by Enss, Chris
In a short time Cort was back on his feet. Madam Silks whisked her lover off to Kansas City for a much-needed break from the routine. She showered him with gifts and clothing and indulged herself in the finer things as well. The pair spent a great deal of time at the Overland Park racetrack, and Mattie became so enamored with the sport that she invested in a racing stable. With the exception of a chestnut gelding named Jim Blaine, all of her horses were losers.
In 1884, after a seven-year engagement, Mattie and Cort were married. Cort’s first wife had died earlier that year, making him free to make an honest woman of his longtime lover. For a short time Mattie’s life was good. She purchased three other parlor houses in the Denver area, all of which were extremely successful. Cort’s philandering had slowed down a bit. He had, however, developed a costly but manageable gambling habit.
With business going as well as it was and with her marriage as stable as it would ever be, Mattie felt she could now pay more attention to her stable of horses. News that Cort’s daughter had died, leaving behind a child of her own, halted any such plans. Cort wanted no part of the orphaned girl and refused to take her in. Mattie did not agree with her husband. She adopted the little girl, whose name was Rita, and placed her in a well-respected boardinghouse. Four years after Mattie assumed responsibility for Rita, Cort passed away. The distraught madam gave her husband a magnificent funeral, spending an untold fortune on the services and his tombstone.
At the age of seventy-seven, after more than four decades of working in Colorado’s underworld, she remained the leading moneymaker in the profession. As her businesses continued to grow, so did the need to protect her ladies from overzealous clients who might harm the merchandise. With that in mind Mattie hired “Handsome” Jack Ready. Jack was a big, good-looking man who worked as not only Mattie’s bouncer, but also her financial advisor. Their relationship quickly graduated from employer-employee to man and wife when the two married in 1923.
Since the turn of the century, the modern world had ever so slightly been encroaching on Mattie’s trade. The Old West ideals of prostitution were tolerated less and less, and government officials were being pushed to abolish the parlor house trade. Police raids on the brothels frightened off customers, and business began to dwindle to nothing. Mattie was forced to shut her doors and sell her homes, including the famed House of Mirrors, which she had purchased from another well-known madam, Jennie Rogers.
Mattie retired to a quiet home just two blocks from one of the five brothels she had once owned. She enjoyed spending time with Jack, her adopted granddaughter, and Rita’s children. When Mattie passed away at the age of eighty-one she willed her estate to her husband and Rita. Over her forty-year career, she had made millions, but when she died she had only $4,000 in cash, a few pieces of jewelry, and some property.
Madam Silks is buried at the Fairmount Cemetery in Denver under a headstone that reads, “Martha A. Ready, January 7, 1929.”
Belle Ryan Cora
The Loyal Gambler
“Man is a gaming animal. He must always be trying to get the better in something or other.”
Historian Charles Lamb, 1823
The New World gambling parlor in Marysville, California, in 1851 was filled with prospectors and sojourners eager to lay their money down on a game of chance. Patrons could choose from a variety of amusements, including roulette, dice, faro, and poker.
The New World was a grand and ornate saloon. An elaborate bar lined an entire wall and brass mountings accentuated the gleaming countertops. Imposing mirrors clung to all sides of the enormous entryway, and paintings of nude women relaxed in beauty prostrate loomed over the patrons from the walls above.
Madame Belle Ryan, a voluptuous creature with dark hair, hazel eyes, and a fair complexion, sauntered down the stairs, surveying the guests who had gathered. Men scrambled for a place at the tables; their gold dust and gold nuggets had been exchanged for the chips they tossed onto the green felt—bets for the lucky cards in their hands.
Charles Cora, a handsome brute of a man with black hair and a thick, trimmed mustache, caught Belle’s eye. He was very nicely dressed. From the bowler hat on top of his head to the polished black boots on his feet, he exuded style and confidence. Charles was seated at a table in the corner of the room, dealing a hand of poker to four men around him. The pile of chips in front of Charles was proof that he’d had a successful evening. He turned to look at Belle and gave her an approving nod. She smiled back at him, then noticed a handful of cavalry soldiers standing just inside the saloon. Charles spotted the men too and motioned slightly for Belle to go over to them. She winked and proceeded obligingly.
The wide-eyed troops admired the beautiful Belle as she strode their way. “Why don’t you come on in and join the fun. Have a drink, sit in on a game or two?” she purred invitingly.
“We aren’t much for gambling, ma’am,” one of the young soldiers shared. “We just got our pay and thought we’d stop in for one shot of whiskey and then be on our way.”
Belle slowly approached the uniformed man and stopped uncomfortably close to his face. The soldier breathed in her perfume and then glanced away, shyly. “But it’s so early,” she said, smiling. “Have a drink, play a hand of faro, and then we’ll dance,” she persuaded.
“I guess we can stick around for a little while,” the enchanted young man offered.
Belle escorted the troops to the bar and had the bartender serve them a glass of whiskey. “That one’s on the house,” she assured them. She then locked arms with a pair of the soldiers and ushered them to the faro table. They obediently sat down, and Charles tipped his hat at the new players. “I’ll be back in a bit for my dance,” Belle whispered in their ears.
