A local legend set in the tri-lakes region of Colorado.
Travel southwest from Monument, Colorado, into the mountains and soon you come to Howling Creek [1].
In the 1850’s a trapper named John Herman and his wife Rebecca settled where Howling Creek emerged on the south side of what is now called Mount Herman [2]. John was after beaver, which was plentiful there. He and Rebecca built a small log cabin and lived in it for a few years.
In 1855 Rebecca Herman became pregnant. When she was ready to have their child, John raced on horseback to their nearest neighbors, several miles away. [3]
“My wife is having a baby,” he said to the man and his wife. “Can you help us?” They agreed to come at once. As they got ready to leave, a violent thunderstorm came over the mountain and a bolt of lightning struck and killed John Herman. The neighbor man and his wife managed to find John and Rebecca’s cabin, but did not arrive until the next day. By then Rebecca Herman was dead too.
It looked as if she had given birth before she died, but the neighbors could not find the baby. Since there were coyote tracks all around, they decided the coyotes had eaten the baby. They buried Rebecca and left.
A number of years after she died, people began to tell a strange tale. Some swore it was a true story. Others said it never could have happened.
—
The story begins in Palmer Lake, which at that time was not yet a town but just a small settlement northwest of Monument, near Mount Herman and Rebecca’s grave. Early one morning a pack of coyotes raced down from the mountains and killed some goats. Attacks like this were not unusual, even today. But a boy thought he saw a naked young girl with long blond hair running with the coyotes.
A year or two later, a woman came upon some coyotes eating a calf they had just killed. Eating the calf with them, she claimed, was a naked young girl with long blond hair. When the coyotes and the girl saw her, they ran off into the woods. The woman said that at first the girl ran on all fours, and then she stood up and ran like a human, as swift as the coyotes. People began wondering if this “coyote girl” was Rebecca Herman’s daughter. Had a mother coyote carried her off, the day she was born, and raised her with her pups? If so, by now she would be eight or nine years old.
As the story is told, some men began to look for the girl. They searched along the banks of Howling Creek, across Fire’s Edge and up Mount Herman. And one day, it is said, they found her walking along a ridge with a coyote at her side. When the coyote ran off, the girl hid under a large rock.
When the men tried to capture her, she fought back, biting and scratching like an enraged animal. When they finally subdued her, she began screaming and howling like a frightened young coyote pup.
The men bound her with rope, put her across a horse, and took her to a small ranch house [4] away from town [5]. They decided to turn her over to the sheriff the next day. They placed her in an empty stall in the barn and untied her. Afraid of the men, she hid in the corner. They locked the barn and left her.
Soon she was screaming and howling again. The men thought they would go mad listening to her, but at last she stopped. When night fell, coyotes began howling and yipping in the distance. Folk say that each time they stopped, the girl howled in reply.
As the story goes, the cries of the coyotes came from every direction, and got closer and closer. Suddenly, like it was planned, the coyotes attacked the rancher’s horses and other livestock. The men rushed into the darkness, firing their guns.
When the men got back to the barn, they noticed that a hole was dug in the dirt under and out of the barn. And the girl was gone!
—
Years passed with no word of the girl. Then one day some men on horseback came into the forest in front of Mount Herman, not far from Howling Creek. They claim they saw a young woman with long blond hair feeding two coyote pups. When she saw the men, she snatched up the pups and ran into the forest. They tried to follow her, but she quickly disappeared up the mountain. They searched and searched but found no trace of her.
That is the last we know of the famous Coyote Girl of Monument. But the old timers in the area, even this day, say that when you hear the howling of the coyotes, if you listen carefully, you can hear the howl of a girl. And that is how this story ends.
adapted by Steve Roscio,
Fire’s Edge Horse Ranch
Footnotes:
[1] This creek has been since been identified as North Beaver Creek, that flows through the Twin Valley and into Monument Creek.
[2] The mountain is still known as “Mount Herman”, or colloquially as “Papa’s Mountain”.
[3] Although the name of the neighbor is unconfirmed, the home is that of present day Cy & Dorthy Sibell, former mayor of Monument, on Front Street in Monument, Colorado.
[4] The ranch house is located on the Delacroix Ranch at the west end of Baptist Road.
[5] The “town” referred to here is not Monument, but Husted (“you-stead”). The town of Husted was located at what is now the northern portion of the United States Air Force Academy. Sadly, Husted has become a ghost town and has since vanished beneath the I-25 interchange and Air Force Academy north gate.
Someone told me this story years ago, but it had to do with a wolf and was set in a different location. I wrote the above for a campfire story to tell my then-young granddaughter Megan and her friends. If you know the original story and/or its author, please add a comment with the information. This will allow me to give proper credit to the origin of the story. Thanx! — Steve