Uncle Dick and Lisa's Old Time Animal Tales

How a Well Known Ravine in Texas Got it’s Name.

A Herd of 15,000 Cattle Stampeded at Night and Before They Were Stopped 2,700 of Them Were Killed-Costly Blunder Made by a Cowboy.

One of the most desperate stampedes of cattle ever witnessed by a Texas cowboy, says Rev. J. B. Cranfill of Waco, Texas, occured in 1876 on the prairie in the center of which now stands the town of McGregor. Fifteen thousand cattle and 25 cowboys participated in the exciting event. Mr. Cranfill was not a participant but he tells the story as he got it from an eyewitness in The Independent. Late in the afternoon of July 4 there had been a lively thunderstorm that made the cattle nervous. At 10 o’clock at night, however, they seemed to be sleeping profoundly. Then the narrative proceeds as follows.
“The stars were all shining, and there was no cause at all for the arousing of the herd. They appeared to get up all at once, with a single purpose, and the roar that was heard seemed to come from a single throat. The Wilson brothers and their cowboys who were sleeping in their camp rushed to their ponies, who were grazing with the saddles and bridles on, and as fast as the bits could be replaced in their mouths they mounted and galloped to the flanks of the now disappearing mass, headed in the direction of the Brazos river.”
The usual course on such occasions is to get in front of the herd-a risky piece of work-and start it to running in a circle. This attempt was made in this case.
“Some cattle can outrun others, and in this case there was a bunch of about 50 fully 20 yards in advance, and toward this leading group the two rescuers rode. Of the leading group, also, some were faster than others, and this group ran in a diamond shape, with two immense steers leading all.” When Mr. Wilson and his companion reached the two leading steers, they began shooting their revolvers close to them, and in that way the bunch was made to oblique, and as the leading bunch of cattle obliqued the main stampede obliqued, and the first step in ‘milling’ had been taken. By this time the cattle were getting tired. Nearly five miles had been covered, and the breath of the leaders was coming short and painfully, but they were rushing on because the front cattle at this time knew as a matter of fact their only safety was in keeping up the run. Those behind were coming, and they were in the majority and the leaders were compelled to run. There was real danger for the forward members of the stampede.
“In the invoice of articles contained in the regulation ‘outfit’ there is always some kind of stimulants, and but for the stimulants contained in Mr.Wilson’s outfit it is possible that the stampede would have been halted without disaster. He had a Mexican along, one of the best cowboys in the southwest. This Mexican and his horse always reminded those who saw him ride of the fabled Centaur. He rode far forward and bent over, so that he and his horse appeared to be one animal. No horse, however rugged, ‘wild and wolly,’ had ever been able to unseat him. This Aztec had been to the little brandy runlet too often and had filled and emptied his tin cup with surreptitions intoxicants, so that his usual excellent judgement went awry. When he succeded in getting mounted, after having fumbled with his briddle a good deal, he was far in the rear, and the stampede had gone past him, so that when he overtook the rear end he passed to the front on the other side and rode on the wrong flank.
“When he reached the head of the herd, he was just in time to defeat the maneuver, then under execution, of bending the moving mass from a straight line to a semicircle. Revolver in hand, disregarding the other men,he began shooting in the faces of the wild steers, and the effect of this was to straighten the run and bring the advance straight toward a precipice. This precipice was a wash in the prairie, forming a deep ravine fully 30 yards wide, and in a shorter time than it takes to tell of this story the head of the column was pouring over, a horrible cascade of beef, plunging madly into destruction while fleeing from an imaginary danger.
“When Mr. Wilson and his lientenants saw that it was impossible to save their cattle, they saved themselves by dexterously turning at right angles at full speed and riding out of the way. They next returned to the flank and held a council of war. A few seconds decided them, and all hands commenced shooting into the herd, the object now being to build a breastwork of carcasses and save the rear end from the destrution that had overtaken the front. The gully was nearly full of cattle by this time. They were snorting and bellowing, crashing and tearing, and still heaping up, and when the firing began the wounded ones tumbled over on the others, and in a short time the gully, like the sunken road at Waterloo, was bridged by carcasses. The herd surged up in billows, like an ocean, and bent now because it could not do otherwise. The semicircle was formed, and Wilson and his men crossed the gully below and rode around the opposite side and recrossed, and in a short time they had the cattle halted, forming an incomplete letter 0, and there they stood, blowing, bellowing, shivering. All hands remained on watch all night, and in the morning, when a count was made it was ascertained that 2,700 head were missing. There were afterward 2,700 pairs of horns taken from that gully. It was called Stampede gully for many yeras afterward, and perhaps will always with some people be remembered by that name.