American Vampires

by Bob Curran

  According to the Crow, the little people live in caves and gullies in the Pryor Mountain Range in southern Montana, but branches of them are also found in the Big Horn Mountains in northern Wyoming and the Wolf Mountains in southeast Montana. However, their home area is not to be approached lightly. Some of the natural rocky spires in the area are thought to be arrows that the little people can magically fire at intruders in order to protect their lands.

  The Crow consider the little people to be great healers. One Crow folktale involves an individual called Burnt Face. A young boy fell into a campfire and completely burnt his face, thus leaving him disfigured. When his family moved north to hunt buffalo, Burnt Face moved south to a remote valley in the Big Horn Mountains where he built himself a Sun Dance lodge. There, he spilled fresh blood on the ground and the little people came down to him from the caves and gullies of the mountains higher up. They healed his scars and gave him great knowledge, as well as supernatural healing powers so that he could help his own people. He returned to his tribe where he became a great chieftain and, although he retained the name Burnt Face, his skin was free of any blemish.

  For the Arapaho, however, the experience of the little people was somewhat different. They referred to the little people as hecesiiteihii or nimerigar, which were cannibal dwarves. They were extremely dangerous man-eaters, and at one time in their history, the Arapaho had fought a war against them, which they had won by trapping many of them in a gorge and killing them. It took them a long while to die, for the use of arrows seemed to have little effect on them. Even so, they were eventually wiped out. However, it was also believed that although small, the dwarves were very strong, and one of them could carry a full-grown warrior on his back to the caves in the mountains where the family could devour him.

  It was believed, however, that these vicious dwarves could not cross running water or any deep place, and the only thing one had to do to escape them was to jump a deep, running river. However, one had to be careful, for the little people were also skilled magicians and could bring misfortune by use of their dark arts. Some legends said that they also trapped the souls of dead warriors who had somehow crossed them and held them prisoner in earthen jars for all eternity.

  Among the Cheyenne and the Shoshone, the little people were also viewed as vicious cannibals who lived underground in types of cave “cities” cut into the rocks of dark gullies. According to some of the medicine men, these beings could not stand the light, as they had a close connection with the spirits of the dead. They shut themselves away in underground places, hunting only when the moon was out. They were also known to kill their own kind when individuals became too old to be of any use to their communities. This was done with a straightforward, single blow to the head. After that, the community drank the blood of the slain. In this way all the wisdom that had been accumulated by the individual was passed among the community. In some cases, the little people also did the same to old and feeble members of human society, usually under the cover of darkness.

  But did such beings exist? Somewhere among the mountains of Wyoming and Montana is there (or was there) a community of vicious dwarves who were hostile toward humans? For many years, the stories of the little people were simply considered to be old Indian legends. In 1932, however, two prospectors—Cecil Mayne and Frank Carr—were digging for gold in the San Pedro Mountains. About 60 miles southwest of Casper, Wyoming, they located what they thought might be a small vein in the mountainside, and used dynamite to blast the rock. When the dust of the explosion cleared, they found that they had blasted through the wall of a small cave, which stretched back into the darkness for more than 15 feet. Entering, they found that the walls of the place contained several petroglyphs, but, more importantly, seated on a ledge directly above them, was the mummified body of what seemed to be a very small man of about 14 inches in height. His skin was brown and wrinkled, and his face displayed a fat nose, heavy-lidded eyes, thick lips, and a thin slash-like mouth. It appeared to be the body of an old man. It was so well preserved in the airless cave that both toenails and fingernails were clearly visible, and the head of the body was covered in a strange, black, jelly-like substance, which neither of the prospectors could identify.

  What became known as “the San Pedro Mummy” was taken back to Casper, where it caused a sensation in scientific circles. Initially, the two prospectors were accused of creating a hoax using old human remains that they had found, but gradually their claims were taken more seriously. Old Crow and Shoshone stories of the little people of the mountains began to resurface, and many thought that this was evidence for such a race, dwelling away from mankind. There were further tales of blood-drinking dwarves who were lurking in dark underground caverns all through the region. There were tales of vampire “cave-cities” somewhere far beneath the mountains, as old Indian beliefs suggested. The Mummy was put on display for several years before being formally examined by Dr. Harry Shapiro of the American Museum of Natural History. He concluded that it was indeed human and that it could belong to another species of man. Nothing was said about possible blood-drinking.

