George Lane, better known as Clubfoot George, was an alleged outlaw who was hanged on January 14, 1864, in Nevada City, Montana. Lane was later alleged to have been a member of a criminal gang known as the Gang of Innocents and sentenced to death. The execution was carried out by the Montana Vigilantes, a committee which functioned during Montana's gold rush in 1863 and 1864.
Lane was born in Massachusetts and suffered from a congenital deformity in his foot. [1] He was a laborer who traveled to the Western United States to find work. Lane then worked several jobs in California, Idaho, and Montana but was haunted by persistent allegations that he was a horse thief.
Sometime between 1848 and 1855, during the California Gold Rush, Lane moved west. This was then a common practice among adventurous men. While in California he worked at a farm in Yuba County and later as a store clerk in Calaveras County.
In 1860, Lane moved to Washington Territory following the path of gold miners. Two years later he was accused of "running off horses" in Idaho and turned himself in to the commander of Fort Lapwai. He was sentenced to do construction work. The next year he was accused of stealing horses again, but escaped the town before he was caught. Lane then moved to Virginia City, Montana, another common destination for gold miners. [1]
Lane came to Virginia City in the fall of 1863, the same year that the Montana Vigilantes Committee was formed. In Virginia City, Lane became a bootmaker working for Dance and Stuart's Store. His employers respected him as a hard worker. [1] [2]
In December 1863, a member of the Innocents gang, George Ives, was subjected to a vigilante trial in Nevada City, Montana. Lane rode to Bannack, Montana in order to inform Bannack sheriff Henry Plummer of the trial. Lane's aim was to convince Plummer that he should request a civilian trial for George Ives. [3] After he learned that Plummer was absent, Lane spoke with two of Plummer's deputies. He complained to them of the common vigilantism in Virginia City. His sentiments were seen as suspicious by the deputies, who soon had Lane arrested. He was told that he was arrested because he was "a road agent, thief, and an accessory to numerous robberies and murders on the highway". [1] He did not resist arrest, but told them that "If you hang me, you will hang an innocent man." [1]
Though some local residents believed that Lane was innocent, the members of the Vigilantes Committee still found him guilty and sentenced him to death by hanging. Shortly before the execution, Lane appealed to his employer to confirm his innocence. Dance responded that although Lane was always honest in dealings at work, he had no knowledge of George's other activities. Dance also admitted that the evidence against Lane was rather strong. Lane asked for no more help, but he said, "Well, then, will you pray with me?" Dance agreed: "Willingly, George; most willingly," and, according to biographer Langford, "suiting the action to the word, the judge dropped upon his knees, and, with George and Gallagher kneeling beside him, offered up a fervent petition in behalf of the doomed men." [4]
Lane was then led out of the building to the gallows. He saw a friend of his who came to see the execution and said to him, "Good-bye, old fellow. I'm gone". Lane then took action, and witnesses reported that "without waiting for the box to be removed, he leaped from it, and died with hardly a struggle". [4]
One witness to the execution said that "He was perfectly cool and collected... He evidently thought no more of hanging than the ordinary man would of eating his breakfast." [5]
Sheriff-outlaw Henry Plummer and his deputies, Buck Stinson and Ned Ray, also alleged members of the gang, were already arrested before on the morning of January 10, 1864 and summarily hanged. [1]
Lane was buried in an unmarked grave in Boot Hill cemetery along with other executed men. In 1907, some residents of Virginia City started questioning who was buried in each grave in the cemetery. A former vigilante showed questioners where exactly Lane was buried. The body was exhumed and his mummified club foot was found. For some time the club foot was kept in the courthouse, but later it was moved to the Thompson Hickman Museum in Virginia City. It has since become one of the museum's most important exhibits. The club foot was later removed from the museum by Lane's extended family. It was cremated and the ashes were spread at a ceremony on Boot Hill on June 24, 2017. [1] [6]
Virginia City is a town in and the county seat of Madison County, Montana, United States. In 1961 the town and the surrounding area were designated a National Historic Landmark District, the Virginia City Historic District. The population was 219 at the 2020 census.
Nathaniel Pitt Langford was an American explorer, businessman, bureaucrat, vigilante and historian from Saint Paul, Minnesota who played an important role in the early years of the Montana gold fields, territorial government and the creation of Yellowstone National Park.
