Hildreth Frost

Hildreth Frost (1880-1955) was a lawyer and soldier from Colorado who commanded Company A of the 2nd Infantry Regiment during the Colorado Coalfield War. He also served as Judge Advocate for the military courts-martial for prosecuting members of the Colorado National Guard following the Ludlow Massacre.[2]

Hildreth Frost
Hildreth Frost in a Bench and Bar of Colorado handbook, 1917.
Born(1880-06-22)22 June 1880
Newton, Massachusetts
Died1955
Colorado Springs, Colorado
Buried
Evergreen Cemetery, Colorado Springs
AllegianceUnited States, Colorado
Service/branch
Rank
Unit
  • 2nd Infantry Regiment (Colorado National Guard)
Battles/warsColorado Coalfield War
World War I
Alma materColorado College (A.B, 1901), Harvard Law School (LL.B, 1904)
Spouse(s)
Bertha K. Marcum
​
(
m. 1914; died 1942)
[1]
Other workLawyer

Early Life

Hildreth Frost was born to Silas and Betsey Frost in Newton, Massachusetts on 22 June 1880. Frost received a bachelor's degree from Colorado College in 1901, the same year as the Cripple Creek Strike, and a law degree from Harvard in 1904.[3] Frost worked as a lawyer on matters relating to the mining industry, which was a major employer in Southern Colorado prior to the Great Depression.

Colorado Coalfield War

On 26 October 1913, Governor of Colorado Elias M. Ammons ordered the Colorado National Guard to deploy to the southern coalfields near Trinidad and Walsenburg in response to violence associated with the United Mine Workers of America strike against the Colorado Fuel and Iron company that had begun on 23 September. Captain Frost led Company A in the strike zone, one of several units deployed. Like other units of the National Guard in the strike zone, Company A began incorporating CF&I mine guards into its ranks.

Company A would remain deployed through the departure of the congressional committee visit and publication of the military report on the strike zone, returning home on 17 April 1914. However, the company's first sergeant and two lieutenants remained and participated in the Ludlow Massacre, where roughly 20 strikers and their families were killed.

Cpt. Frost participated in the northern-most engagement of the conflict, a ten-hour long gun battle in near the mines of Louisville, north of Denver, on 28 April. Two strikebreakers were critically wounded during the battle against the incensed miners.[4]

Following the conflict, several members of the Colorado National Guard, including Lt. Karl Linderfelt and Major Patrick J. Hamrock were court-martialed in relation to the violence at Ludlow and the killing of strike-leader Louis Tikas. Frost participated in the trials, which resulted in no punishments, as Judge Advocate.

After the Coalfield War

Frost married Bertha K. Marcum on 1 October 1914.[3][5] Frost continued to work as a lawyer following the conflict and was drafted following the entry of the United States into the First World War, which he had penned several newspaper opinion pieces against in the years preceding it, citing his experience during the 1913-1914 strike. Frost died in 1955. His son Hildreth Frost, Jr. would be appointed as assayer for the Denver Mint in 1970.[6]

References
  1. Luzier, Athlyn. "Evergreen Cemetery Records thru 1972". Pikes Peak Genealogical Society. Retrieved 3 January 2020.
  2. "Bench and Bar of Colorado". 1917. Retrieved 14 December 2019.
  3. "Harvard Alumni Bulletin". 9 December 1914. Retrieved 14 December 2019.
  4. Martelle, Scott. Blood Passion: The Ludlow Massacre and Class War in the American West. New Brunswick, New Jersey and London: Rutgers University Press, 2007. bib., illus., index, 197 p.
  5. "Hildreth Frost". Find A Grave. Retrieved 14 December 2019.
  6. Brooks, Mary (2 February 1970). "Colorado Professor Takes Oath as Assayer of Denver Mint". United States Mint. Retrieved 3 January 2020.
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