Calamity Jane: The Legend vs. the Woman

Martha Jane Canary arrived in Deadwood in the summer of eighteen seventy-six. She was a teamster, a skilled horsewoman, and by multiple contemporary accounts an accomplished shot. She also drank heavily and dressed habitually in men's clothing, at a time when doing so in public was notable enough to be remarked upon in newspapers.

The dime novelists got hold of her story in the eighteen seventies. By the time they were done, Calamity Jane was a frontier heroine, a scout, a sharpshooter of legendary precision, a romantic partner of Wild Bill Hickok, and a compassionate nurse to smallpox victims. Some of that is documented. The nursing: confirmed by contemporaries in Deadwood. The scouting: she served in Army camps, though the nature of that service is a matter of some dispute in the historical record. The romance with Hickok: the Deadwood Historic Preservation Office flags this as a claim she made later in life, without supporting documentation from the period. It has not been verified.

She performed a version of her own legend in Wild West shows and touring exhibitions through the eighteen nineties. She died in nineteen oh three, broke, in Deadwood.

She asked to be buried next to Wild Bill Hickok on Mount Moriah, the hill above town. Her request was granted. Whether she knew him well enough in eighteen seventy-six to warrant the proximity is one of the things the historical record cannot confirm. The stones are close together on the hill. Visitors take photographs.

The woman and the legend exist in the same grave. One of them is better documented.