Although the Big Horn Basin escaped the violence of the Indian wars and the conflicts between cattle barons and small ranchers, the final range war -- between sheep and cattle ranchers -- climaxed in the Ten Sleep area in 1909.  Conflict had been brewing for two decades over which domestic animals had the right to graze on Wyoming’s vast stretches of public land.  Cattle ranchers insisted that they had arrived first, that sheep cropped the grass so short that they ruined the rangeland, and that sheep were inherently despicable animals.

In many regions cattle men established "dead lines" which sheep crossed at the risk of their lives.  Sheep ranching however, was a highly profitable business, and the promise of money encouraged many men to take the risk.  During this conflict approximately 10,000 sheep were shot, dynamited, driven off cliffs, or attacked by dogs; and at least sixteen sheep herders were murdered.

When Joe Emge, a Ten Sleep area cattleman who had publicly expressed his hatred of sheep and had even built an illegal fence to keep sheep off of public range, turned traitor by selling his cattle and going into partnership with a well-known sheep rancher, he earned the contempt and hatred of the area cattlemen.  In April of 1909 Emge boldly moved his sheep across a dead line, and his camp was raided that night by five men wearing gunny sack masks.  They killed Emge, his partner, and a sheep herder, then cremated their bodies in their wagon and shot many of the sheep.

While the murders were being investigated, one cattle rancher who testified before a grand jury was shortly thereafter found dead.  Eventually, however, all five raiders -- several of them prominent ranchers -- were identified and convicted.  Although some Wyoming cattlemen retain their dislike of sheep, the Ten Sleep incident was more or less the end of the violence, with later conflicts between cattle and sheep interests being settled in a more civilized fashion.

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