Why did the Johnson County War start?

Answer 1

The main reason the Johnson County Warhappened was conflict over land. Most of the land in Wyoming at that time was in the public domain, open to stock raising and to homesteading. Large numbers of cattle were turned loose on the open range by large ranches. Homesteaders moved in and settled on the land that the large ranches had been using as open range.

The large ranchers claimed that they were victims of massive cattle stealing in Johnson County and that the local authorities were doing nothing to protect their herds. They also claimed that juries in Buffalo, Wyoming refused to convict on cattle rustling charges no matter how strong the evidence.

The small ranchers were excluded from the spring roundups and the large ranchers used many tactics to try to force the small ranchers off their land. The small ranchers rightly claimed that their cattle had as much right to grass on the public range as did the herd of the large ranchers.

By 1891, the large ranchers, members of the Wyoming Stock Growers Association (WSGA) decided they going to take action against the small ranchers. They formed a squad of invaders out of employees of the WSGA and gave them a list of 70 names to either shoot or hang.