April 26 Tuesday ca. – Sam left for Silver Mountain to report on mining activity there and to allow his swollen nose to recede for a couple of days.

April 24 Sunday ca. – Sam got his nose bloodied by George F. Dawson at Chauvel’s Fencing Club, a Virginia City gymnasium. Dawson, an Englishman, at the time an assistant editor at the Enterprise, was a skilled boxer [Mack 252; Fatout, MT in VC 184]. Sam clowned around with a pair of boxing gloves, but evidently Dawson thought Sam was threatening, so uncorked a punch to Sam’s unguarded nose. De Quille claimed a “plentiful flow of claret” and a nose “like an egg-plant” that supposedly embarrassed Sam enough for him to take an out of town assignment for the newspaper.

April 22 Friday – In his Autobiography, Sam wrote of his attempt at a duel with James L. Laird, editor of the Virginia City Union and how it all came about:

April 20 Wednesday – “Frightful Accident to Dan De Quille,” was printed in the Territorial Enterprise. Branch called this sketch “in Mark Twain’s best vein–a typical product of the mutual raillery he carried on with De Quille, resembling his earlier ‘feuds’ with the Unreliable” [ET&S 1: 359].

April 19 Tuesday – Ruel Colt Gridley (1829-1870), an “old schoolfellow of Mark Twain’s” and owner of the Gridley Store in Austin, made a wager on the outcome of a city election, with the loser having to carry a fifty-pound sack of flour from Austin to Clifton, a mile and a quarter’s distance [Fatout, MT in VC 186]. Note: the next day the process began which led to the great flour sack promotions for the Sanitary Fund, a forerunner of the American Red Cross (See May 17 entry.)

April 17–24 Sunday – Sam’s item in the Enterprise Local Column was “Missionaries Wanted.” This humorous drubbing of two locals in a fictional scene was typical of Sam’s barbs for those he wanted to deflate. Such reports won him the title of “wild and unpredictable humorist.”
Yesterday morning [John] Gashwiler and Charley Funck, citizens of Virginia City and of the Territory of Nevada, and officers of the great Virginia and Gold Hill Water Company, came rushing into our office in a state of excitement bordering on lunacy… [Note: John W. Gashwiler (1831-1883) “Old Gash”]

April 16 Saturday – Sam and Dan De Quille had been taking fencing lessons from Professor O. V. Chauvel, who ran a gymnasium at 12 North C Street [Mack 251]. The Gold Hill Daily News ran an article about their fencing expertise:

April 14 Thursday – Sam wrote to Orion, resigning his commission as a notary public for Storey County [MTL 1: 279n9]. No reason was given, but this work was similar to the scraps of work and fees his father, John Marshall Clemens, had sought, and so by association, Sam may have concluded the small fees were not worth the effort. Noted on the letter for Apr. 15 is Orion’s acceptance.

April 1 Friday – “Another Traitor – Hang Him!” a hoax article in the Enterprise is attributed to Sam [Fatout, MT in VC 180]. Also printed in the Evening Bulletin on Apr. 1 as “Another Goak” [Camfield bibliog.].

March 31 Thursday – Adah Menken “suddenly left Virginia without saying goodbye to anybody, and returned to San Francisco.” Of course, she had $36,000 worth of comfort plus gifts of stock certificates bearing a naked lady on a galloping stallion, which she sold a year later for $50,000 [Fatout, MT in VC 167]. She died in 1868 at age 33.