Vest P. Shoun Biography


	This biography appears on pages 714-715 in "History of Dakota 
	Territory" by George W. Kingsbury, Vol. V (1915) and was 
	scanned, OCRed and edited by Maurice Krueger, mkrueger@iw.net.

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				VEST P. SHOUN.  

	Vest P. Shoum who is engaged in general merchandising at New 
Underwood, was born in Johnson county, Tennessee, on the 18th of July, 
1837, a son of William and Jennie (Brown) Shoun, who were also natives 
of that state. The paternal grandmother was of Welsh birth but the 
Shoun family comes from a long line of American ancestors. The parents 
of V. P. Shoun never came to the west, spending their entire lives in 
Tennessee. At one time William Shoun held the rank of major in the 
state militia.  

	Vest P. Shoun attended the public schools but his educational 
privileges were somewhat limited. At eighteen years of age he left 
Tennessee and went to Montgomery county, Missouri, in 1855. He spent 
some time in different counties of that state, where he was employed at 
manufacturing rails and in railroad work. He then started on foot to 
California, driving a bull team, and was nine months in making the trip 
from Springfield, Missouri, to Sacramento. He afterward spent a half 
year in working in a sawmill and then engaged in mining, remaining in 
California for a year. On the expiration of that period he made his way 
northward to Oregon, leaving San Francisco for Portland, where he 
arrived on the 22d of June, 1858. He then went to Salem, where he 
engaged in the lumber business for three years and at the end of that 
time removed to Washington territory, where he engaged in mining. Idaho 
was separated from that state in 1861 and he found himself in the 
latter district, continuing his mining operations in Idaho until 1865. 
He next went to Montana, where he engaged in the freighting business 
from Salt Lake to Fort Benton on the upper Missouri river, and during 
the three years spent in that way he had many interesting, exciting and 
difficult experiences such as occurred upon the frontier. He afterward 
engaged in railroad contract work on the Union Pacific until the 
completion of the line in the spring of 1870. He next took his 
freighting outfit to Nevada, going to Eureka and various other points, 
where he continued until 1871, when he started for Omaha, Nebraska. He 
thence made his way to Mexico but afterward returned to Galveston, 
Texas, and from that point journeyed northward to St. Paul, Minnesota. 
Later he arrived in Duluth, Minnesota, and afterward went to Mankato 
and to St. Cloud. He purchased an outfit at Saint Peter, Minnesota, and 
again engaged in contract work, this time being employed on the St. 
Paul & Sioux City Railroad until the line was completed. He afterward 
took his outfit to the St. Vincent branch of the Northern Pacific 
Railroad and was engaged in contracting in connection with construction 
work and also active in the tie camps. He remained on that work until 
the failure of Jay Cooke caused the suspension of railroad building, 
after which he took his outfit to St. Paul and engaged in street 
grading. Still later he went to Wisconsin and was engaged in logging on 
the Yellow river, but eventually he sold his outfit there and returned 
to Tennessee. For some time he remained in the south, going to 
Mississippi, Louisiana and again over Texas and on the Rio Grande river 
to the border of Mexico. Later he proceeded to Kansas, seeking railroad 
contracts in that state, Nebraska and Colorado. After a brief period 
passed in Iowa he once more went to St. Paul, where he engaged in the 
butchering business in 1873. After a year he lost his place of business 
through fire and then went again to Omaha and on to Arizona. He 
proceeded thence to lower Colorado, where he remained for six months, 
and in the winter of 1874 returned to Iowa.  

	On the 5th of April, 1875, he started for the Black Hills with 
Gordon's train. On the 25th of May the whole train was burned on the 
south bank of the Niobrara river, about fifty miles from Spotted Tail 
agency. Mr. Shoun was taken as a prisoner to Fort Randall. After a day. 
they were put across the river with orders not to return, but Mr. Shoun 
went back the next day after being liberated by the soldiers. He 
returned across the river, where he worked for a wood contractor, 
waiting for a government train to come in. When that train reached Fort 
Randall he joined it and went to Fort Robinson, where he organized a 
party of seven men and proceeded to the Hills. They left Harney Peak on 
the 25th of October, 1875. Mr. Shoun was compelled to hide from the 
soldiers who were camped about Custer, keeping in the clear until the 
soldiers left. He then engaged in mining, opening mines on Castle 
Creek, but the venture there did not prove profitable and the sixteen 
men of the party reached Deadwood in December, 1875. Mr. Shoun is today 
the only survivor of these sixteen men. He engaged in placer mining and 
soon afterward other people came. He continued there until 1876, when 
he sold his mines and engaged in the freighting business on the Sidney 
route and also to Fort Pierre and to Bismarck, North Dakota, spending 
his time in that way between 1876 and 1879. In the latter year he moved 
onto his ranch on Elk Creek, sixty miles southeast of Deadwood, 
continuing upon that ranch until 1908. He made shipments of cattle to 
Chicago and Omaha but sold out in 1908 and took up his abode at New 
Underwood, where he has since engaged in general merchandising. He 
recently sold out the lumber business but still conducts his store and 
carries a large and well appointed line of general merchandise, 
devoting his entire time to the business. Through all these years he 
has continued in South Dakota without interruption save when in the 
fall of 1888 he left the state and spent six months in travel.  

	In politics Mr. Shoun is a democrat and for one term he served as 
sheriff of Boise county, Idaho, while for seven years he was postmaster 
at Viewfield, South Dakota. In early life he was made a Mason but for 
many years has not attended lodge meetings. He has been a frontiersman 
from 1855 and has heard the whoop of many an Indian on the warpath. He 
says that a hat would not hold the lead which has been shot at him, but 
he was very fortunate in escaping wounds. He was in Deadwood when Henry 
Weston Smith was killed, also when Wild Bill was killed, and in fact he 
was one of the first white men who ever set foot in Deadwood. He cut 
the first tree where Lead City now stands and there are few phases of 
pioneer life with which he is not familiar. He participated in an 
Indian fight on the Humboldt in Nevada, and his first Indian fight was 
at Gravelly Ford on Humboldt river, in 1857. He has been in many an 
Indian fight since that time and knows all of the methods of the wily 
red foe. For one year he acted as wagon master for General Custer, whom 
he knew intimately. The experiences of frontier life drew them strongly 
together and their friendship continued until Custer's death. The story 
of pioneer experiences in the west, if written in detail, would present 
a correct picture of the life history of V. P. Shoun, and his 
reminiscences of the frontier are most interesting and entertaining.