Veterans Became Cowboys After The Civil War & Beyond

While popular culture often romanticizes the life of the American Cowboy, their reality has always involved hard work, relatively low pay, and a tough, often lonely existence. So, have you ever wondered what sort of men were perfectly suited to become cowboys in the Old West? 

Well, below is an interesting article from the New York Star published in August of 1889. It's titled "A Soldier's Life." The short article concludes with the writer giving his opinion of what sort of career a soldier would be suited for after serving his time in the Army on the American Frontier. After looking at a soldier's life while serving a five-year enlistment in the United States Army stationed in the West, the writer for the New York Star recommended that veterans become "Cowboys." 

A SOLDIER'S LIFE. 

Routine duty on the frontier is about as follows: The soldier gets $13 per month straight pay, rations, clothing, and a certain allowance which is paid him on the date of his discharge; an increase for each year's service or re-enlistment; additional remuneration if promoted corporal, sergeant or artificer; extra pay if worked as a carpenter, plasterer or mechanic, and lota of other perquisites too small to mention. Guard duty is the hardest in the service, and to this the soldier is eligible about one day in six.

Three roll calls a day, reveille, retreat, and tattoo of a cavalryman, stables twice a day; drills Mondays or Fridays, dress parade every evening, and target practice whenever weather permits. The rifle used is the ordinary Springfield service pattern, 1888 Springfield "Trapdoor" in .45-70 Government, a breech-loader, carrying seventy grains of powder and 500 grains of load, with common service sights that never get out of order. The U.S. Army standard sidearm is the Colt Model 1889 revolver, a double-action revolver with a swing-out cylinder, chambered in .38 Long Colt and .41 Long Colt. 

Each company in the service is provided with a pair of breech-loading shotguns, a certain annual allowance of powder, shot, wad, and shell, and these are open to everybody for hunting purposes when not employed on other duty. A soldier can then amuse himself knocking over jack rabbits, bagging sage hens and prairie chickens, and missing as many ducks and wild geese as he wants to. Tours of detached service are merely picnics. Large game of some kind can almost always be found, and what better sport could anyone ask? 

There is one undeniable fact about a five-year term in the United States Army. All sorts of material are caught for soldiers; the beer-drinking Teuton, the bulldog Englishman, the fun-loving Irishman, the ignorant darky, and, in fact, men of all nationalities and all climes. They come to us as bright as meteors and as verdant as cucumbers, but no matter how green and unsophisticated the recruit may be when he joins, he has developed into a fine marksman when he leaves the Army, and with decidedly more sense than he was enlisted with. 

The bump of fun is exceedingly large in the average soldier of the line. Generally. as remarked, they are young men in the prime of manhood, of fine physique and perfect in every way (else they would not have been accepted by the recruiting officer), who look upon the term of enlistment as a sort of lark, and propose to get as much amusement and fun out of the five years as possible. 

Astonishing as it may seem, yet it is nevertheless true that it is no easy matter to enlist in the United States Army. Nineteen out of twenty applicants are rejected for cause, and the twentieth man must be up to the mark, or lie is liable to travel the road of his nineteen predecessors. 

After enlistment expires, a majority of the discharged soldiers, who originally came from some of the states back East, never return to their former homes. Civilization, with all its drawbacks, has lost its charms for them, and so they stick to the West and grow up with the country. 

Long service and extensive scouting over the plains have cured them of city life and the struggle for existence. They either take up land claims somewhere, buy farms from the railroads, or drift to ranching or stock raising. Many of them prefer cowboy life, which a term of service in the Army, saddle, and scouting work especially equips them for. 

— end news article of the New York Star, August 1889

So what do you think of the writer's reasons for recommending that career path for veterans who served in the West in 1889? 

Taking a look at those serving in our military and the lives of cowboys, you can't help but agree that there are a lot of similarities between soldiers and cowboys. Yes indeed, soldiers, especially those stationed in the American West, possessed physical strength and stamina and were usually excellent riders and marksmen. Cowboys also needed to have physical strength and stamina, be skilled riders and marksmen, as well as know how to rope -- besides having a lot of other skills. 

Cowboys were primarily young men who worked long hours, endured hardship, and toughed it out while tending cattle on horseback. Cowboys were responsible for carrying out the instructions of the Cow Boss, which isn't much different than soldiers carrying out the orders of their First Sergeant. Typically, a Cow Boss reports to the general manager or ranch owner, answering for the well-being of the cattle and the performance of the cowboys. And yes, a First Sergeant reports to his Company Commander or Commanding Officer, to answer for the well-being of the unit and the performance of the soldiers.

While not all soldiers became cowboys, there wasn't much of a difference between following orders in the military and following orders on a ranch. Tending cattle and maintaining a ranch takes work, such as repairing fences, maintaining buildings, and managing horses. Tending to a military unit and its structures within a fort also takes work. Soldiers had to paint and repair their barracks, offices, and other buildings within an Army fort. As for their living conditions? Cowboys lived in a bunkhouse with other cowboys, enduring long solitary hours and harsh weather, the same as soldiers living in barracks and pulling guard duty.

Of course, cowboys who participated in cattle drives and transporting herds to market often lived a nomadic life while traveling with the herds. In most cases, all they had as companionship were other cowboys. The same applied to soldiers assigned to patrol wide-open spaces, on escort duty, or away from the fort on assignments. Whether it was a detail to gather firewood or searching for missing pioneers, it was a very solitary existence. 