  In 1979, fresh tests were carried out on the Mummy using x-rays, and it was confirmed that it was some form of human and might have even been a child. Professor George Gill of the University of Wyoming also revealed that the individual had met a violent death, possibly with a single blow to the head; the curious substance surrounding its head was actually congealed brains and blood. Part of the spine and the collarbone had been broken by a single blow. Gill also suggested that the child might have been born with anencephaly (with part of its brain functions missing) and might have been ritually killed. However, his findings were disputed by some other academics from the University of Harvard, who had also examined the mummy, claiming that it was actually the mummified body of a 65 year-old adult male. One curious fact that emerged from both investigations was that the canine teeth of the mummy were curiously pointed. As this seemed to be a natural phenomenon, stories began to circulate of a tiny vampire race living among the mountains of Wyoming and Montana.

  Following these scientific investigations, the San Pedro Mummy was eventually purchased by a local Casper businessman, Ivan T. Goodman, who put it on display as part of a sideshow. When Goodman died in 1950, the Mummy passed into the hands of another businessman, Leonard Walder, and seems to have disappeared. Walder died in the early 1980s without leaving any trace of the mummy among his estate. There is allegedly a current reward of $10,000 offered by Wyoming University to anyone who can find or give information towards the finding of the relic.

  In 1994, however, another such mummy, this time female, was found in another sealed cave in the San Pedro Range. This was discovered by accident by an unnamed family who held lands in the mountains. Once again, Professor Gill was involved in the examination, as were physicians from Denver Children’s Hospital in Colorado. They concluded that this was the body of an infant girl who had been born with some sort of deformity or congenital condition, and had been ritually killed. DNA testing seemed to confirm that the remains were human, and Native American and radiocarbon dating showed that they were at least 300 to 400 years old. Others were not so sure that the findings were conclusive, and hinted at another species of human dwelling in the mountains. After the tests had been carried out, the family who had initially found the female mummy asked for it back, and upon receipt, they disappeared and were never heard of again. Once again, the evidence remains inconclusive, but the Crow, the Arapaho, and the Shoshone claim that races of small people with vampiric tendencies were (and perhaps still are) wandering the San Pedro and other mountain ranges of Wyoming and Montana.

  But is there any other evidence for such beings, perhaps even from elsewhere in America? In 1876, a ploughman on the farm of James Brown of Hillsboro, Tennessee, was turning over some earth in a small and remote valley when he stumbled upon what appeared to be human remains—possibly those of children. Upon investigation, it was found that he had dug into an e
xpansive graveyard in which a good number of tiny bodies, some no more than 3 feet in height, had been buried. Although it was said that “thousands” of them were buried there, this is probably an exaggeration. The area became known as “the pygmy cemetery,” and, for a while, enjoyed something of a reputation, which has now diminished. When a number of the skulls were unearthed, they had naturally pointed incisors, prompting speculation about vampiric dwarves once again. Indeed, folklore of both the Cherokee and the Chickasaw tell tales of “little vampire men” who are of a much older race than the Red Men, and who fought against them in some distant time in the past.

  And there seems to be some evidence of such vampiric entities elsewhere in Tennessee. In nearby White County, for example, another peculiar grave site was found on the farm of Captain Simon Doyle. This was investigated on July 29th, 1820, by a Mr. Turner Lane of Sparta. Mr. Lane, an amateur archaeologist, found evidence of a number of burials of small people on Captain Doyle’s property, one of which was remarkably intact, probably due to the soil in which it had been buried. Together with John H. Anderson, a local attorney and investigator, they opened several other graves and found a number of skeletons, the most intact measuring a little more than 3 feet in length. The results of their finds were published in an academic paper in Sparta the following year under the names of Lane and Anderson, but reports concerning the “White County Pigmies” had been printed in local newspapers, with stories circulating that these were some sort of vampire.

