Cottonwood Connection

Historic Fort Hays

Season 4 Episode 4 | 24m 50sVideo has Closed Captions

Join us as we visit Old Fort Hays and learn its deep rooted history in Kansas culture.

We visit the Fort, learn about its history, the role it played in its years of service and how it continues to be a focal point in sharing the story of Western Kansas.

04/04/2024

Problems playing video? | Closed Captioning Feedback

Cottonwood Connection is a local public television program presented by Smoky Hills PBS

Cottonwood Connection

Historic Fort Hays

Season 4 Episode 4 | 24m 50sVideo has Closed Captions

We visit the Fort, learn about its history, the role it played in its years of service and how it continues to be a focal point in sharing the story of Western Kansas.

04/04/2024

Problems playing video? | Closed Captioning Feedback

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[Music] As the United States grew, posts like Fort Hays in western Kansas were established along major routes, paving the way not only for western expansion, but for the very communities that would grow up around them. [Music] Well, Fort Hays was started back in the late 1860s.

It was established to guard the Kansas Pacific Railroad and also for supplies. Fort Hays was decommissioned back in the 1880s.

That is, it quit being a national fort. The state of Kansas took it over, and in the early years, the fort at Fort Hays was used as the Hays normal school, where you went for teacher education, and then later, across Big Creek or to the north, they established Fort Hays State Teachers College at first, and normal school, and then now what is currently Fort Hays State University. But Fort Hays was a, in its heyday, was a prime example of all sorts of things of the west. It represented the west as we see it in the movies.

Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer was at Hays, Buffalo Bill Cody, and also the Marshal of Hays for a while was none other than Wild Bill Hickok. So take a tour of Fort Hays. [Music] Hello, I'm Adam Conkey.

Welcome to historic Fort Hays.

Right here, right around the corner, we're in the Visitor Center. We have a map on the wall, shows you sort of the early history when we get into Fort Hays and why it's here, along with Native American artifacts on the wall over on this side.

Right through the Visitor Center, we've got Custer's Boots. With Custer, the great debate, we have one example of a temporary exhibit in the museum. Elizabeth Custer, otherwise known as Libby, donated George Custer's Boots, her husband's boots, to Kansas Historical Society in the early 1920s. We've held on to those for the last 100 years, and here they are in display at Fort Hays, as part of a temporary exhibit designed by the Kansas Historical Society staff in Topeka. Here is a representation of George Armstrong Custer and one of the troopers he would have had with him in his detachment around the Calvary encampment at Fort Hays. Behind all of us here, you can see railroad workers laying down ties.

The fort was here basically to protect railroad workers, telegraph lines, all the way out to Denver, and the construction of those things. Well, my name is Bob Wilhelm.

For about 28 years or so, I was the director out here.

