Democratic Sentinel, Volume 1, Number 37, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 October 1877 — QUEER TYPES OF OUTLAWRY. [ARTICLE]

QUEER TYPES OF OUTLAWRY.

How many romances and thrilling stories nre allowed to bloom unseen, to run to seed in Western papers, never attaining more than the dignity of a three or four lino mention in the metropolitan press no one knows perhaps but the mailrenders of the papers. A glance at the files of exchanges for a week, for instance, reveals as many tragedies and sensational developments of crime as would make the /Saturday Review go into moral hysterics over “American civilization.” For instance, a reporter of the Louisville Courier-Journal who has been spending some days in the domains of “ King Jim'’ Simmons and his band, a gang of murderous outlaws, furnishes some interesting particulars concerning the gang, their methods, and, above all, the country in which they operated. Jim Simmons, he says, was a man of great cunning, with a talent for doing crime and hiding it; the son of a member of the famous—that is to say infamous—Murrell band. As an inn keept r many years ago at Harmony his house became notorious for the robberies and even murders of the guests, and setting afloat of counterfeit currency. At the outbreak of the war he had to fly to Grub Ridge, a safer locality, where he did a lively business in horses stolen by guerrillas. At the close of the war, fearing the vengeance of returning Federate, the Simmonses removed to Arkansas, where they killed a man, and avoided lynching by paddling down stream in a horse-trough, hearing behind them the disappointed baying of bloodhounds at fault on their track. In 1873 “King Jim” tried to kill his wife with a bottle ; then, when she recovered, fearing her vengeance, fled to the lead mines near Lockport, leaving her with her two sons in Eminence; a third lives in Meade county ; a price of SSOO has been put on the head of the fourth. Nigh of criminal kiu to them were the Goodriches. All five of the boys are “ hArd citizens,” thriftless and illiterate, and three of them are in jail to answer for murder. Dave Carter, who turned State’s evidence, is an ignorant and worthless inebriate, with, however, more ability than he would be credited with from a casual inspection, incapable of executing alone any of the crimes in which he participated, and without, apparently, that keen delight in committing crime or appreciation of difficulties surmounted in its successful commission to be noted in Ids companions. He is out on his own recognizance, which is as much as to say that he is in a fair position to be “removed” by some as yet undetected members of the gang, or the vindictive friends of tiie prisoners. The latter say confidently that he “has gone a-ghosting,” and the people interested in a successful prosecution of the gang wish him sent to jail, to be in safe-keeping. He, however, feels confident that he can kill as well as any one else in daylight, and has resolved not to move out at night. The country over which this gang ruled so bloodily is a hilly district extending from Harper’s Ferry, near the Franklin line in the south, to the lead mines in the north, bordering on the Kentucky river some eight or ten miles, and running I a k from the river nearly an equal dislanee. The roads are narrow, rocky bridle-paths; there is little cultivated grpund, here a small patch of corn, there a smaller bed of tobacco, and the frequent gulches and beds of streams are thickly wooded. Every inch of these lands, so difficult of access, s rt well situated for ambush or concealment, was known to the gang. The gang was busy. 1n1871.10e and Bob Goodrich butchered a pedler named Darrall with an ax iu a lonely part of the wood; Shuck came on them while they were rifling the body and got $25 as the price of his silence. In August of the same year Jack Horan/himself a desperate character, was lured out in a fearful rainstorm by Shuck and a dozen others to be killed. He was shot in the arm, anil, then began a frightful scene, as, recognizing the purpose of comrades he knew so well, he pleaded pit. ously for his life. His pleading was vain. A bowlder was tied to his neck and he was taken in a skiff to the middle of the river. There, while frantically begging for a moment —a single