A design by the prestigious architectural firm of Link and Haire, the four storey building was constructed as the Silver Bow County Courthouse. In 1977 the governments of the city of Butte and the county of Silver Bow consolidated to form the single entity of Butte-Silver Bow, making this now the Butte-Silver Bow Courthouse.
The Butte-Silver Bow entity, still a county for all intents and purposes, is the smallest county in Montana, at 719 square miles. At present the population hovers near 34,200.
Given that the courthouse was built on the site of a previous courthouse, jail and hanging site it should come as no surprise that there is at least one
denizen of the dark which has been spotted skulking about the grounds and the courthouse. possibly looking for a way to clear his name.
Following is the account of the haunting of the courthouse from Haunted Houses.
History/Description
Historically this part of town was the place where the Butte County Courthouse and jail has always stood, from the very beginning of the town. The original courthouse was a structure that by 1908 was deemed a little too funky and ratty looking for the booming, rich mining town of Butte, so a new, grander courthouse was started in 1910, built upon the same lot where the old one had stood. It was finished by 1912. It was and is one of the West's most beautiful public buildings, designed in the Beaux Arts style. It cost 482,600 dollars and was financed by public bonds.
Today, this impressive courthouse building is used as office space for county government employees and officials. The modern jail was built across the street just to the east of the building.
HISTORY OF MANIFESTATIONS:
A miner named Miles Fuller was convicted of killing another prospector probably over a claim or a card game. While a prisoner, he was kind and thoughtful to the guards, leaving thank you notes with the empty food trays, while being held in the jail next to the courthouse.
Because he received the death sentence, Miles was executed by hanging via the portable gallows which were set up in the yard, which was located on the north side of the jail behind the courthouse on May 18, 1906. As his coffin was being placed on the funeral wagon by his pallbearers, a loud crack-like noise, sounding like thunder, was heard by the living, bringing up the possibility to those who heard it that he may have been innocent of the murder. UH OH!
MANIFESTATIONS:
Throughout the years, an apparition looking just like Miles has been seen wandering around this same yard, by the back door of the courthouse ground floor.
STILL HAUNTED?
Yes, it seems to be.
Although the old courthouse has long been torn down, this gentle spirit still haunts the land where it once stood by wandering the old gallows yard and occasionally visiting the inside of the ground floor area of the present courthouse building, which is also next to the outside yard area where Miles was executed via the gallows almost 100 years ago.
Miles is perhaps still looking for something at the scene of his death, needing, perhaps, to clear his name before passing on to the other side. Or perhaps though he was justly convicted, he wasn't ready to die just yet.
From Haunted Houses
SILVER BOW COUNTY COURTHOUSE
Prestigious architects Link and Haire designed this magnificent four-story courthouse in the Beaux Arts style. This grandiloquent form introduced at Chicago’s 1893 Columbian Exposition was often utilized in American civic buildings. Offices within are laid out around a rotunda with an elaborate stained glass dome, and a molded stone figure of blind-folded Justice presides over the façade. Dedicated in 1912, the courthouse has served as podium for such famous statesmen as William Jennings Bryan and Franklin D. Roosevelt. In 1914, the courthouse became barracks for state militia when Butte was under martial law following violent labor disputes.
From the NRHP plaque at the building