Of all these wild affrays, of the savage life which they denoted,
and of the stern ways in which retribution overtook the
desperadoes of the mines, there is no better historian than
Nathaniel P. Langford, a prominent citizen of the West, who
accompanied the overland expedition of 1862 and took part in the
earliest life of Montana. His work, "Vigilante Days and Ways," is
an invaluable contemporary record.
It is mentally difficult for us now fully to restore these
scenes, although the events occurred no earlier than the Civil
War. "Life in Bannack at this time," says Langford, "was perfect
isolation from the rest of the world. Napoleon was not more of an
exile on St. Helena than a newly arrived immigrant from the
States in this region of lakes and mountains. All the great
battles of the season of 1862--Antietam, Fredericksburg, Second
Bull Run--all the exciting debates of Congress, and the more
exciting combats at sea, first became known to us on the arrival
of newspapers and letters in the spring of 1863.
The Territory of Idaho, which included Montana and nearly all
Wyoming, was organized March 3, 1863.
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