moment—to make his hopeless peace with God, he was hurled into the stream. Shuck assigned ro reason for this murder in his confession, but there is ground to believe that Horan had been a member of the baud and broken with them, and it was to prevent his possible revelations that he was murdered. His body was afterward washed out by the waves caused by a passing steamboAt, buried; some arrests were made, but the persons arrested were discharged by the examining Justice, and that was the last ot the case till the new developments attending on Shuck’s confession. More atrocious was the murder of Eli Downey a year later. He had $l4O in his own money and a pension he had just drawn. The gang, all old friends, dissuaded him from going home by train, offering to accompany him if he would walk. Near Siy-Mile creek, to reach which at nightfall they loitered, is a large flat rock with an opening in it some six feet square and about twelve feet deep—the mouth of a cavern. One of the party

pretended to hear a strange noise in it, and thus Downey was induced to go to it and loan over the cavity. As he did so Jack Simmons put a pistol to the back of his head and blew out his brains. His body was stripped and tumbled into the cave, and covered with brush and stones, on top of which was thrown the carcass of a hog, to throw off inquirers should the stench of decomposing flesh attract attention. And more horrible was the murder of Seeler James, the 17-year-old son of John James, who had married as his second wife one of “King Jim” Simmons’ daughters. Either the boy, an innocent and somewhat gawky youth, knew too much of the gang’s secrets or his stepmother could not get along with him; in any case, his death was decided on. Bob Goodrich, Dave Carter and Jack Simmons, pretending to sympathize with him, induced him to rob his father and run away from home; then, meeting liim in a secluded part of the marsh, they took from him the money they had counseled him to steal. It is altogether probable, if local belief is entitled to any credence, that the father at least consented to his slaughter. Over the grave wh« re the murdered boy’s remains were buried was placed the carcass of a slain hog,' the strategy to which allusion has already been made thus appearing to be habitually practiced. Still another exploit of the gang was the murder of one Galbgar, a tree-peddler. Him they ambushed on a narrow path high above the river bed, and, having taken his money and valuables from him, they beat out his brains with a stone, fastened a bowlder to his corpse, and rolled it into the river. It was for the murder of Nelson Parish that Shuck, the informer, was hanged, though he always declared his innocence, while admitting that he had taken part in other crimes as heinous. Shuck was Parish’s son-in-law. Parish was shot in the daytime, and his body was taken to a schoolhouse, where, iu the course of the night, it was burned. As Shuck could not account for his whereabouts o.j the day of the killing, and money and papers belonging to the murdered man were found iu his possession, his sentence is generally regarded as a just one. Shuck’s grave lies under two little walnut trees on his father’s farm. As the body was about to be lowered into it the coffin was opened and the body found to be batbed in a profuse sweat—whence, probably, arose the rumor now current iu the neighborhood to the effect that the murderer was resuscitated. There is not much travel now o’ nights in Henry and Owen counties, save by armed bodies of men in search of Jack Simmons. Says the reporter: “In my ride of seven miles on a public road through a thickly-settled district, and in the early part of a pleasant summer night, not one living being did I see. Every one has a mental recognition of the fact that travel is safer now than for years previous, but all the horrors of the recent revelations hang like a pall over all the people, and even the nomadic negro goes not out of nights. ” Such gangs always come to grief, however successful may be their operations for a while. That the wages of sin is death was strikingly exemplified iu the fate which overtook at Kansas City a gang of desperadoes known as the Payne Jones boys, consisting of Payne Jones, Bill Hulse, Andy Maguire and one Burnes. One rainy night, about