Sheldon T.C. Hartford

Sheldon Terence Clovis Hartford is the great-great-grandfather of Katy Hartford, the first president of the Knoxville & Asheville Railroad Company and the town founder of Sheldon, North Carolina.

Biography
Sheldon Terence Clovis Hartford was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1862. His father, Jackson Hartford, enlisted in the Union Army during the Civil War shortly after his birth, leaving his mother, Jennifer Hartford (nee' Winifred) to raise him. Both his parents were 16 at the time of his birth and were living in the slums of Philadelphia with Jackson's parents, Marideth and Andrew (who was a Scottish immigrant who worked on the Camden & Amboy Railroad).

After the Civil War, Jackson was promoted to Sergeant Major and was assigned under the command of General George S. Custer. He moved his wife and child to Fort Hood, Texas while his parents moved down to Knoxville, Tennessee when Andrew recieved a job offer for a chief engineer from the Smoky Mountain & Atlantic Railroad.

Not much is known about Sheldon's early life, other than the fact he was a star student and he only had an 8th grade education.

Royal Gorge Railroad War
In 1879, at the age of 17, Sheldon left home to find work and make his mark on the world. He found employment with the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad Company as a track layer. But once he arrived on the scene, he was instantly dragged into the Colorado Railroad war of 1877 - 1880 with the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad.

On March 20th eariler that year, the Santa Fe's representing company, the Cañon City and San Juan Railroad, hired Bat Masterson to put together a group of gunmen. As a Sherif in Kansas, Masterson had no authority in Colorado, but this didn't prevent him from enlisting a large posse of men. Masterson's force included such famous fighters as Doc Holliday, Ben Thompson, Dave Rudabaugh and Mysterious Dave Mather, as well as about seventy others.

This impressive force had great success through early June 1879, but, on June 10, the state Fourth Judicial Circuit, with the later concurrence of the federal courts, ruled in favor of the Denver and Rio Grande, changing matters entirely. With the assistance of the sheriffs in the counties through which the railroads passed, the Denver and Rio Grande mounted an attack on its rival's forces. There was heavy fighting at the Santa Fe's garrisons in Colorado with Hartford describing the fighting as one of the bloodiest gunfights he had been in. The garrisons in Denver and Colorado Springs fell quickly. Masterson's headquarters in Pueblo held out the longest, but they eventually conceded defeat. Later, there were some bloodless skirmishes, but the war was essentially over with the Denver and Rio Grande in control of the Royal Gorge. On May 7, 1879 the first D&RG excursion train traveled through the Royal Gorge.

More to come soon...

Trivia

 * Sheldon's personal weapons he purchased during the Royal Gorge Railroad War were:
 * A Colt model 1873 Single Action Army Revolver with a 7 1/2 inch barrel chambered in .45 colt, with blacked steel parts (except for the hammer and the trigger which were nickel plated), Victorian engravings with gold inlay and a eagle carving on the handle.
 * A Winchester model 1873 rifle also chambered in .45 colt., with blackened steel parts (except for the hammer and the trigger which were nickel plated), Victorian engravings with gold inlay and a eagle carving on the stock.