  Strange finds of curious skeletons were not unusual in White County, which contained several Indian Mounds. Indeed, Mr. Lane had already investigated the opening of one of these mounds on the farm of Andrew Bryan in which they had found the bones of a man who stood almost nine feet tall. The skeleton wore a necklace made out of stones and curious metals, which were taken away for examination. In some of the other mounds, extremely small skeletons were supposedly also found, although no evidence of these exists.

  Of course, it is possible that the folklore of the area contains a germ of truth and that there were more ancient (and physically different) forms of mankind. The famous “horned skulls” of Philadelphia certainly seem to suggest this. In 1880, a burial mound was opened and several skulls were taken out, each of which had two bony protuberances on the forehead just about 2 inches above the eyes. The accompanying skeletons were well over 7 feet tall, but were normal in all other respects. It was thought that they had been buried somewhere between AD 100 and AD 1200. The find was made under the supervision of a Pennsylvania State Historian and a minister of the Presbyterian church, Dr. G.P. Donehoo, and two prominent archaeologists, Dr. A.B. Skinner of the American Investigating Museum and Dr. W.K. Morehead of Phillips Academy in Massachusetts. Their finds were preliminary, and the skulls and some of the bones were sent to the American Investigating Museum for authentication. However, there seems to have been some sort of bureaucratic error and they were misplaced before completely vanishing. However, all paperwork concerning them is still extant.

  With horned men walking around in early America, it does not seem beyond the bounds of possibility that a tribe of vampiric dwarves might have been living in Wyoming and southern Montana, and that they passed into the folklore of the Native Americans. Perhaps there was some grain of truth in all the old legends. Were the dwarves another blood-drinking species of mankind that had evolved alongside ourselves? And could it be that such a species survived in some parts of America well into the 19th century, largely unknown to us?

  These were the stories and questions that the settlers considered as they built their communities in the rugged landscape of Wyoming, and gradually the old folktales of the Native American peoples of the area became incorporated into their own lore. The mountain-man Jim Bridger who had blazed the Bridger Trail into Wyoming in 1864 often regaled his listeners with stories of vampire-like entities that he had allegedly encountered up in the remote and winding mountain canyons and ravines. However, Bridger was known for his tall tales and exaggerations, and had undoubtedly heard some of the Indian folklore and adapted it into his own exploits. Most people took his stories with a grain of salt, and yet others were not entirely sure that these truly were exaggerations.

  Bridger had asserted that somewhere among the mountains (he refused to say where) there was a kind of “mound city” that he had seen from a rise somewhere in the southern Rockies. He said it was an artificially created metropolis built by a race of small, gray people, who drank blood. He hadn’t approached such a place, as local Native Americans had told him that it was extremely evil and he could feel the dark vibrations coming from it. Of course, Bridger may have been recounting nothing more than an old Native American legend of a great mound, which had been constructed somewhere among the hills by an early people. The great Oglala Lakota medicine man, Black Elk, mentioned a story that he had heard as a child of a great mound somewhere among the mountains that had great healing powers. Supposedly, it had been built by an earlier people who lived among the hills. Bridger may have simply lifted this old tale, or one like it, and incorporated it into his own personal experience. This telling of tall tales was a feature of the lives of many of the “mountain men,” the tough, lonely characters who lived out in the wild and traded with the Native Americans, often absorbing much of their ways and lore.

  Whether or not Bridger’s story was true, similar tales had an effect on some of the settlers who came to Wyoming and Montana. The strange landscape with its mountains and gullies must have had a rather unsettling effect on the pioneers who put down roots in the region, and it was perhaps easy to imagine something monstrous and dangerous lurking out there among the shadowy canyons or in underground caves in some remote mountain valley. In such an “alien” place, the imagination can certainly play strange tricks, and interpretations of events might become a little skewed. And, of course, this feeling of unease could not be helped by the old stories, especially when they were recounted by the likes of Jim Bridger and other mountain men. Hostile and vampiric little people were used as a means of explanation for a number of things that befell the early homesteaders in this unfriendly land. The beings who dwelt there were as hostile toward the whites as they had been toward the Native Americans. If a child disappeared, it had been taken by the little people; if a community fell sick, the little people had poisoned the wells; if an individual wasted away, the little people were visiting him or her during the night and drawing off his or her blood. Even if things went missing from the home, the little people had stolen them for their own purposes or for malicious mischief. They were up in the mountains, hills, shady gullies, and caves watching and waiting for every opportunity to do humans harm.

