Deputized Civilian Valentine Hoy

Valentine Hoy

Deputized Civilian Val Hoy was shot and killed while riding with a posse attempting to arrest a man wanted for cattle rustling and the shooting of a teenage boy on a ranch near Rock Springs, Wyoming, just north of the Colorado border.

The Routt County sheriff deputized Mr. Hoy and other citizens after it was learned that the suspect had fled into Colorado. They located the man, and two escapees from the Utah State Penitentiary, at Lodore Canyon on the Green River. As the posse approached, the men fled on foot up to high ground on the rimrock shelf, leaving their horses and provisions behind. The posse seized the horses and provisions and returned to town for the night.

The following day they returned to the area and began searching for the subjects, who had gone even higher up the mountain on a steep, narrow trail. As Deputy Hoy attempted to walk through a narrow fissure he was shot in the chest by one of the men. The three subjects were captured by the posse four days later and hanged.

Deputy Hoy was a Union Army veteran of the Civil War. He was survived by his wife and two children.