Civil War Breaks Out

At about the time our first governor was appointed, war broke out between the northern and the southern states. We on the frontier had but little actual concern in that terrible conflict, save that there was urgent danger, as we understood full well, that the Indians, realizing that at such a crisis the government at Washington could pay but little heed to an outlying city, might take it into their heads to work mischief.

Therefore, instead of giving a deep interest to the conflict between the north and the south, our attention was directed almost entirely to keeping an eye on the Indian tribes close at hand. We paid more heed to rumors which reached us regarding what the savages were doing than concerning this or that great battle which had been fought so far away from us; but our people of Colorado responded heartily when the government called upon all states and territories to raise troops for the army, and therefore our share in the terrors of that awful war was mainly the departing of our volunteers from time to time for some post of danger.

We had one taste of the war, however, in a small way, when McKee, the Texan, with forty or more desperate followers, made an unsuccessful attempt to enter Denver, under the pretense of being a member of the southern army, which he never was.