THREE GUARDSMEN Ep. 3 | Chris Madsen: “Soldier of Fortune”

Legends of the Old West

Black Barrel Media

Arts, History, Documentary, Society & Culture

4.8 • 3.4K Ratings

🗓️ 3 August 2022

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Chris Madsen was a Danish immigrant with a colorful past, but one thing was certain: he loved action. When he moved to America, he joined the Fifth Cavalry and fought on the Northern Plains for nearly 15 years. Then, he traded his uniform for a Deputy U.S. Marshal badge and started chasing bandits across Oklahoma Territory. Join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons: blackbarrel.supportingcast.fm/join To advertise on this podcast, please email: [email protected] For more details, visit our website www.blackbarrelmedia.com and check out our social media pages. We’re @OldWestPodcast on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. This show is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please visit AirwaveMedia.com to check out other great podcasts like Ben Franklin’s World, Once Upon A Crime, and many more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	On January 17th, 1876, 26-year-old Christian Madsen Vormose arrived in New York City.
0:24.4	Three weeks earlier, he left his home country of Denmark.
0:27.9	Now that he was safely in America, he needed a job.
0:31.6	Only four days after arriving in the US, the short red-headed young man with blue eyes
0:37.3	enlisted in the army.
0:39.3	He signed in using the name Chris Madsen, which he kept for the rest of his life.
0:44.5	And when he told his fellow recruits about his previous military experience, they couldn't
0:49.0	believe their ears.
0:51.0	At age 13, Madsen said, he fought with the Danish army in a famous skirmish between Prussia
0:57.0	and Denmark.
0:58.0	At age 20, he left Denmark for good and joined the French foreign legion.
1:04.3	He joined just in time to fight in the Battle of Sedan, in which Napoleon III was captured.
1:10.8	More than 100,000 of his fellow soldiers were also captured, but Madsen managed to stay
1:16.1	free.
1:17.1	He spent the next four years as a soldier of fortune, drifting from conflict to conflict
1:22.4	wherever muscle was needed.
1:24.6	He even spent time in Africa, presumably helping set up colonial interests for European
1:29.4	powers.
1:30.9	In 1874, about a year and a half before coming to the States, Madsen drifted to Norway.
1:37.6	He was offered a job at a railroad shipping office.
1:41.0	Somehow it turned into a job on wailing ships.
1:44.4	On one of those ships, he met a man who served in the US Civil War ten years earlier.
	...

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