Richens Lacey Wootton
Encyclopedia
Virginia
The Commonwealth of Virginia , is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" and sometimes the "Mother of Presidents" after the eight U.S. presidents born there...
, but lived most of his life in Colorado
Colorado
Colorado is a U.S. state that encompasses much of the Rocky Mountains as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of the Great Plains...
.
In his early life Wootton was a mountain man and trapper, then a hunter at Bent's Fort. In 1866 he built a toll road through Raton Pass
Raton Pass
Raton Pass is a mountain pass on the Santa Fe Trail along the Colorado-New Mexico border in the United States. Raton Pass is a federally designated National Historic Landmark...
. He hired a tribe of Utes under Chief Conniache to build it. He later sold the road to the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad.
He appears as a character in Flashman and the Redskins
Flashman and the Redskins
Flashman and the Redskins is a 1982 novel by George MacDonald Fraser. It is the seventh of the Flashman novels.-Plot introduction:Presented within the frame of the supposed discovery of a trunkful of papers detailing the long life and career of a Victorian officer, this series centres around...
when Flashman
Harry Paget Flashman
Sir Harry Paget Flashman VC KCB KCIE is a fictional character created by George MacDonald Fraser , but based on the character "Flashman" in Tom Brown's Schooldays , a semi-autobiographical work by Thomas Hughes ....
employs him as a guide. Flashman and his caravan are forced to abandon him when he catches cholera
Cholera
Cholera is an infection of the small intestine that is caused by the bacterium Vibrio cholerae. The main symptoms are profuse watery diarrhea and vomiting. Transmission occurs primarily by drinking or eating water or food that has been contaminated by the diarrhea of an infected person or the feces...
.