They didn't just plop forts down where ever. They put them out where they needed them. And here in Kansas, following the Civil War, you know, you had the railroad acts that Lincoln signed. The Union Pacific Eastern Division was coming through Kansas. It was part of those railroad acts. That was one of the missions of the fort, but in the beginning, you had the Smoky Hill Trail. That went from Acheson to Denver, and it was basically to get out to the gold fields and that sort of thing, but it was along with the expansion and everything. At first, the soldiers were here to protect people on the Smoky Hill Trail, and then they were here to protect the builders, particularly of the railroad, and then later, the traffic along the railroad. So they could do that, because Fort Hayes had not only cavalry, but they also had infantry. The infantry was used because with the trains coming in, they could put the infantry on the trains and get them closer. But also, the infantry was used to guard the railroad trestles after they were built, because the railroad trestles were the bridges crossing little draws and ravines through western Kansas were made of wood. The Indians knew that wood burned, so a lot of them were set on fire to prevent the trains from coming through. A lot of the infantry were assigned to guard bridges, guard the railroad, because they could camp nearby and stuff with the railroad workers while they were working, and help out in many different ways. So once the railroad was built and the soldiers were here just to make sure everything was clear, this became more of a supply depot than an outpost protecting people. People are colored by a lot of movies and things. They think that well, you come up here to the fort back in the day and you're a soldier, so you're out fighting Indians all the time and the fort would be attacked and all that. And in reality very few forts were ever attacked by the Indians. And most of the jobs that the soldiers did were just things around the fort. The fort takes a lot of upkeep. They did go out after some Native Americans who were implicated in some attacks and that sort of thing. The people that came out here in the beginning, the soldiers that came out here in the beginning, were pretty much veterans of the Civil War. Block houses were built during the Civil War and they put at strategic points and defense of certain areas and that sort of thing. And so that's kind of what they expected when they came out here was the soldiers here and the Native Americans, they just figured they were going to fight like whites do. But they didn't. The Plains Indians have been called some of the best light cavalry in the world. They had swift horses and they were masters of the hit and run tactics. But, you know, they obviously resented the fact that there were people in this country which was very important to them. There were Indian trails that went north and south that showed that they moved with the buffalo. The buffalo were very important. This part of the visitor center includes a lot of the Native American history. It shows you some interpretation of artifacts that they would have used coming off of the buffalo themselves, what they would have used as daily tools. Black Kettle is a representation right over this way. There's also some debate what path you would choose if you happen to be Native American, whether you would assimilate or move to the reservation as the government has asked you to do, or whether you would fight. Those are all questions that we'd probably ask ourselves these days if someone were to try to take away our ways of life as well. We do have a short seven minute video out here for you to watch. If you want to know a little bit more about the foundation of Fort Hayes, this was a good introduction to it. It includes violence on the plains and it explains why there was conflict between the nations and the federal government in the 1860s. Here we have an interactive map on Fort Hayes. We can see when we click on each one of these buildings when you come and visit, you're allowed to click on a different item. It will come up, you can click on the pictures as well. It will show you a representation of the fort in its time. We'll give you a better idea when you go walking around outside where the fort was and what buildings constituted it. At one time, everybody in the country knew where Fort Hayes was, as well as some of these other forts around during the fort's lifetime. It's just an interesting thing. You got the big three, Custer, Hickok and Cody were here and they were at a lot of places. It was very interesting while they were here. The history of Hayes City in those early years, when the fort was active, they were very closely connected. There's a lot of contention between the soldiers at the fort and the citizens of the town of Hayes, because those citizens were mostly saloon keepers and they served the railroad, they served the soldiers, they served the buffalo hunters and all the freighters that came in and out. Fort Hays, a lot of the buildings were moved off as they deteriorated. Some of the officers' quarters were moved to downtown Hays and used as boarding houses for a long time, but those had been moved back. Right now, we're along Officer's Row at Old Fort Hayes and we can see all the way down the row, there would have been ten buildings out here originally. Right now, we have building number two and building number three on Officer's Row, visible. There would have been officers that lived here that would have moved in and out on campaigns in different aspects. Once new infantry regiments moved in, older ones moved out and they moved across the plains, moved to new forts and out west. The officers' houses represented here at Fort Hays are set up as an example of a bachelor's pad where the whole house would belong to officers and they're also set up in a way for married families. This room was restored in 2010. You can see the fancy wallpaper on the walls. This would have been a more extravagant example of wallpaper from the time period. Though their stay here was temporary, families here were allowed to decorate, paint the walls, use wallpaper, furnish their house with whatever items they found fit. In Hays City itself, a lot of merchants there supplied some of the officers' wives here in their decorating ability, including window sashes, wallpaper, paint, furniture. All of it was available coming off of the railroad for Fort Hays officers' wives. In this room you can see the example of a very sparsely decorated officer who happens to be a bachelor. He didn't want to spend necessarily all of his money on decorating his short-term apartment instead of deciding maybe to spend it on other things, such as gambling or drinking, if he was allowed to do either of those. Down at the Trader's Post past the block house, you could have saw him in there playing billiards or pool or poker. You can see here on the floor and on his nail piece he may have been a hunter, an avid hunter, and in fact a lot of them were, including George Armstrong Custer himself. He had hounds, he used for hunting purposes, and he did make acquaintances out here based off of all of those interests. In this room you see the dining room set up. The dining room and the pantry were a shared space between officers' families. If bachelors lived in the same abode, they had no problem mixing together. The families on the other hand liked their separate space, including the two bedrooms upstairs and the two parlors on either side. You can see the kitchen was also a shared space down this hallway. Here is an example of the kitchen. Both the officers' families would have involved themselves in this room to some degree, though they would have had servants do a lot of the work for them, including enlisted of men who would have done small jobs in here. Otherwise, some of the jobs would have belonged to a laundress. You may have done laundry for a particular officer, may have worked in as a kitchen staff just to make a little extra money on the side. Officers that lived at the Post were more treated as royalty than a lot of people in the day. These two buildings, restored in the 1960s and the 1980s respectively, were brought back to Fort Hayes. After Fort Hayes glows in 1889, the buildings were auctioned off. The reason these buildings still stand today, they had occupancy in them the entire time until they were moved back out to the site. People lived in both of these places for 80 to 100 years after the fort had closed. Their care over time ensured that these buildings still exist. Most of the buildings constructed at Fort Hayes were brought in by the railroad. You can see this is a wood frame structure. All of the lumber would have been milled and brought out on a railroad car. In the winter and spring of 1867-68, a lot of the troopers were out here working and constructing these buildings. So all along Officer's Row, about that time they would have been finished. The barracks were all constructed about the same time the officers' quarters were. So all these wood frame buildings, including the officers' quarters, the barracks, the hospital, the quarter masters grounds, all of them were constructed by civilian labor, painters, blacksmiths, and a lot of money went into that. Over $20,000 at that time per month came out here just for civilian contract labor. And some of the extra enlisted men duties included helping those artisans out. It's unfortunate, I think, from our standpoint here today that so much of the fort was built out of wood. And then when the fort was closed, those buildings were either dismantled or moved. Initially, they were using the limestone, which is the guard house and block house were built out of. So it was harvested not too far from here on one of the hills to the west. And that in itself is interesting. The guard house is kind of a written history in a way of the fort because the stone is relatively soft and is easily scratched. And so even though it's against the law now to do that, back in the early 1900s, you know, from the time the fort was closed to the mid-1900s, this was a park area and so a lot of people would carve their names. But there are a lot of soldiers' names down there too. On the south side of our grounds here, we're at a building called the guard house. It was built in 1873 of stone.

