John D. Nesbitt

ELLA WATSON

My name is Ella Watson; I was hanged
By a group of men who thought they had the right
To take the law into their grasping hands.
They said I rustled cattle but I bought them
In October from a man named Engerman.
I paid good money and I had my brand.
I also bought my moccasins, which fell
When Bothwell, Sun, and others put the rope
Around my neck and left me there to choke.
I was twenty-eight years old the day I died.

They put the story out in all the papers,
They called me rustler, strumpet, virago,
And said I traded favors for slick calves.
To justify the hanging of a woman
They called me Cattle Kate and made me cheap.

My name’s Frank Jameson; my wife and I
Picked up the moccasins that lay two days
Upon the ground beneath the strangled corpse.
We heard the stories of the witnesses,
How Bothwell, Conner, Durbin, Sun, McLean,
And Galbraith took the pair down to the river
And hanged them from a pine tree side by side.
We knew that Bothwell wanted both their homesteads
And filed false claims on other land nearby.
We heard how all four witnesses had vanished,
How all six men walked free without a trial,
And Bothwell ended up with both their claims.

My name is Owen Wister; I have friends,
Wyoming cattlemen, the very best.
I met a man, a friend of theirs, who helped
To lynch the man and woman in July.
I hope they let him off, he seemed a good
And solid citizen; the sheriff said
It’s only the wayward classes that complain.

My name is Ella Watson; I was hanged
By men who said my cattle were not mine.
They wanted all the Sweetwater to themselves,
So they rubbed us out and called me Cattle Kate.


Carmen and Steve Mendelson and John's YouTube video reading of "Emma Watson":



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John confesses: "The hanging of Ella Watson on the Sweetwater River in 1889, like the killing of Nate Champion in 1892, was carried out by powerful cattlemen who accused the victims of rustling and then conducted a smear campaign in the newspapers. The injustice demands to be written about."

JOHN D. NESBITT is the author of many works of fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. He writes mostly on subjects of the American West, present and past. His contemporary poem "Prairie Center" won the Western Writers of America Spur Award for Best Poem in 2019. He has won many awards for his short fiction and novels. He lives in Wyoming and has a good horse named Pearl. See his website at www.johndnesbitt.com.