It has been customary among every nation to perpetuate the daring deeds
of its heroes, by rearing a monument commemorative of their heroism.
The general who commands armies, and by chance wins great battles,
is no more deserving a monumental tribute than the man who discovers
new means for the more rapid advancement of knowledge, or the man who
extends the highway of civilization.
In opening the vast, illimitable resources of the great West, sturdy
pioneers were as essential as the brain and muscle that propel the
industries of the nation. Every new country must, of necessity, gather
the vicious elements eliminated by the stern application of law,
from the older communities. If there were no compensating influence,
new countries could never advance, but would become the asylum for
lawlessness and vagrancy. The fairest and most fertile districts might
thus be withheld from the hand of industry and become as plague spots,
from which would spread a disease that ultimately might destroy the
nation.
Wild Bill played his part in the reformation of pioneer society more
effectively than any character in the annals of American history. It
is true he killed many men, but many men are killed in every war, and
Wild Bill waged a legitimate war against the desperadoes who sought to
destroy the bulwarks of law and order. The killing of men is often as
necessary as the extermination of destructive wild animals. Both law
and society, and the rights of man, so declare, and no man can say that
Wild Bill was anything more than the stern administrator of a wholesome
law. Every man he killed made society the gainer, and while he was
near, the order-loving, law-abiding people felt secure in their lives
and property.
When the war broke out he was among the first to enter the ranks; not
as a soldier, but as one who takes the heaviest burdens and bares
himself to a thousand dangers and privations where the soldier meets
with one. His valuable services, no less than his unexampled bravery,
have received the highest meeds of praise from his commanding officers.
No danger was too great to prevent him from doing his duty; no labor
was too severe to deter him a moment from carrying out his intentions.
He had a mind to dissect dangerous undertakings with the precision
that a rhetorician would analyze a sentence, and his failures were as
few as his successes were conspicuous. Wild Bill was essentially great
in many respects and callings. He was undoubtedly the greatest scout
and conservator of the peace that ever crossed the plains; as a spy
and strategist he has, perhaps, never had an equal. The service he has
rendered the country at large, and the West in particular, cannot be
estimated. Abilene and Hays City, the people of which places he served
so effectively, cannot afford to withhold their respect for the memory
of Wild Bill, and it would be as creditable to the people of Kansas
as it would be deserving to the brave heart that was stilled by the
assassin’s bullet, to bring the remains of Wild Bill into their state
and give it a resting place among the most illustrious of their dead.
If ever a hero deserved a monument, Wild Bill is worthy a shaft that
would rear its apex so high as to overlook every spot of territory
between the great Missouri and the Rocky Mountains. Kansas was his home
and first-love; will the people of Kansas make the state his sepulchre?
[Illustration: Wild Bill’s Grave in Mount Moriah Cemetery, Deadwood.]