The Unforgiving West

This is a frontier story

One cold morning, 

The February rain splashes against his face,

Barely 20  the year 1850,

He left his family,

The farmstead he was meant to inherit when both of his parents passed,

John was raised in Virginia in a small town too irrelevant to name,

His family has owned a small farm for 3 generations,

He sold it to some rich man who was building a railroad,

Pennies on the dollar,

Him being young and ambitious he heard rumors of gold and fortune in California,

So just enough to buy rough  camping gear, 

Two weeks of food rations,

and a hunting lever action carbine,

A revolver and he had some hunting knife his grandfather carried, 

A winter coat and a lasso,

He traded his family legacy for this and rumors of fortune,

Leaving  only enough for a one way train ticket to California,

So he went the train ride took days almost a week felt like months to john,

When  he arrived he spent 3 months looking for gold he found nothing,

He actually found much worse,

Widows and children crying for their father who never returned to the camp site,

Starving people stuck in the snow on top of the mountains,

Waiting for someone to look sick starving and near to death,

So they could eat and wouldn't starve themselves,

He had to intake this camp "stew" so he didn't die of famine himself,

He spent weeks on top of those goddamn mountains

Until one night his group of traveling strangers made it off the mountains and into A town,

One out west one he doesn't recall the name of,

 There was no work he almost starved,

 He spent all of his inheritance on a rifle now buried in the snow,

A revolver now rusted from the lack of care and a winter coat that is now lost,

Likely one of the campers stole it,

He saw a post hiring miners,

Coal work he was starving desperate for food shelter and money he went,

He worked there for 10 months now passing his 21st birthday turning Big rocks into small ones,

Always exhausted wondering why he even left home he now regrets that decision,

One night soot dirt grime all over his body A misplaced dynamite to expand the tunnel,

It goes off BOOM!,

He sees the mine collapsing all around him he thinks its too late...... the  black,

Waking up he sees all the mine workers,

All of them in shock digging him out of the ruble in shock he survived,

He left the mines wanders the desert for months,

Low on cash almost none,

Surviving off the charity of travelers he has met along the way,

The scarce water,

and food he might come across,

One night on July 19 1852 now 22 years old,

He meets a band of outlaws,

They agree to train heist,

It goes horribly wrong,

The gang gets shot down in a pool of blood,

Hes taken into custody by a local Oregon Sheriff,

There is no court hearing this isn't Virginia,

3 days he spends in a county jail,

He's dragged out to the gallows,

Hog tied on  horse back,

The rope placed around his neck,

The black hood over his head,

The Sheriff reads out aloud,

"John  Mcallahan you will be punished for your crimes of murder and robbery any last words?",

He's too shaken the boy is cold shivering,

The sheriff waits "well hell nothing i guess let him swing."

Then john the boy who chased fortune is no more