FEATURE — Gold Butte is 300,000 acres of rugged wilderness in Southern Nevada with a history as rich and colorful as its sandstone mountains. These two aspects of the area make for a beautiful place to explore.
In 1865 the
FEATURE — Gold Butte is 300,000 acres of rugged wilderness in Southern Nevada with a history as rich and colorful as its sandstone mountains. These two aspects of the area make for a beautiful place to explore.
In 1865 the Mormon pioneers began to settle in the Gold Butte region. However, the area was inhabited by the Moapa band of Paiutes for thousands of years prior.
In 1905, Gold Butte experienced a mining boom, and by 1908, the area became known as an attractive mining and grazing district.
“The mining boomtown enticed many sagey characters to settle there,” Jaina Moan, executive director of Friends of Gold Butte, said.
Today the area where people settled is a ghost town located just east of the former St. Thomas settlement, which was buried under Lake Mead in the 1930s.
“Later on, in 1916, Bill Garrett moved to the area,” Moan said.
Garrett was a single man, never married and balding at age 36. Riding a tall horse, Garrett was a skilled cowboy and trick roper rodeo man, Moan said, and he was handy with a six-shooter. Garrett was sent by a Texan rancher to catch some horse rustlers. He found the thieves and shot two of the men and a boy, and he got the horses. He never returned to Texas but ended up staying in Utah.
Mormons were well-established in Southern Utah by the time Garrett arrived. “Gentiles,” as non-Mormons were often called, settled in as well. Similar to the reason Garrett was sent to the area in the first place, a motivation that united the two seemingly disparate groups was defending their farms and ranches against rustlers.
One particular thief constantly bothered Mormons and Gentiles alike by stealing cattle, horses and anything else he could get his hands on. That is, until he stole Bill Garrett’s horse.
Garrett located the man, reclaimed his horse and left for home; however, the rustler followed Garrett and shot at him, missing him by just inches, Moan said. Garrett spotted the outlaw hiding behind a cactus. He aimed hi