As Belle walked away the bartender served another round of drinks to the soldiers and Charles started dealing the cards. By the time Belle returned to the table, the troops had lost their entire wages. They took a turn with her on the dance floor and then lumbered out of the establishment, dazed and disappointed.
Occasionally Belle was the one that dealt the cards, but her main contribution to the gambling industry was luring players to the game and building their confidence. Belle and her partner, Charles Cora, made hundreds of thousands of dollars off unsuspecting marks who believed they were better than the professional gamblers luring them to the tables.
Belle Ryan Cora was born in Baltimore in 1832; her parents named her Clara Belle. Her father was the minister of a small parish, and the home life she had with her doting mother and young sister, Anna, was idyllic. At seventeen she fell in love with a distinguished older gentleman and became pregnant. After learning the news the child’s father abandoned them. Desperate and ashamed, Belle fled to New Orleans to have her child. The baby died shortly after being born, leaving Belle despondent and alone. While wandering the streets of New Orleans contemplating her life, she met a kindly woman who took pity on her situation and offered to help.
The popular Belle Ryan Cora’s house on Waverly Street in San Francisco
California Historical Society
Belle recognized the woman as a known madam in the city. She was fully aware of the kind of assistance being presented, but she felt her options were limited. After accompanying the woman to her parlor house, being fed and provided a new wardrobe, Belle accepted her offer of work. In a matter of only a few months, she was earning more than any other woman in the city.
When Charles Cora, a well-known New Orleans gambler, spotted Belle he was instantly smitten. She was equally taken with him. The two began spending time together and in a few weeks were inseparable.
Once the news of the California gold rush reached Charles, he decided to try his luck in a place rich with glittering finds. With Belle by his side, he boarded a steamship bound for San Francisco. Charles and Belle weren’t the only ones with a dubious past making the trip. The vessel contained more
than forty gamblers and ladies of the evening. Personalities clashed during the voyage. The scruples of such a motley group of passengers were questionable or nonexistent. When they weren’t cheating one another at a game of poker or faro, they were conning law-abiding travelers out of their possessions or blatantly stealing from others.
Charles was one of two thieves who got caught trying to take writer Edward L. Williams’s purse filled with money. On December 11, 1849, Williams recorded the incident in his journal.
I was hanging in a hammock near the bow, alongside a row of bunks. Not long after falling asleep I was awakened by a volley of curses and a loud “Get out of here!” There followed more coarse and vile oaths and the threat: “If you don’t get out, I will cut you down. You are keeping the air from me!” I didn’t move. One of them I recognized as Charles Cora removed a large knife from his pocket. Just then, on the other side of his hammock I saw a pistol gleaming in the moonlight and the man holding it said, “You attempt to cut the boy down for his purse before me and I will blow a hole through you, you infernal blackleg Southerner. I know you, you used to run a gambling game at New Orleans and you robbed everybody. Get away from that boy!”
The confrontation between Charles and the competing robber intensified as the voyage continued. Angry over the thwarted attempt to steal a bankroll to gamble with, Charles and his cohorts took to bullying the passengers. He caused so much trouble that the ship’s captain had him and his partners in crime placed in irons.
Belle and Charles arrived in San Francisco on December 28, 1849. The gambling team then boarded a stage for Sacramento. The river city was the location for some of the territory’s biggest poker games. The price to sit in on one particular game was $20,000. Belle put up the money and Charles played. He won a sizeable amount in one hand, but his luck quickly changed and he lost it all. Belle fronted him an additional $60,000 to stay in the game, but he was unable to turn things around. He then solemnly vowed he would never again play with a woman’s money.
The lovers left Sacramento and made the rounds at the various mining camps in the foothills. They set up games at makeshift saloons, and Belle lured prospective gamblers in for Charles to fleece. Once they had made up the losses they incurred in Sacramento, they moved on to Marysville and opened a gambling den called the New World.
There were no limits on the bets taken at the tables at the New World. One prospector recalled that “Charles Cora himself laid down a bet of $10,000 in one hand of five-card draw. He won his bet too.”
Once the gaming house was established and earning a profit, Belle sought to expand the enterprise. In April 1851 she traveled to Sonora. The booming mining town had a population of five thousand people and was in desperate need of additional entertainment. Using the name Arabelle Ryan, Belle purchased a house of ill repute. She expanded the business to include gaming and developed a reputation as a confidence woman, gaining clients’ trust to entice them into games of chance. She called the combination brothel and gambling den the Sonora Club.
The business was a profitable venture. Charles followed after his paramour and dealt cards for her. By the end of 1851, Belle and Charles had earned more than $126,000 from their combined businesses in Sonora and Marysville. The gamblers used their substantial holdings to move their trade to San Francisco.