John Merin Bozeman was a pioneer and frontiersman in the American West who helped establish the Bozeman Trail through Wyoming Territory into the gold fields of southwestern Montana Territory in the early 1860s. He helped found the city of Bozeman, Montana, in 1864, which is named for him.
3-7-77 is a symbol originally used by the Montana Vigilantes, a 19th century vigilance committee in Virginia City, Montana, United States.
Bannack is a ghost town in Beaverhead County, Montana, United States, located on Grasshopper Creek, approximately 11 miles (18 km) upstream from where Grasshopper Creek joins with the Beaverhead River south of Dillon. Founded in 1862, the town is a National Historic Landmark managed by the state of Montana as Bannack State Park.
Henry Plummer was a prospector, lawman, and outlaw in the American West in the 1850s and 1860s, who was known to have killed several men. He was elected sheriff of what was then Bannack, Idaho Territory, in 1863 and served until 1864, during which period he was accused of being the leader of a "road agent" gang of outlaws known as the "Innocents," who preyed on shipments from what was then Virginia City, Idaho Territory to other areas. In response some leaders in Virginia City formed the Vigilance Committee of Alder Gulch and began to take action against Plummer's gang, gaining confessions from a couple of men they arrested in early January 1864. On January 10, 1864, Plummer and two associates were arrested in Bannack by a company of the Vigilantes and summarily hanged. Plummer was given a posthumous trial in 1993 which led to a mistrial. The jury was split 6–6.
Alder Gulch is a place in the Ruby River valley, in the U.S. state of Montana, where gold was discovered on May 26, 1863, by William Fairweather and a group of men including Barney Hughes, Thomas Cover, Henry Rodgers, Henry Edgar and Bill Sweeney who were returning to the gold fields of Grasshopper Creek, Bannack, Montana. They were on their way to Yellowstone Country from Bannack but were waylaid by a band of Crow Indians. After being ordered out of Crow hunting grounds, they crossed the East Slope of the Tobacco Root Mountains and camped for the night in Elk Park, where William "Bill" Fairweather and Henry Edgar discovered gold, while the remaining party was out hunting for meat. Agreeing to keep the new discovery quiet the group of miners returned to the town of Bannack for supplies. However, word leaked out about the new strike, and miners followed the Fairweather party out of town. The party stopped at the Point of Rocks, part way between Bannack and Alder Gulch, and established the Fairweather Mining District in a miners meeting. It was agreed that the discoverers were entitled to two claims and first choice. The first stampede of miners reached Alder Gulch June 6, 1863, and the population swelled to over 10,000 in less than 3 months. The "Fourteen Mile City" ran the length of the gulch, and included the towns of Junction City, Adobe Town, Nevada City, Central City, Virginia City, Montana, Bear Town, Highland, Pine Grove French Town, Hungry Hollow, and Summit. Upon arrival the miners lived in brush wickiups, dugouts and under overhanging rocks until cabins could be built. The first structure built in Virginia City was the Mechanical Bakery. Virginia City, and Nevada City were the centers of commerce during the height of the Alder Gulch gold rush. In the first year the area had over 10,000 people living there. Montana Territory was established in May 1864, and the first territorial capital was Bannack. The capital then moved to Virginia City, where it remained until 1875. The Alder Gulch diggings were the richest gold placer deposits ever discovered, and in three years $30,000,000 was taken from them, with $10,000,000 taken out in the first year. Nowadays, except during summertime, the streets of Virginia City are usually quiet and relatively few visitors find their way to the 16 ton granite monument that marks the spot of that incredible discovery of May 26, 1863.
Wilbur Fisk Sanders was a United States senator from Montana. A leading pioneer and a skilled lawyer, Sanders played a prominent role in the development of Montana Territory and the state's early political history.
Samuel Ross Mason, also spelled Meason, was a Virginia militia captain, on the American western frontier, during the American Revolutionary War. After the war, he became the leader of the Mason Gang, a criminal gang of river pirates and highwaymen on the lower Ohio River and the Mississippi River in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. He was associated with outlaws around Red Banks, Cave-in-Rock, Stack Island, and the Natchez Trace.
