author

Col. J. M. Travers

Known today mainly for a single surviving frontier adventure, this late-19th-century pulp writer published under the name “Col. J. M. Travers.” The byline carries an air of mystery, which only adds to the rough-and-ready charm of the work that remains easily traceable.

1 Audiobook

Custer's Last Shot; or, The Boy Trailer of the Little Horn

Custer's Last Shot; or, The Boy Trailer of the Little Horn

by Col. J. M. Travers

About the author

Very little confirmed biographical information appears to survive about this author. Reliable catalog and library records identify Col. J. M. Travers as the credited author of Custer's Last Shot; or, The Boy Trailer of the Little Horn, a dime-novel-style historical romance published in 1883 by Frank Tousey in New York.

Modern public records for the name are sparse, and the surviving trail is bibliographic rather than personal. Project Gutenberg currently lists one title under this name, and the Dime Novel Bibliography also links the byline to Custer's Last Shot, suggesting that this is the work most firmly associated with the author today.

Because so little can be confirmed, Travers is best understood as one of the many shadowy popular writers of the cheap-fiction era: an author remembered less through a documented life story than through a vivid adventure tale built around Custer and the Battle of the Little Bighorn.