Working Ranch Magazine March/April 2025

looking back

Spade Ranch headquarters, Sheridan County, NE, circa 1889.

PHOTOGRAPHER UNKNOWN - PUBLIC DOMAIN

growing their operation even larger. Bartlett lobbied unsuccessfully to get Congress to pass a law that would provide him a government lease giv ing him exclusive rights of usage. President Theodore Roosevelt, him self a one-time cattleman in the area, vetoed it and sent former Confederate General, John S. Mosby, (the famous Gray Ghost) to have the law enforced and the fences removed. DeForest Richards had been elected Governor of Wyoming as a Republican in 1898. His record was very progres sive in many areas. He advocated for issues like state-run prisons, hospitals, schools for the disabled, and a home for disabled soldiers and sailors. He sup ported railroad expansion, connecting to remote ranching and mining areas. He also continued to advocate for the idea that the federal government should give control of all public lands to the states and endorsed state own ership and free use of all public lands.

DeForest Richards died four months into his second term on April 28, 1903. The federal government and Roosevelt’s attorneys filed new indict ments against Richards and Bartlett’s brother-in-law, William G. Comstock, and they were convicted in 1905 of violating the Van Wyck Law. Though they claimed they were innocent, the government sent their own surveyors whose work proved they had fenced more than 212,000 acres of public land. The fenced areas included 60 civil townships, more than enough to support nearly 1,000 families at two sections per family. The trial was set to start in November in Omaha. Just before it began, Richards and Comstock pled guilty. They both received a fine of $300 and were sentenced to six hours in the custody of the U.S. Marshal at the Omaha Cattlemen’s Club. No doubt a few drinks and a fresh cigar were part of their punishment. When word got back to Roosevelt he was enraged to the point of firing the Omaha Marshal and U.S. Attorney. When the new marshal and attorney were appointed in 1906, the pair were indicted again, charged with conspir acy to defraud the government and misuse of public land. They were convicted again and fined $1,500 apiece and ordered to spend one year in a real jail. After three years of failed appeals, they were sent to the jail in Hastings in 1911. Bartlett Richards died on September 5, 1911, one month before completing his sentence.

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the Spade Ranch in Sheridan County, Nebraska, adding Bartlett’s brother, Jarvis, and his brother-in-law, Will Comstock, as new partners. By the turn of the century, finding new land to buy was becoming increasingly difficult due to the influx of new set tlers. For years the ranchers of the West had been pushing the settlers, old Civil War soldiers, and their wid ows to claim the 160 acres they were entitled to under the Homestead Act of 1862. When they were granted the claim, they were strongly ‘encouraged’ to deed these claims to the Nebraska Land and Feeding Company. The Richards brothers and other outfits were able to add thousands of acres to their company for very little cost. Despite the Van Wyck Law, the barbed wire went up, and the ranch ers continued to keep other people off the land. Jarvis Richards was busy doing the same thing in Colorado and

Bert Entwistle’s web page is www.blackmulepress.com.

PHOTOGRAPHER UNKNOWN - PUBLIC DOMAIN

Loading Spade cattle on rail cars at the Ellsworth Stockyards. William Comstock is on the left.

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