charlie before, but he was kind of a poor loser anyhow. Which was the trouble.”
Pease had 75 in cash and a check written to him by Stalcup for $25.
“Prosecuting Attorney Vidal then asked Stalcup if he did not draw a king, while Charlie drew a queen. The boy looked startled for the first time during the interview, and replied: “Who told you anything about the king and queen? But that was the way it was anyhow.”
When Charlie was shot he fell back slowly on the bed, the blood squirting out in quite a stream over his shirt and the bed. Was excited and looking at me. When he threw the cards away he said, ‘I ought to kill you,’ and he hit me in the face with his hand. I told him he should have no trouble with me and offered to settle if he would give me an order for $50. He said ‘we might as well settle this now as at any other time.’ When I shot him I pitched the gun back on the bed.”
A post-mortem examination was held. The bullet that entered Charley’s left cheek, near the corner of his mouth, lodged in his neck vertebra. The coroner’s jury found that Charles Pease died from a gunshot at the hands of Elmer Stalcup with “felonious or murderous” intent.
Pease died in mid-December at the hands of Stalcup. Elmer Stalcup’s trial didn’t begin until June of the following year.
Wyoming State Journal – Lander Clipper – June 19, 1908
EXPERTS WILL DIFFER
Doctors Disagree in the Stalcup Case That Has Dragged Along Nearly All Week
CASE IS NOT FINISHED YET
Expert Witnesses Still On The Stand This Afternoon And Pleas Of Counsel Are Yet To Come
“The trial of Homer Stalcup, charged with the murder of Charles Pease will hardly be completed today owing to the fact that the expert testimony of Doctors Starr, Safely and Padget has taken up most of the past two days. The jury appears to be almost worn out by their long siege with cadaveric spasm, rigor mortis, tonic spasm, and other medical terms, difficult to understand and made much more so by the disagreement of medical authorities.
Dr. O. F. Starr who testified as an expert for the defense gave it as his positive opinion that after having examined the hand of the deceased at the inquest, the knife found in the hand of the corpse could not have been placed there after death. Doctors Safely and Padget called for the state did not take the same view but held that it might have been so placed after the shot which killed Pease instantly had been fired.
Stalcup’s testimony was to the effect that he and Pease had been drinking whisky and gambling all night and that he won about $60 from Pease when the latter became abusive and grabbed a butcher knife from the cupboard and threatened to kill Stalcup.
He afterward put it down and the two men disrobed and prepared to retire when the quarrel broke out afresh. According to Stalcup’s testimony Pease, who was sitting on the edge of the bed, again grabbed the knife and he seized the broken gun and fired. The shot passed through Pease’s face and jaw and severed the spinal cord, killing him instantly.
Stalcup said he saddled a horse and at once started for Lander to give himself up. He lost his nerve and got drunk and Sheriff Stough picked him up. All witnesses testified to finding the butcher knife clasped in Pease’s hand and the entire controversy has raged around the proposition of whether or not it could have been possible for Stalcup to have placed the knife in the hand of the dead man after the fatal shot was fired. There were no eye witnesses to the tragedy, hence the call for expert testimony to settle the disputed point.
The wide acquaintance of Pease in his life time and the youth of the prisoner have served to create great interest in the trial. The court room has been crowded at each session, many of the visitors being ladies. Stalcup in his testimony stated that his mother died when he was but 18 months of age and that he had made his own living since he was eight years old. He has no relatives except his sister, Mrs. Eugene Hilton, who is here with her husband to extend their aid and sympathy to the friendless boy.
Preston and Sheldon have been employed to assist in the prosecution and Stone and Winslow have the defense. There have been no material discrepancies in the testimony of the various witnesses except the disagreement of the doctors as stated above. Big Jack Swain shamed the verbosity of the lawyers by answering every question in the fewest possible words.
The jury is a good one made up of representative farmers and business men.”
The bewildering testimony of the medical experts often confused the jury, but the way “Big Jack” Swaim handled both sets of attorneys brought smiles to the men who knew him well. Glib and filled with a bit of sarcasm, Swaim was the star of the trial.
Closing arguments were made, and the jury reached a verdict quickly.
Wyoming State Journal – Lander Clipper – June 26, 1908
“The jury in the Stalcup case brought in a verdict of not guilty about eleven o’clock Saturday after a few hours deliberation. Although the sentiment of the jury was for the prisoner from the start, several ballots were taken before the verdict of acquittal was finally reached. Stalcup was immediately rearrested on the charge of stealing Pease’s saddle.”
Though he had obviously tried to sell a stolen saddle, the sentiment in Lander was in the 19-year-old Stalcup’s favor.
After a few days in the Fremont County jail, the charges were dropped.
He took a carriage to Hudson with his half-sister, boarded a Chicago North Western passenger train for Omaha, and never returned to the Wind River Country.
Stalcup was a free man. No rope around his neck, no prison sentence, and no record of the killing to haunt his future.
It wasn’t a Hollywood ending.