Before that, there was another stockade here made completely out of wood. This building here housed people that were prisoners that had done not necessarily bad things, might have drank too much, got a little too burly with other people, or may have mouthed off to an officer. One of the most famous photographs ever taken in the Wild West happened at Fort Hays or Hays City between Fort Hays Troopers. Private David Roberts in Hays City, and that was two gentlemen one night, it happened to be similar troopers to him, and got into a gunfight. The very famous picture in Hays City, which you see right here, happened in 1873. Sumner and Welch are the two troopers laying here on the ground. This is one of the most interesting examples of Wild West history there is collected in photographic form. David Roberts, the killer of these two gentlemen, was put into jail here, right behind me. On this wall there are three cells for solitary confinement. The rest of this room also was part of the jailhouse. A violent offender would be put into the solitary rooms over here with heavy doors. The nonviolent offenders who owed fines and had deserted were laid out on the floor. There were plenty of deserters out here at Fort Hayes. Fort Hayes at the time was not known as a place you would like to spend your free time. It was kind of the end of the line for a lot of these people. There were options and availability to make a lot of wealth if you decided to go to Denver and work in the mines. There were a lot of more opportunities down in Dodge City in 1872 and 1973, working in saloons or anything that catered to the cowboys down there coming up from Texas bringing cattle herds. So a lot of the men here, a lot of the enlisted men who were not making very much at the time, decided to desert. If they were caught, they'd end up here in the guardhouse. This here is an example of the barracks bed. It's now housed in the guardhouse, but you can see where their rifle slots would have held their rifles on this bed. Four men to a bunk. So if you can imagine being in tight quarters now with siblings, this was a lot worse in 1867. You can see behind me, Hill P. Wilson and his trading post. This would have been an example, sort of an example, of what his merchant area would have looked like in his trader store. If you look at the prices closely enough, you can see judging off of an enlisted man's salary for a month, making about $11 to $13 a month depending on what year it is, that doesn't go very far. When a can of peaches is 85 cents. If you're trying to supplement your diet with more vegetables. You could have bought some of them here from him as well. Also, once again, you don't have a whole lot of money. Not only are you paying your laundress, you're also going to end up paying him. And a lot of the guys decided just to eat what they served in the mess halls, which would have been more bread and meat than a lot of other things. Those men developed scurvy part of the time. And so here's your one chance to supplement your diet. What would they have likely spent on?

