Crees in the American Old West
by Charles M N Cree

My paternal grandfather, James E. Cree, was "well-to-do." His family had made their money in a number of ventures, one of which was in the whiskey distilling business. Although the Crees sold their share of the Crabbie and Cree business, I believe the Crabbie brand remains to this day.

James Cree dabbled in archaeology, and actually made a small name for himself in that area as well.

In those days, it appears to have been commonplace for the well-to-do to invest overseas, either in New Zealand, Australia, or in the American Territories. James Cree decided to invest in American ranch land in what, decades later, was to become the State of New Mexico. He and his partner, a man of questionable character whose name I will not mention, but to whom I will refer as "B.K." *, purchased a large tract of land in the area then and now known as Lincoln County in the Territory of New Mexico. This is the same Lincoln County made famous as a result of the so-called "Lincoln County War", in which Billy the Kid played a prominent part. According to my father, both Billy the Kid and his friend, the man who, as sheriff, later killed Billy, worked for short times for my grandfather.

"B.K." made himself extremely unpopular among the local population. Word reached him that a lynching party was on the way to kill him, so he quickly sold out at a bargain price to my grandfather, and allowed himself to be smuggled out of the country in a pickle barrel.

James Cree, on the other hand, was well liked, even by the Apache Indians, who called him "the Little White Father" because of his fairness and kindness to them. (He overlooked the taking of an occasional steer for food.) James Cree was never known to carry a weapon of any kind, not even a pocket-knife. Rather than placing him at risk in this wild land, this reputation served to protect him in a land where killing an unarmed man was the ultimate in poor taste.

The original brand registered to the Cree Ranch was a simple "VV", and this brand, along with many others, is still to be seen on the wall of a small museum in the village of Lincoln. The brand, and the fact that my grandfather was one of those who introduced the Angus cattle to the United States, is the reason that many old timers called the Cree ranch the "Angus VV Ranch". The Angus cattle, by the way were not well suited to the New Mexico climate and land, and did not make my grandfather any wealthier. If one takes the care to inspect the brands, it is remarkable how many of them can be made by making simple changes to the VV brand. Indeed, "running a brand" was a common method used by cattle thieves of that day. Small wonder, then, that the Cree brand was later changed to "V Pitchfork V", which is made by adding a third V to the brand and running a vertical bar through the resulting middle V. Much more difficult to alter. But this later version of the Cree brand is not recorded on the wall of the little museum.

It seems to have been customary in those days to run cattle "on the open range". In the case of the Cree ranch, the "open range" may have been a misnomer, because a map shown in a book called Ranch on the Ruidoso, by Wilbur Coe, shows that there was a substantial overlap of the rangeland used by the Cree ranch with that used by the Coe ranch. I have not found a record of either party having sold the land to the other, and it is obvious that the Crees and the Coes were on extremely friendly terms, so I judge that it was shared amicably by both parties,

On pages 94 and 95 of that book, Wilbur tells of a trip that he and his sister, as children, made to the VV Ranch. He says, "the Cree holdings were vast. More than a thousand longhorn cattle, along with some three or four hundred Black Angus, roamed over a thousand acres of open range." He went on to say that he and his sister noticed, as they neared the ranch house, a fresh-killed beef hanging up, and how he and his sister were looking forward to some good steaks for dinner. He adds, "Mrs. Cree, who spoke with a real Scotch burr, came out to welcome us," and went on to say how Mrs. Cree gave them a tour of the pantry. He and his sister noticed "a sickening smell", despite the fact that "everything was immaculately clean". They soon discovered the reason: "Mrs. Cree held her lantern high and pointed proudly to twenty or twenty-five dressed chickens hanging on wires stretched across the ceiling, and explained that they were being ‘cured’ according to the Scottish custom." Wilbur resolved never to have chicken if he ever visited Scotland.

However, Wilbur, having prepared himself for a good steak dinner, was horrified to see at the table, instead of a plate of steaks, "a mound of chicken on a blue-willow platter"! Said Mrs. Cree, as she passed the plate arotmd, "I know you folks can have fresh beef any time so I cooked some chicken for you as a special treat."

Oddly enough, I can sympathize with Wilbur, having been faced with a plate of haggis before. In fact, although it was called "tripe" or "trippa", I have also been served (at my own request!) with essentially that same dish in a German cafeteria and in an Italian restaurant in Germany. I have determined that I have proven myself, and need never order it again.

Most of the family lore comes down from stories my father used to tell (and there were many). He didn't write many of them down (though I treasure some handwritten notes in an old copy of The Saga of Billy the Kid by Walter Noble Burns), but I still remember many - which, if not told and remembered, will die with me. My father told stories of "B.K." from days before he became a partner with my grandfather, ghost stories (which he swore were true) about his home ("Tusculum") in North Berwick, Scotland and in Santa Fe, New Mexico, where my younger brother and I were born. One of my favorite stories was about "the Duke of Galveston", which he always told with a Scottish burr. If other readers are interested, I will commit to write up some of these in future editions of CREE NEWS but this narrative must end here.

For more details of the life, ancestors and decsendants of James E Cree, please see his entry in the Cree Genealogy Database.

The Crabbie drinks brand does indeed still exist to-day (2015) although the original John Crabbie company went into liquidation in 1848. The main business was and is the manufacture of alcholic ginger beer. The mother of James E Cree was Agnes Paxton Crabbie.

* Lynda Robertson writes:
BK is most likely to be the wealthy Scotsman Brandon C. Kirby, the adopted son of James Cree. BK went to America to invest Cree's fortune and chose to buy land and cattle in Lincoln County

(Email, 12 May 2014)