THE MYSTERIOUS “TRAVELLING MAN”
The study of equestrian history teaches one major lesson: People bring horses wherever they go. The mysterious “Rocky Mountain Stud Colt of 1890” is no exception. If Sam Tuttle’s history is believable, then we need to ask who likely captured the Stud Colt’s mother from Bird Island, who brought her on such a long journey to the Rocky Mountain region, and why such a journey might have been made.
Earlier installments of this series established that farmers during the Colonial period commonly kept herds of horses on peninsulas or offshore islands, a practice that began in Rhode Island and then spread southward to the Carolinas. Penning horses this way minimized the trouble and expense of building and maintaining fences. Island horse-keeping in the Carolinas was particularly practiced not by wealthy plantation owners, but by small farmers who had very little money.
What was going on in 1890 that would motivate someone from such a family to head west? Perhaps a vigorous and enterprising young man heard of the gold strike at Cripple Creek, Colorado. Gold rushes, such as the one at Sutter’s Mill near Sacramento, California in 1849, had enticed thousands of young men west. Can we envision the son of a hardscrabble farmer rounding up a few of his buddies in the month of March, swimming out to a herd maintained by his father or his uncle on an offshore sandspit they knew as Bird Island, and running a few head into a makeshift chute? After that it would probably take a few days to get them broke enough to ride bareback. Then halfswimming, half-wading at low tide, they brought them back to the farmstead. What they didn’t know was that the best mare of the lot had already been covered by an island stallion….
Then came the great trek out to Colorado. The trip would have taken about two months, the trail leading first through the Cumberland Gap, then on to Lexington and Louisville and St. Louis, and finally on to the well-worn Oregon Trail as far as Colorado. The young man would have ended his journey in late summer at a boomtown that began in 1899 with 500 residents but swelled over the next year to 10,000 as others like himself arrived determined to make their fortune. As to the island-bred mare—her pregnancy would not have been obvious until autumn, as is the way with horses. Then there came a morning when, going out to feed her, the young man discovered he’d gotten a twofor-one bargain.
The scenario after that is not hard to imagine—1890 is late in the history of gold-rush mining and union organizers were active at Cripple Creek. By 1892 there was armed conflict between union organizers and mine management. The young man decided he’d had enough. The colt would now be over 2 years old and broke to ride, so he headed back East….
What happened at that point is less certain. In her book on the history of the Rocky Mountain Horse, Bonnie Hodge presents reliable testimonials that the Hinds and Tuttle families brought mares to the Rocky Mountain Stud Colt of 1890, thus beginning the Rocky Mountain Horse breed. What made this possible? Did the young man return and buy a farm in eastern Kentucky with his earnings? Some people interviewed by Hodge make it that the Stud Colt was traded to a local farmer for supplies, and this might mean that the young man came back from Colorado nearly penniless—the fate of many hopeful gold prospectors.