Beer. There's been a lot of archaeological work done at Fort Hays. They exposed the footings of the officers' quarters, some of the sidewalks, some of the barracks buildings that are not seen there, and did a lot of work on the latrines. And people say, "Well, why would you dig the latrines?

" Well, those are real treasure chests. But they found with the enlisted men, since they were being paid so poorly, a lot of beer bottles in the latrine vaults. And behind the officers' quarters, there were a lot of champagne bottles and higher priced whiskeys and brandies and stuff like that. So a lot of stuff has been found. Some of the artifacts out here that belong to Fort Hays have returned now are in display cases. There are some musical instruments, as well as a surgeon's kit from the old Fort Hospital, along with a few of the weapons the Buffalo soldiers may have carried when they first arrived out here. And they were one of the first regiments out here in 1867 when the post was established. There were two cavalry regiments that were composed of black enlisted men led by white officers. And they were both here. The 10th Cavalry was the one that was involved in the Battle of the Saline River up north and later the Battle of Prairie Dog Creek, which were connected battles. And then the 9th Cavalry, this was the... they were stationed here in the 1880s. They may have been an integral part in getting a lot of the buildings built out here of wood frame construction, as well as the limestone blockhouse. This is the famous blockhouse of Fort Hays, built in 1867. It's the oldest building in northwest Kansas. Not only was the blockhouse designed as a defensive structure by the end of its life when the post closed here in 1889, the blockhouse later became the sheriff's living quarters for Hays City, also became a clubhouse for the Hays City Golf Course. We have the blockhouse down here, which I think is a really fascinating building. It's got rifle slots in it, loopholes. So it was initially intended to be some sort of a defensive structure, but the fort was never attacked, and by the time they pretty much got the building done, they realized that, and so they plugged those things up. And eventually they started using it as... they used it for a lot of different things. It was a post library at one time. We had a library here at Fort Hayes. One of the first libraries in the area was here at the fort. The commander had his office there. This was kind of the headquarters building. So it was used for a lot of different things. It was used for a grain storage house at one point near the end of the fort's life. I just think that people should know their history. People should be aware. Fort Hayes was very, very important for the area, not only for the railroads, but to guard all the trails. So there's a lot of people out...a lot of campaigns went out of Fort Hays. This place, the people... there were people who were born here at this fort, who died here at this fort, and this was put here specifically, this spot, and the railroad came to this spot to supply not just the fort, but the town of Hays and the towns north, south, east, and west of here. These are tangible things. This building was here. If it wasn't for this fort, you wouldn't have the university over here, because it's located on what used to be military reservation. Hays has got one of the best park systems in the state, I think. We've got a lot of parks here. This experiment station over here where they do research, helping people...helping farmers grow their crops in this land. And it's all because the fort was here. And I think it would behoove people to come out here and learn about this place and why it was here and what benefits you have because of this fort being here. I just think it's just an incredibly interesting place and I think when people come by here and visit, I don't know really what they're expecting but I think a lot of them are surprised at what they find here and hopefully in a good way. [MUSIC] [BLANK-_AUDIO]