eleven years ago, information was received at police headquarters that Payne Jones was at the house of his brother-in-law, Mr. Evans, a very respectable citizen, residing near Independence. A posse was fitted out for his arrest, and proceeded to the place indicated and surrounded the premises. The door was opened by Mr. Evans, and a parley ensued. In the meantime a young girl, the daughter of a widow woman, came out of the house, where she had been passing the night, ami was in the act of crossing a board fence on her way home, near which a young man named Wilkerson, one of the Kansas City posse, was standing, when Jones appeared at the door with a double-barreled shot-gun, and shot both the girl and Wilkerson dead. The pistols of the posse were wet and refused to go off, and Jones dashed from the house and made his escape. Jim Crow Childs, another desperate man, was living near Westpert, and he received information that Payne Jones was about to steal a fine horse from him. He concealed himself in the stable-loft and awaited developments. About midnight the fence leading to the woods was let down by Jones, and Crow shot him dead. A short time afterward Burnes was found lying dead near a haystack, with his skull crushed in; and the general opinion was that he had been killed by the members of the gang for betraying Payne Jones to Childs. The next one of the gang to pass out of existence was Bill Hulse. He was detected in the act of setting fire to a mill near Lee’s Summit, and was shot and killed. At the bank robbery at Richmond, Andy Maguire was present. This robbery resulted in the death of several parties, including the Marshal and Mr. Shaw, Mayor of the city. Shaw was shot ®n the street, but It /ed to walk home and fall dead in the hall of his hotel—the Shaw’ House—iu the presence of his wife and family. The robbers escaped at the t rue, but Maguire was afterward arrested in St. Louis and returned to jail at Richmond. During the night he was taken from the jail by a mob and hanged. This ended the prominent members of the gang who had killed among them ovex twenty men. Jim Crow Childs, who killed Payne Jones, was himself killed at Independence about three years ago.

As complete but more signally sudden was the extermination, a few days ago, of a horde of cattle-thieves in Kansas, an extermination which recalls the epigrammatic order in the case of certain horse-thieves attributed to Sheridan, to “chase, catch them and plant them.” A private letter from Colorado to a gentleman at Leavenworth describes the affair as follows : “Seven thousand five hundred head of cattle were stolen, and eight of the thieves were killed. To one not knowing the manner in which cattle are handled in Colorado, it will seem almost impossible that so many cattle could be stolen without immediate detection. Cattle are allowed to run over the range in one vast herd, and once in a year a grand * round-up’ is made, and each cattle-owner gets out his cattle. Sometimes they are not seen for months. Thus it was that twelve of the robbers with which this country is infested succeeded in getting 7,500 head together, and nearly got away with them. They were seen by a herder, however, who gave the alarm, and fifteen well-armed rangers gathered in pursuit. After five days’ riding the thieves were overtaken in the extreme northwest comer of Kansas, on a fork of the Republican river. The pursuers surrounded their camp, taking them by surprise, and opening a deadly fire, killing four at the first volley. Panic-stricken, the remaining thieves attempted to escape by running, but, before they were out of range, three more bit the dust. One, a Mexican, threw up his hands and begged for mercy, but a rope was thrown around his neck, and he was dragged a quarter of a mile to a tree and hung. This wa on the 21st day of last August. On the 14th of September a party ran across the pile of dead men, and attempted to bury them, but the horrible stench was too much, and they were obliged to leave them for the vultures and coyotes. ” With the robbery of a train on the Union Pacific railroad and the death of the leader of the band and his lieutenant, who, when the soldiers took them prisoners, and their horses being jaded and loaded down with stolen gold, there was no way of escape, with the words.

