Lester Eblen Stiles v. Fred Gove, of the Estate of Ethel Gove, Deceased

Tragedy struck suddenly on a pleasant August afternoon in Virginia City, Montana. Ethel Gove, fifty-two, and her two grandchildren, Barbara, three, and Carol, one and a half, had boarded the ancient stagecoach at its regular stop in front of the old Opera House. Seventeen other passengers were also aboard as the stagecoach headed easterly up Wallace Street. Lester Eblen Stiles, in the driver’s seat, held a tight rein on the four-horse team as the stage turned northerly and headed for the cemetery, known as “Boot Hill.”

Then, reentering Wallace Street at the village pump, the team and stage proceeded westerly past Mrs. Pankey’s house nestled in the trees, and neared the Madison County Court House. Blondie and Huntley and the other two horses comprising what Robert Glick later called a “plumb gentle team” were performing well.

Shortly thereafter the stage approached an intersecting gravel street. The horses sighted something lying in the street directly ahead of them. They immediately “spooked.” As seventy-six year old Chris Christianson later described it: “The horses, they trembled around and got scared. * * * ” The animals began pulling hard to the right and everybody got…