Although Charles and Belle were not married, she took on his last name when they relocated to the City by the Bay. The pair operated out of a three-story wooden building that had two entrances. Belle decorated the combination bordello and casino with the finest furnishings and accoutrements. When the Coras opened the doors to the business on November 17, 1852, patrons reported that “it rivaled the finest residences in the city.” Customers included politicians, entrepreneurs, and gambling professionals. They were treated to free champagne and hors d’oeuvres, the most beautiful women in the trade, and liberal tables with a new deck of cards or dice each night.
A description of the Cora House included in a manuscript written in 1855 by historian Frank Soule provides a good indication of the establishment’s popularity.
In the fall of 1855, Belle and Charles hosted a party designed to attract high rollers to the den. The evening the couple selected for their soirée fell on the same night Mrs. William Richardson was having a get together. Mrs. Richardson and her husband, a U.S. Marshal, were unhappy with the lack of male attendants at their event. When they learned that their invited guests chose to go to Belle’s place, the marshal and his wife were furious.
The previous year antigambling laws had been passed by California representatives, and all such establishments were to have been shut down. Charles Cora could no longer practice his profession legally. The Richardsons suspected the party at Belle’s place had actually been a private game in which Charles was the dealer. Mrs. Richardson and the marshal vowed to monitor the activities at the Cora House and catch the pair in the act of breaking the law. When Charles learned of the Richardsons’ plan, he informed Belle. A bitter feud between the couples erupted.
On November 5, 1855, the Coras and the Richardsons attended a play at the American Theatre. The two couples were placed in balcony seats in close proximity to each other. When the Richardsons learned that the Coras were at the same performance, the marshal demanded that the theater management throw the “low moral fiber duo” out. When the manager refused, the Richardsons left.
Over the next week Charles and the marshal exchanged insults and derogatory remarks. Whenever their paths crossed tensions escalated into threats. Finally the two met on the streets to settle things once and for all. The gambler shot Marshal Richardson in the head with a derringer, killing him instantly.
Charles was arrested and thrown into jail. Many of the townspeople who admired the marshal were outraged and demanded that Cora be hanged immediately. Belle rushed to her common-law husband’s aid and hired two attorneys to represent him. The cost of their combined retainer was $45,000.
While Belle fought to prove that Charles acted in self-defense, a vigilante committee was being organized. Leaders of the group planned to overtake the jail and exact their own justice. Initial attempts to break into the facility and remove Charles were thwarted. He was arraigned on December 1, 1855, and the trial was set for early January. Belle was not content with merely purchasing good counsel, and she turned her attention to the witnesses who claimed to have seen Charles brutally gun down the unarmed marshal. Belle met with an eyewitness to the shooting and offered her money to change her story. When that didn’t work Belle threatened to kill her. Neither approach convinced the witness to retract her accusation.
Charles’s trial began on January 3, 1856. Shortly after a jury was selected, Belle attempted to bribe a select few of them. Her efforts were fruitless. No one would agree to side with the unpopular couple. The court was made aware of Belle’s behavior but decided against any legal action.
The trial was lengthy and the prosecution played up the “devious” characteristics of Charles and Belle, referring to the pair as “shady gamblers with sinfulness in their lives.” The defense argued that their morals weren’t on trial and that whatever “sinfulness there was in Belle’s life, it was far outweighed by her fidelity to her man.”
The jury deliberated for forty-one hours but failed to reach a verdict. While Charles awaited a second trial, the public at large grew more and more incensed at the lack of outcome. Believing that Charles would get away with murder, the vigilante committee stormed the jail and escorted him to a secret area to be hanged. A blindfolded Belle was brought to the location of the execution. The tearful madam asked if one of the clergymen there would marry her and Charles. Minutes before Charles was put to death, the two were legally wed.
Heartbroken and inconsolable, Belle Cora retreated to her bedroom at the gambling den and remained tucked away in the house for more than a month. Belle emerged a changed woman. She sold the business and moved to a small house with only a fe
w servants as company. She used her considerable financial holdings to support local charities and help children obtain a higher education. She died in San Francisco on February 17, 1862, having given away the bulk of her fortune. She was thirty years old.
Rosa May
The Outcast’s Friend
“Unattached females arrive in the boomtowns in a dead heat with the saloons. They entice men into small back rooms for amorous interludes, and split the fees with the saloon owners. I believe they are void of all human emotion and only love money.”
Harrison Phillips, A Miner’s Memoirs, 1852
Rosa May sat beside the bed of a dying miner and wiped the sweat off his feverish brow. She looked around his rustic, one-room cabin, past the sparse furnishings, and fixed her eyes on a tattered photograph of an elderly man and woman. “Those are my folks,” the man weakly told her. “They’re in Marshall County, Illinois. Where are your folks?”
The question stunned Rosa. No one ever asked about such things. No one ever asked her much at all. Conversation wasn’t what men were looking for when they did business with her. Rosa glanced out the window at a couple of respectable, well-dressed women. They watched her through the clouded glass, pointed, and whispered. She knew what they were saying without hearing it.
Rosa was just one of a handful of “sporting women” living in Bodie, California, in 1900, and she knew what people thought of her. It had bothered her in years past, but not by the turn of the century. It was an occupational hazard she’d learned to live with.