As for life on the range, even after the cattle drives died out, cowboys still patrolled the boundaries of their ranch, checked water sources, mended fences, and kept an eye out for rustlers. Soldiers did the same when it came to patrolling treaty boundaries, checking water resources, establishing outposts, and keeping an eye out for hostile Indians. 

At the end of the Civil War in 1865, soldiers, both from the Union and Confederacy, became cowboys. In fact, former soldiers contributed significantly to the rise of the "Cowboy Culture" and the cattle industry in the West. The fact is, soldiers sought work and opportunity after the Civil War when jobs were hard to come by and the nation was still reeling from the ruin and economic aftermath of that war. 

Several soldiers who were discharged from military service needed to find new ways to support themselves, and in many cases, also their families. The expanding cattle industry and the promise of a fresh start in the West, particularly in states like Texas with large herds of wild cattle, offered such opportunities. The demand for beef grew after the Civil War, and the development of railroads further West facilitated cattle drives to distant Northern markets. 

These factors created a demand for skilled cattle herders and drovers. Many veterans came West to meet the demand. Some specifically headed to Texas, where the cattle industry was booming. They brought with them skills, experience, and a willingness to adapt to the frontier lifestyle. The Civil War and its aftermath on former soldiers and dislocated Southerners who fled a destroyed South had a huge impact on the West. Because of the need for people to work in a growing cattle industry, and more folks taking advantage of the Homestead Act after the Civil War, the settlement of the West was taking place faster than most understood.  

The 1890s were after the Great Die Up and an era when open-range cattle drives were on the decline. And with the Indian Wars ending, many former soldiers became cowboys seeking a fresh start. After being without employment or prospects, some sought new opportunities and a new life in the West. The cattle industry experienced a boom, a glut, a slump, and a resurgence, all between 1865 and 1890. 

Unlike the demand for cowboys that took place before the winter of 1886, before the Great Die Up, the 1890s did see a demand for cowboys. What was considered the "Golden Age of the American Cowboy" was ending by the mid-1880s, mainly because of the expansion of railroads and barbed wire fencing. And even though that was the case, the cattle industry remained a cornerstone of the Western economy.

With cattle, there will always be a need for cowboys. And though the role of the American Cowboy was evolving because of the decline in cattle drives, ranches still needed management and hands to work those spreads. Of course, the diminishing open range led to the establishment of large fenced ranches. This saw the rise of family-owned ranches and larger cattle companies giving way to family-owned ranches. Those smaller ranch operations still required skilled cowboys to manage their livestock.

It was at that time that cowboys became more focused on caring for horses, and tended to fenced-in herds to manage grazing lands, while still maintaining fences and ranch infrastructure. They still performed the ranch work, including gathering and branding, but the massive cattle drives were pretty much at an end.

Of course, there were smaller-scale cattle drives. With the decline of the massive cattle drives to distant railheads, some smaller-scale cattle drives did not stop. After all, cattle still needed to be moved to market or between grazing lands. And really, while they were not the drovers who moved those huge herds up cattle trails to railheads, they were still cowboys who drove livestock to markets or new grazing lands.

Many soldiers, particularly those men who served in the cavalry, had experience with horses, which was a key skill for cowboy work. The demand for beef in the East, facilitated by the expanding railroad network, made cattle ranching a potentially profitable venture. So while the peak of long-distance cattle drives occurred in the decades immediately following the Civil War, the 1890s still saw an enormous amount of ranching activities -- and former soldiers would have been among those working as cowboys during that time.

So yes, a lot of former soldiers made the move to become cowboys after their enlistment ended, even into the 1890s. That's the reason why there was a strong presence of former soldiers, both Union and Confederate veterans, working as cowboys in the Old West. They were drawn by the opportunities presented by the expanding cattle industry and the possibility of a new life that wasn't that much different than the life they led as soldiers.

By the late 1890s, the cowboy had become a powerful symbol of the American West. It became an image that influenced popular culture through Dime Novels, Wild West shows, and later Hollywood films. Of course, while it's true that the romanticized image of the cowboy portrayed in popular culture might not fully reflect the reality of their demanding and sometimes dangerous work, the relevance of the "Cowboy Culture" and the cattle industry is what keeps an ongoing demand for cowboys alive to today.  

As for what was being called "The Closing of the West," the U.S. Census Bureau's 1890 report indicated that the frontier line, defined as a continuous settled area with a population density of at least two people per square mile, no longer existed. It was a method for the Federal Government to track Westward Expansion. Since it was deemed as being no longer discernible, this declaration, made in 1890, signaled that the vast, unsettled lands of the American West were largely occupied and integrated into the nation's settled territory.

That declaration is considered by most as the "End of an Era" because it marked the end of the period of Westward Expansion and the beginning of a new era focused on urbanization and industrialization. Of course, just because some Federal bureaucrat says that the "End of an Era" took place, doesn't make it so. The fact is that settling the West continued into the early 1900s. 

And since there were still opportunities for cowboys who wanted to cowboy, primarily on established ranches, large and small family ranches, on smaller-scale cattle drives, and on feed lots, veterans would be among those who became cowboys well into the 20th Century and beyond. 

Tom Correa