Person:Henry Keiser (5)

Newspaper Obituary

SCOUTED FOR GENERAL MILES

Pioneer Montana Who Lived With Indians, Is Buried

MILES CITY, Mont., Jan. 21 (AP) - Henry Keiser, 85, trapper, Indian trader and scout in the pioneer days of Montana, was buried today at Bowman, N. D., where he lived since 1917.

Keiser came to Montana in 1863, the year in which one of his cousins was killed by Indians where the city of Wolf Point now stands. Keiser later was adopted by the Crows and lived with them for several years.

During the Indian wars he served as a scout and guide for General Terry and was with Terry when Terry led his troops up the Big Horn and came upon the scene where General Custer made his last stand. He also had been a scout for General Miles. He located at Fort Keogh, near Miles City, in 1876. - transcribed from a newspaper clipping, publication information missing

1.   Progressive men of the state of Montana, ca. 1903.

   HENRY KEISER.— Coming from his West Virginia home to Montana when he was a mere boy, and being intimately associated with the pioneers of the state in its early settlement and subsequent development, Henry Keiser is well entitled to honorable mention wherever the deeds and achievements of the progressive men of Montana are recorded. He was born at Phillippi, W. Va., September 14, 1849. His parents were Daniel M. and Elizabeth (Auvil) Keiser, both natives of West Virginia, where the latter died in 1863. The father was of Pennsylvania Dutch ancestry, and a successful lawyer in that state until 1866, when he moved to Maryland, where he died in 1871.
   
   Their son Henry attended school in his native town until 1864. At the age of fifteen he came to the northwest and has since contributed his share to the development and improvement of this section. After passing a few months at the.Gros Ventre Indian agency, he went to Fort Union, then in command of Maj. Pease. In 1866 and 1867 he was at the mouth of Milk river, engaged in hunting and trapping. He then joined the Crow Indian tribe at Fort Peck and remained with it a year. In 1868 he was at the mouth of the Musselshell, again enaged in hunting, trapping and fighting the Sioux Indians, who were troublesome at that time. In 1869 and 1870 he was interpreter at Fort Hawley for the Northwestern Fur Company, and during 1870 was mining in the Coeur d'Alene district. In 1871-72 he was in the Whoop-up country across the Canadian line, trading with the Indians, and from there went to Fort Claggett, where for two years he was in the employ of T. C. Power, the post trader.
   
   In 1874 he went to the old Crow agency, near Livingston, and was employed by the government as sub-agent until 1876. In the winter of that year he established a trading post. on Keiser creek (named in his honor), where the town of Columbus now stands. He remained there until the spring of 1877, when he went to Fort Custer and served as guide and interpreter for two years. During 1879 and 1880 he conducted a post trader's store at Junction City. In the summer of 1880 he took a company of Indians east on exhibition, as part of a traveling show. From 1881 to 1885 he was employed as chief scout, guide and interpreter for Gen. Miles. He then went into the stock business on a squatter's claim near Fort Custer, and conducted that business in connection with contracting on the Northern Pacific Railroad until 1890. He was also engaged in building irrigation ditches on the Crow reservation, and had an interest in three stores there, trading with the Indians. In 1900 he sold all his interests in this locality and has since been engaged in construction work on the Northern Pacific and other railroads.
   
   In politics Mr. Keiser is a Republican, but has never been an active partisan. He. was first married at Junction City in 1879. At Chicago, in 1897, he contracted a second marriage, uniting with Miss Julia Dwyer. By the first marriage there were three children : Maggie; Frank and Myrtle. By the second, one — Virginia.

2.   Recent Death of Keiser, Squawman, Breaks Links with Early Pioneers, in The Billings Gazette (Billings, Montana), 29 Jan 1933.

   Image at Ancestry.com (paid website)

3.   Keiser Becomes Member of Crow Indian Tribe and Later Encounters "Liver Eating" Johnson, in The Billings Gazette (Billings, Montana), 16 Dec 1934.

   Chapters from the book Mennaparshu: the autobiography of Henry Keiser, c1848-1929
   Image at Ancestry.com (paid website)

4.   Keiser, Henry. Mennaparshu: the autobiography of Henry Keiser, c1848-1929. (1934).

   This book was serialized in chapters in The Billings Gazette (Billings, Montana)