“ Well, pard, we may as well die game, any way,” drew their revolvers to fall riddled with balls, newspaper readers are familiar. These plucky desperadoes were part of the throng attracted to Deadwood, in the Black Hills, by the chance of robbing stage-coaches and plundering express safes. The business began last April, when three gangs were organized to “work” the Sidney, Cheyenne and Bismarck lines. The first attack was an unusually cowardly one. A coach from Cheyenne, says a correspondent of the Chicago limes, entered Whitewood canon, ten miles from Deadwood, a little after dark. The roads were very heavy, the stage crowded, and the darkness of the gulch impenetrable. The driver, Johnny Slaughter, a bright little fellow, was joking with Mr. Iler, a passenger upon the box, when he discovered a body of men walking along in front of the horses. Believing them to be miners, he called out in his usual pleasant voice, “ Look out, boys; let me pass; I can’t see, or I would turn out for you.” The men stepped to either side of the road, and when the stage came between them they all apparently shouted “Halt!” at the same time discharging a volley from shot-guns, rifles and pistols. One charge of thirteen buckshot entered Mr. Iler’s coat at the left shoulder, passed between the coat and his back, passed out at the right shoulder, and, entering poor Johnny’s left breast, lodged iu his heart, killing him instantly and knocking him from the box. Another shot took off the point of Mr. Iler’s finger. The horses, being driverless, and frightened at the firing, started down the road, Mr. Her hanging on and finally climbing up to the box, where he secured the reins and guided the team into Deadwood. An alarm was speedily given, and in a few minutes’ time Sheriff Bullock and a hundred citizens were galloping toward the scene of attack. The body of the driver was found, but no trace of his cowardly murderers, nor has one of them been brought to justice. That the gang was green in the business was manifested by every feature of the attack, and by the failure to even search the persons of the eleven passengers so completely in their power. This was the first appearance of the rascals, who by June were better prepared for their nefarious operations. Coach after coach, often the same vehicle twice upon the same day, was stopped and plundered. Their plan of operations was simply to conceal themselves in some little ravine, or behind rocks or brush close to the roadside and permit the coach with its unsuspecting guard and passengers to approach within twentyfive feet or so, when they would rise, and, with leveled and cocked rides, command the driver to halt. Being thus “covered,” none but the foolhardy would disobey, consequently the coach became an easy prey. Their work was generally pretty thorough, but occasionally they “ missed it,” as upon one trip Fat Keeiy, messenger, took out an extra empty treasure-box in the boot, in anticipation of being raided, the principal box, containing $150,000 in dust, being concealed in a bag of oats placed carelessly in the body of the stage. Sure enough the coach was stopped, and Pat ordered to “dump out the d d dust chest, and mighty lively, too.” The quick-witted messenger made a display of tugging at the empty box, and finally tumbled it to the ground. There being no passengers on the coach no search was made inside, and the driver was ordered to hurry on, a command that he gladly complied with, and before the robbers could blow open the box he was beyond danger. The lines for a time suffered heavily, and finally declined carrying dust or valuables for which they could be held responsible. Passengers would deposit their money with the company at one office, taking a receipt therefor, and an order upon the company’s office at the other end. of the route for a similar amount. On one occasion one of the mines cleaned up SB,OOO and ran it into a retort, which for several days remained upon exhibition in a bank window in Deadwood. A plan was then matured by highwaymen to capture the retort on its way to Cheyenne. Sheriff Bullock, of Deadwood, got wind of the game, and by exercising strategy saved the treasure. First, he caused to be circulated a quiet report that the retort would be sent out via Cheyenne upon a certain day. He then distributed a posse of deputies along the Sidney route, and two days before the designated time the SB,OOO, together with $125,000 in dust, taken to the railroad at Sidney. The robbers stopped the Cheyenne coach announced to carry the treasure, blew open the iron box, and found it empty. The stage was allowed to proceed, but so chagrined were the “ agents” at their failure, or so suspicious that the retort was concealed about the coach, that they pursued and again halted that vehicle, ransacking every piece of baggage, every bundle and roll of blanket, before they finally allowed the driver to continue the trip. Coach-robbing is, however, not always such easy and agreeable work for the robbers, and sometimes the enterprising agents encounter such a surprise as during Bazaine’s time did a body of Mexican reavers who infested the highway. Bazaine sent a body of his slimmest young soldiers on a decoy stage, dressed in female apparel, each with a short carbine under his mantilla. The vehicle was halted, and the trembling maidens compelled to disembark, while the guerrillas prepared to rifle the luggage. At that moment the trembling maidens opened fire, and in thirty seconds a dozen Mexicans lay heaped round the coach, while the solitary survivor was riding away for his life, pursued by a hot fire. For months after a petticoat was a better guard for a stage on that road than a platoon of soldiers. —New York II arid.