History, Haunts and Hotels

Old West adventures await across the Cowboy State’s colorful Carbon County.

- CANDY MOULTON

Quite likely the most gruesome artifact on exhibit in any museum in Wyoming (maybe the West) is the pair of shoes at the Carbon County Museum in Rawlins. They might appear to be just simple leather shoes, and they are…except that the leather is the skin of Big Nose George Parrott.

The skinning came after the hanging from a telegraph pole in front of the Hugus Store on Front Street in Rawlins…and that happened after Parrott hit sheriffJames G. Rankin over the head with a pair of shackles and then escaped from the county jail.

It all started in 1878 when Parrott, Dutch Charley Burris, and some accomplices attempted to derail a Union Pacific train near the coal mining town of Carbon. They weren’t successful, but the effort earned the attention of Carbon County Deputy Sheriffs Tip Vincent and Robert Widdowfield, who pursued the outlaws right into an ambush on the west side of Elk Mountain. Vincent and Widdowfield were the first two lawmen to die in the line of duty in Wyoming Territory, and after their killing, Parrott and Burris struck out north to Hole-in-the-Wall country and eventually to Montana, where they were arrested two years later.

Brought back to Carbon County, Burris was dragged off a train near Carbon and hanged. Parrott went to trial and was sentenced to death, but he escaped before his execution date. He was quickly recaptured and hanged and then skinned by the doctor who did the autopsy on his body. (There is more to his story that you can learn at the Carbon County Museum!)

Parrott was not the only outlaw to ride through Carbon County. Butch Cassidy and the Wild Bunch frequented the Little Snake River Valley, which was isolated and, more importantly, strategically located between Hole-in-the-Wall and Brown’s Park—both regular hangouts for the gang. The Gaddis- Matthews House in Baggs is a tangible reminder of the connections Cassidy and the Wild Bunch had to the area.