[Left to Right]: George Wynkoop, Unknown, Unknown, Unknown,
Charles Shippen Wynkoop, W. N. Byers.

Byers, sat in his office conversing with three pacific strangers from the East, four gamblers rushed in with cocked revolvers and abusive epithets, dragged Byers to a drinking saloon where, only through the strategy of a friend, was he saved from death. After his escape, the enraged gamblers rode back to the News office and fired several bullets into it.
    The establishment was always in a state of armed neutrality. Printers and editors were moving arsenals, with revolvers at their belts and shot-guns standing beside their cases and desks. The typos returned the fire, killing one of the assailants. By this time half a dozen armed citizens reached the scene and chased the flying gamblers through the streets. One of the latter named Steele, galloping along Blake street, met Thomas W. Pollock whose horse was also upon a full run. Neither checked his speed. Both fired, at the same instant. Pollock was unhurt; Steele fell dead with a charge of buckshot in his brain. Another of the gamblers was captured and barely escaped hanging. By a close vote in a popular assembly, he was permitted to leave the country.

Source:

Richardson, Albert D., Beyond the Mississippi: From the Great River to the Great Ocean. Life and Adventure on the Prairies, Mountains, and Pacific Coast., Hartford, Conn., American Publishing Company, 1867, pp. 291, 292-293

    While this story doesn't mention any of the Wynkoops specifically by name, Ned Wynkoop's son, Frank M. Wynkoop ties two of them specifically to this incident in his Reminiscences

    A brother of my father's, Charlie Wynkoop, was a printer, and he worked on the Rocky Mountain News when it was down back where the present Denver city hall is now. Among the historical collection at the Museum in Denver, is a picture of the old newspaper office and of the interior with the printers at work at the cases and Byers seated at the desk, and rifles stacked at each place. Those early day papers used to say some of the doggonedest things about some people. Byers at one time was a very close friend of my father's - still he stuck up for Chivington and Chivington's doings.

Question: When your uncle worked for Byers was that before you were born?

    Oh yes - and also in the picture is another uncle - the one who went south, married a southern girl and joined the Confederate Army. (He couldn't remember this uncle's name at the time.)

    The Wynkoop family was a large family. Among the men of the Wynkoop family was my father, my uncle Frank, the eldest (I do not know, my father may have been the next to the eldest) then came Charles. He came out west a good many years after father first came out.

    Frank's Reminiscences date from late in his life and his memory wasn't quite as clear as it once was. George Wynkoop was the printer who worked on the Rocky Mountain News shortly after his youngest brother, Ned, had moved to Denver and become her first Sheriff. Charles, George and Ned's next older brother, like Ned, in fact, also had some training in the newspaper business, probably courtesy of their oldest brother, Col. Francis M. Wynkoop, who owned and ran the Anthracite Gazette from 1844-1846, back in Pottsville, Pennsylvania. Charles stopped over in Denver, either on his way to or on his way back from the California Gold Fields in 1860. It's not known how long he stayed, but certainly long enough to have his image captured.

Charles Shippen Wynkoop.            George Wynkoop.
(1828-1863)                                (1830-1866)

Edward W. (Ned) Wynkoop, May 1867.
(1836-1891)

    A comparison of this sketch of Ned, done 6 or seven years later, with the two sketches above it, will reveal the close family resemblance. All three of them were very tall and slender and had a tendency to favor mustaches. Charles' sketch isn't quite as detailed as George's, probably because he'd only been working there for a short time and had fewer responsibilities, but there's no doubt the two men in this original sketch are related.

    
    "An editor is a poor fellow who empties his brain to fill his stomach," Byers said.

    Being a journalist was tough in the days when reader complaints were handled not with angry letters but with a noose and a tree. Byers' campaign against lawlessness got him kidnapped and shot at. News employees were hired, in part, on how good they were with a gun.

    "Men of worth and character have staked their all upon your word and are now left penniless, and now have swor (sic) a fearful vengeance upon the author of all their miseries. You are now organizing a territory. Be careful, the next territory you will occupy will be foreign and called Hell. I don't conceal my name or purpose. Death and vengeance."
--W. C. George, letter to the editor to William Byers, published Feb. 8, 1860. ^[1]

    
    This was the atmosphere that first, George Wynkoop, and later for a few brief months at most, his older brother, Charles Shippen Wynkoop, stepped into in the years 1859 and 1860.

    By August 9th, 1860 Charles had moved on to the Gold fields of White Oak Township, El Dorado County, California, where he was working as a miner in the Durse Postal area. ^[2]

    On August 23rd 1860, the Federal Census had a listing for E. Wynkoop, aged 23, born in Pennsylvania, and living in the Denver P.O., Arapahoe County, State of Kansas. He was listed as a Speculator and his personal estate was valued at $3,000. Living with him at the time was Louisa Wakely, aged 20, born in London. ^[3]

    There was no listing for George or Charles in this particular Census record. Apparently they had both left Denver prior to this, perhaps because of too much variety in the workplace environment.

    ^1. Anton, Mike, "Frontier Journalist: William Byers Brought Denver its First Newspaper and Raised a City to Read It", Rocky Mountain News, Denver, Colorado, May 2, 1999.

    ^2. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, 1860 United States Census - Population - M 653, Roll 58, (1860 Census California, Del Norte & El Dorado Cos.), Page 1028, Family 2850.

    ^3. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, 1860 United States Census - Population - M 653, Roll 348, (1860 Census Kansas, Arapahoe, Co.), Denver, Arapahoe County, Kansas, Sheet 348, Line 14.

    Chris