This 2023-2024 new release has it all for fans of Wild West legends and lore. And for those obsessed with Civil War stories, this book has NEW battles for you to delve into.
Emigrant Tales of the Platte River Raids (M Press Publishing, 2023-2024) follows diaries, letters, and other first-person accounts of emigrant travelers going through the “Black Hills of Idaho” in the summer of 1864. Heading west on the trails this year were some of U.S. history’s GOATs (Greatest of All Time) when it comes to literary exploits.
Watch what happens when you combine the families of Wyatt Earp, Johnny Ringo, John Brown and Daniel Boone under the blazing heat of the Western sun…
See the dark pockets of history that prior historians have missed and not even Marshal Law can reach…
And discover, when push comes to shove, who will stand after this trial by fire and whose future is forever derailed?
This book is a no-fuss look back in time that is told straight from the folks who survived. In July of 1864, nearly 70 survivor accounts tell of a week in hell when an army of Northern Plains Indians descended upon the emigrants passing around the “Big Bend” in the North Platte River through the Laramie Mountains and Medicine Bow Forest in Wyoming. The Platte River Raids were the largest coordinated series of attacks in Plains history that you’ve never heard of… until now. The Union Army was not only helpless to stop the Raids, but their response simply made everything worse.
If you love any of the following, this book is FOR YOU!
- True Stories
- Shoot-Outs
- Conspiracies
- Military Strategizing
- Plains Indian Warfare
- Trail Grit
- Poison Water Holes
- Organized Crime Rings
- Grave Hunting
- Civil War “Easter Eggs”
- Fated Chases
- Horse Wrangling
- Unlikely Heroes
- and Surprise Twists
Early trail historians, Grace Raymond Hebard and E. A Brininstool, describe what may have led up to this historical event.
Read more: A Wyatt Earp, Johnny Ringo, John Brown & Daniel Boone MUST-READ!“The shortest route to the [gold]fields was by the Bozeman Trail, which, when utilized, enraged the [Plains] Indians to such a point of fury that they realized that if anything could be done, it must be done at once to stop the invasion of their precious and loved territory in the region of the Powder, Tongue, Big Horn, and Yellowstone Rivers.
To destroy those who attempted to pass through this territory was not entirely satisfying to the red man; anyone who dared to appear on the trails to the south … became a marked man upon whom the hand of hate and vengeance descended, resulting in torture, mutilation and death.”
Hebard & E. A. Brininstool, The Bozeman Trail (Cleveland: Arthur Clark,1922), 125.
From the Author:
Of course, the women on the Oregon and Overland Trails are pretty awesome, too, if I might say so myself. Most of the histories that build out this fantastic literary adventure originate from the women who experienced the “vengence” themselves, watched their loved ones fight for their survival, and lived with the devastating effects on their families. The female diarists, researchers, and family historians who preserved the events for future generations are prominently featured in this book.
A particularly moving account comes from America Forbis from Missouri, who captures the very tender moments of Johnny Ringo’s coming of age as his mother Mary stays up all night, helping her son to stay on guard after Martin Ringo’s tragic, accidental death. Men… you may want to grab a tissue.
Wheelchair-bound diarist Sarah Rousseau sparks readers’ imagination with her extremely detailed action sequences showing how the Earp family patriarch turns a doctor, farmer, and a “cripple” into an ad-hoc fighting squadron that takes down a major crime ring leader. If it wasn’t true, it’d be unbelievable.
Of course, there are the ever-dramatic accounts of Sarah Larimer and Fanny Kelly who were both famously kidnapped at Little Box Elder Creek on July 12. But their stories, set in the appropriate context, reveal the total dysfunction of the Union Troops under the direction of Lt. Col. William O. Collins. This narrative will leave you shaking your head… #SMH
Oh… And did you know that William and Sarah Larimer had a shoot-out with members of the Ringo Company? No? Well, let me tell you… Or better yet, see them tell about it for themselves when you pick up your copy of Emigrant Tales of the Platte River Raids today!