Charlie Utter
Charles H. "Colorado Charlie" Utter was a figure of the American Wild West, best known as a great friend and companion of Wild Bill Hickok. He was also friends with Calamity Jane.
Early life
Utter was born in 1838 near Niagara Falls, New York, and grew up in Illinois, then traveled west in search of his fortune, becoming a trapper, guide, and prospector in Colorado in the 1860s. He met and married 15 year old Matilda "Tily" Nash on September 30, 1866, in her parents' home in Empire, Clear Creek, Colorado Territory. Their marriage record lists Empire as his place of residence at the time of their marriage and by the 1870 Federal Census shows they had settled in nearby Georgetown, Colorado Territory.Career
In early 1876, Utter and his brother Steve took a 30-wagon train of prospectors, gamblers, prostitutes, and assorted hopefuls from Georgetown, Colorado, to the burgeoning town of Deadwood in the Black Hills of the Dakota Territory, where the recent discovery of gold had sparked a gold rush. Like many wagon trains, the wagons were Schuttler wagons, which were notable for "gaudy paint jobs." In Cheyenne, Wyoming, famed gunman "Wild Bill" Hickok became partners with Utter in the train; Calamity Jane joined in Fort Laramie. The wagon train arrived in Deadwood in July 1876, and Utter began a lucrative pony express delivery service to Cheyenne, charging 25 cents to deliver a letter and often carrying as many as 2,000 letters per 48-hour trip."Wild Bill" Hickok
Utter had been a close friend of Hickok's for some time previously, constantly watching to ensure that Hickok's weaknesses of alcohol and gambling would not bring Hickok to a bad end. Utter was not present on August 2, 1876, when Jack McCall fatally shot Hickok in the back of the head as Hickok played poker in a Deadwood saloon. Utter later claimed the body and placed a notice in the local newspaper, the Black Hills Pioneer, which read:Attendance at the funeral was heavy, and Utter had Hickok buried with a wooden grave marker which read:
Utter left for Colorado, but returned in 1879 to have Hickok re-interred, at Calamity Jane's urging, in a ten-foot-square plot at the Mount Moriah Cemetery, surrounded by a cast-iron fence and with an American flag in the ground.
In February 1879, Utter purchased the Eaves Saloon in Gayville, a mining town west of Deadwood, but ran into a string of bad luck. He was found guilty of selling liquor without a license.
Later that year, Utter opened a dance hall in Lead, a company town far more sedate than its raucous, rollicking neighbor, Deadwood. The dance hall's "boisterous music and scandalous cancan dancing" earned Charlie an appearance before the honorable Gideon C. Moody. Charlie was convicted of "operating a nuisance", but because he had already closed the establishment, Judge Moody sentenced him to a mere one hour in jail. He was also fined $50 on the charge of disturbing the peace.
Utter was back in Deadwood by the fall of the year. He opened another dance hall and also managed one of Deadwood's theaters. On September 26, 1879, a fire devastated Deadwood, destroying more than three hundred buildings and consuming the belongings of many inhabitants.
After Deadwood
Following the destructive fire, Deadwood ceased to be a frontier town where fortunes could be built from nothing, and the newly impoverished left to try their luck in other gold rushes. Utter followed, first to Leadville, Colorado, in February 1880; then Durango, Colorado, having separated or divorced from his wife; then Socorro, New Mexico. There, he opened a saloon and was reported to have a relationship with faro dealer Minnie Fowler. Utter's biographer, Agnes Wright Spring, traced him to Panama in the early 1900s. By then losing his eyesight, he owned drugstores in Panama City and Colón.According to ship manifests, Utter made several trips back and forth between the United States and Panama in 1888, 1891, 1905, 1910, 1912, each listing his occupation as a "druggist". He finally returned to Panama in 1913.
His gravestone is in Cementario Amador, Calle B, Santa Ana, Panama. The inscription lists Charles H. Utter as having died on July 3, 1915. His wife Emma B. Utter, who died in 1894, is buried nearby.