Michael Zimmer tells me he
has 4 favourites of his own westerns! One, THE
POACHER’S DAUGHTER, won the Western Heritage Wrangler Award.
Montana 1885. After young Rose Edwards is widowed by vigilantes who hang her husband for an alleged theft, she turns outlaw. Later she finds herself the reluctant hero of the local Native American population, aiding them in their struggle against encroaching settlement.
Clashes
between Montana cattlemen and settlers on one hand, and outlaws and Indians on
the other, form the background to Michael’s tale. Michael
is rightly proud of the authenticity of his work.
In 1884 cattlemen
in Montana organised against rustlers operating in the Musselshell River
region. Led by prominent rancher GRANVILLE STUART, this group of vigilantes,
known as ‘Stuart's Stranglers’, were responsible for the deaths of at least 20
thieves in July 1884, by hanging, shootings or fire.
Montana rancher
Granville Stuart
The novel is dedicated to the free-spirited and
independent women of the Old West.
There
were a number of female outlaws in western history. They include ROSE DUNN, the
‘Rose of the Cimarron,’ ‘Cattle Annie’ and ‘Little Britches’ (ANNIE MCDOUGAL and
JENNIE STEVENS) PEARL HART, FLORENCE QUICK and ‘Cattle Kate’ (ELLA WATSON) who
was lynched by Wyoming vigilantes in 1889.
Probably
most famous however is BELLE STARR, (1848-1889) nicknamed ‘The Queen of Bandits.’
She – alongside the James-Younger Gang, the Doolin-Dalton Gang and others - was
a product of the combination of two anarchic elements: the American Civil War
as waged by guerrilla bands in and around Missouri, and the lawlessness of the
adjoining Indian Territory (now Oklahoma) which became a refuge for outlaws,
many of them disaffected confederates, from the 1860s to the 1890s.
Belle Starr was a farm girl, born MYRA MAYBELLE SHIRLEY in Missouri, whose brother was killed in the Civil War. She knew the James-Younger Gang, although a story that the father of her daughter was COLE YOUNGER was disputed by Younger himself.
She married at least three outlaws: JIM REED, SAM STARR and JIM JULY STARR - all three of whom were killed in gunfights. The Starrs' were members of a notorious Cherokee outlaw clan operating in Indian Territory. Although Belle occasionally donned male attire and took part in raids, she was mostly the 'brains' behind a lot of their criminal activities - organising, planning and fencing for the rustlers, horse thieves and bootleggers she worked with, as well as harbouring them from the law.
In 1883 she was arrested by the famed black lawman BASS REEVES and brought before 'hanging judge' JUDGE ISAAC PARKER. Charged with horse theft she served 9 months in prison and was deemed a model prisoner.
On February 3, 1889, she was riding home near Eufaula, Oklahoma when she was ambushed and killed. Her death resulted from shotgun wounds to the back, neck, shoulder and face. Suspects range from her husband, Jim July Starr, to her two children, as well as neighbour EDGAR J. WATSON. It was rumoured Belle knew Watson was an escaped murderer with a price on his head and he killed her to shut her up. But the murder remains officially 'unsolved.'
Many of the actresses who specialised in playing 'feisty' women in western TV shows and films have portrayed Belle, among them Isabel Jewell, Jane Russell, Marie Windsor, Jeanne Cooper and Jean Willes.
Rather more unlikely actresses in the role include Gene Tierney,
Elizabeth Montgomery and - perhaps oddest of all - Italian actress Elsa Martinelli!
The setting of the Montana cattle country reminded me of books/movies like 'These Thousand Hills' and 'The Missouri Breaks.'
She married at least three outlaws: JIM REED, SAM STARR and JIM JULY STARR - all three of whom were killed in gunfights. The Starrs' were members of a notorious Cherokee outlaw clan operating in Indian Territory. Although Belle occasionally donned male attire and took part in raids, she was mostly the 'brains' behind a lot of their criminal activities - organising, planning and fencing for the rustlers, horse thieves and bootleggers she worked with, as well as harbouring them from the law.
In 1883 she was arrested by the famed black lawman BASS REEVES and brought before 'hanging judge' JUDGE ISAAC PARKER. Charged with horse theft she served 9 months in prison and was deemed a model prisoner.
On February 3, 1889, she was riding home near Eufaula, Oklahoma when she was ambushed and killed. Her death resulted from shotgun wounds to the back, neck, shoulder and face. Suspects range from her husband, Jim July Starr, to her two children, as well as neighbour EDGAR J. WATSON. It was rumoured Belle knew Watson was an escaped murderer with a price on his head and he killed her to shut her up. But the murder remains officially 'unsolved.'
Many of the actresses who specialised in playing 'feisty' women in western TV shows and films have portrayed Belle, among them Isabel Jewell, Jane Russell, Marie Windsor, Jeanne Cooper and Jean Willes.
Marie Windsor as Belle
Rather more unlikely actresses in the role include Gene Tierney,
The real Belle (left) and Gene Tierney
Elizabeth Montgomery and - perhaps oddest of all - Italian actress Elsa Martinelli!
Elsa Martinelli as Belle
The setting of the Montana cattle country reminded me of books/movies like 'These Thousand Hills' and 'The Missouri Breaks.'
‘These Thousand Hills’ (1959)
Reviews
of THE
POACHER’S DAUGHTER:
‘It detonated
like dynamite in my hands’
‘A
wonderfully endearing heroine with a gentle heart and steel in her spine’
‘Zimmer
ratchets up the tension to piano wire tautness’
‘One of
the best westerns I have ever read.’