Sidney Edgerton was an American politician, lawyer, judge and teacher from Ohio. He served during the American Civil War, as a Squirrel Hunter. During this time, Edgerton served as a U.S. Congressman. In 1863, Abraham Lincoln appointed him the first Chief justice of the Idaho Territorial Supreme Court. Edgerton lobbied for the creation of separate territories, out of the Idaho Territory, and in 1864, Abraham Lincoln appointed Edgerton as the first Territorial Governor of Montana. During his term as Territorial Governor, he was an alleged member of the infamous Montana Vigilantes, and was reputedly among its founders.
George Lane may refer to:
Hell Gate is a ghost town at the western end of the Missoula Valley in Missoula County, Montana, United States. The town was located on the banks of the Clark Fork River roughly five miles downstream from present-day Missoula near what is now Frenchtown.
Levi Boone Helm was an American mountain man, Old West gunfighter and serial killer known as the Kentucky Cannibal. Helm gained his nickname for his opportunistic and unrepentant proclivity for consuming human flesh, usually in survival situations, though instances of killing people for their meat unprovoked were also documented.
The Innocents were an alleged gang of outlaw road agents in Montana Territory who operated during the gold rush of the 1860s, preying on shipments and travelers carrying gold from Virginia City, Montana. According to the early chronicler Thomas Dimsdale, the gang attempted to steal gold while it was being transported; they killed many travelers who resisted. Sheriff Henry Plummer of Bannack, Montana was accused of leading the group, and was executed by a group of vigilantes from Virginia City in January 1864, along with several other alleged gang members.
The history of vigilante justice and the Montana Vigilantes began in 1863 in what was at the time a remote part of eastern Idaho Territory. Vigilante activities continued, although somewhat sporadically, through the Montana Territorial period until the territory became the state of Montana on November 8, 1889. Vigilantism arose because territorial law enforcement and the courts had very little power in the remote mining camps during the territorial period.
Granville Stuart was an American pioneer, gold prospector, businessman, civic leader, vigilante, author, cattleman and diplomat who played a prominent role in the early history of Montana Territory and the state of Montana. Widely known as "Mr. Montana", Granville's life spanned the formative years of Montana from territorial times through the first 30 years of statehood. His journals and writings have provided Montana and western historians unique insights into life in the Northern Rocky Mountains and Great Plains during the second half the 19th century.
This is a timeline of pre-statehood Montana history comprising substantial events in the history of the area that would become the State of Montana prior to November 8, 1889. This area existed as Montana Territory from May 28, 1864, until November 8, 1889, when it was admitted to the Union as the State of Montana.
Cyrus Skinner was an Old West outlaw and brother to criminal George Skinner. Skinner was called a "roadster, fence, and [a] spy" for Henry Plummer. He and his brother were members of Richard H. Barter's gang that robbed a mule train transporting $80,000 in gold bullion. Skinner and Barter were caught stealing mules to transport the gold. He was imprisoned at the Angel Island and San Quentin State Prisons, until he escaped by mid-1860. Skinner left California and established four saloons in Idaho and Montana.
Arthur Pauley (1905-1984) was a historian and writer. He wroter the book Henry Plummer, Lawman and Outlaw, published in 1980 by the Meagher County News, White Sulphur Springs, Montana. He published the first biography of Henry Plummer, an old west lawman and criminal. Pauley's interest in Plummer began when he was very young listening to the old-timers taking about the subject while living in Deer Lodge, Montana. He conducted research for many years before his book was published, visiting several places of interest associated with Plummer such as Nevada City, California and Bannack, Montana and central Idaho. Pauley was an amateur historian described by his editor, Verle L. Rademacher of the Meagher County News, as driving around with great reams of paper files stacked in heaps in the back seat of his car.
The Daly Gang was a notorious, though now obscure, 19th-century bandit gang that operated in Aurora, Nevada, and its neighboring parts. It was named after its leader, John Daly, but was masterminded by a boss known only as “Three-Fingered” Jack McDowell. Until it was put down and its leaders executed at the behest of a vigilante band in 1864, the gang freely terrorized Aurora for a quarter-century's time and was infamous for its armed robberies and shootouts and violent treatment of its victims and anyone who resisted its robbery. It is now considered by historians as one of the most underrated, violent gangs in the Old West.