  They were the people who had built some of the inexplicable stone circles that adorned the nearby mountains, or who had carved the petroglyphs in some of the deep caves in the cliffs. They were, according to some, the same people who had constructed the Bighorn Medicine Wheel in Big Horn County in Wyoming. The name refers to a certain alignment of stones believed to be arranged in such a way as to have spiritual or supernatural properties. They are all laid out in a basic pattern, usually centered around a single stone with an outer “ring” from which a number of lines connect like spokes. They are sometimes named “sacred hoops” among certain tribes. Built by a largely unknown prehistoric race, they have been used across the centuries by indigenous North American people for astronomical, healing, teaching, and religious purposes. Some people have argued that they are “doors” to other worlds, which such ancient peoples used (and though which some people could sometimes be dragged and vanish in their own world); others claim they were the center of long-vanished cities and of strange and inhuman peoples (such as the vampire dwarves). The Big Horn Wheel is the most southernly and most ancient of all these structures and therefore has some importance attached to it. One story about such structures was that they “centered” dark powers, which the vampires used to bring evil and misfortune on a tribe through black magic. Many of the se
ttlers accepted such a belief, and when misfortune or illness struck their own communities (especially in Wyoming and Montana), it was claimed that the dwarves were clandestinely using the Medicine Wheel to bring about death, so that they could feed on the corpses. Scattered all through the Pryor Mountains were small stone circles that were often called “fairy rings,” which these malevolent dwarves used from time to time in order to do harm. Such places were to be avoided, even by the most hardened and wily of mountain men.

  The idea of vampiric little people was not unique to the Pryor Mountains or to Wyoming, even though stories of them appear to cluster in that state. Around the Great Lakes, the idea of cannibalistic diminutive warriors appears in the oral traditions of the Ojibwe. These beings resemble those in Wyoming—they are great magicians and also drink blood from time to time. They live in deep caves and ravines and are creatures of darkness, only coming out at night. They will then approach Ojibwe houses and try to entice those to come out, when they will attack them and drink their blood. Sometimes, they will take on the voice of a friend and call softly or trick the inhabitants of a house by pretending that there is some sort of emergency outside to draw them out. As in Wyoming, they are said to be the remnants of an ancient race and are opposed to humankind whom they think have invaded their lands.

  And, like the mountains of Wyoming, there are cave drawings attributed to the little people scattered throughout the Great Lakes region. In the early 1900s, a prospector name Lewis Calhoun was hunting down veins of copper in the Porcupine Mountains, which extended through Ontonagon County in Michigan. Throughout the course of his investigations, he descended into a narrow gully protected by a rocky overhang. There was really nothing down there, but at the very bottom of the gully, where it was almost cave-like, he saw a number of drawings on the rock wall. One of them showed what looked like a number of small, hairy-faced men in a canoe (presumably on one of the Lakes below). Another showed them gathered around one of their own, and they seemed to be drinking its blood. Calhoun was horrified—even more horrified when he found what appeared to be a sharp vampire-like tooth amongst the stones at the very bottom of the canyon (though he later admitted it may have been a piece of rock). He had the feeling that he was being watched from the shadows, even though he couldn’t see anybody and heard nothing except the distant cries of birds out on the mountain slopes. He said later that he had never been so anxious to get out of a place in his life. There was a feeling of ancientness about the gloomy location, and he scrambled up to the wholesome sunlight once more. Later, he would return to the area in the company of some other miners and more learned men, but he couldn’t find the place again. There had been numerous rock falls in the locality and its geographical references changed. Although they explored several gullies and caves, they couldn’t find any trace of the drawings at all. However, several of the searchers claimed that, like Calhoun, they too felt as if they were being watched by someone or something unseen.