People's Pilot, Volume 3, Number 13, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 September 1893 — BLOODSHED ON THE STRIP. [ARTICLE]

BLOODSHED ON THE STRIP.

Gsmblars Murder Three Members of • Vigilance Committee Seven Persons Burned to Death by Prairie Fires. Arkansas Cmr, Kan., Sept 13. Sargt. Morgan has arrived from Orlando and brings word of a terrible tragedy that occurred there Tuesday afternoon. Owing to the numerous thefts and depredations occurring there the strippers Monday night formed a vigilance committee. At noon Tuesday they arrested John Ferris, a shell man, forced him to refund the money secured from the victim, gave him thirty lashes on the bare back and drove him from the camp. During the afternoon Richard Martin, John Seabold and David Winters, three prominent members of the vigilance committee, went to a gambler’s tent near the Arlington hotel for the purpose of making an arrest The crowd of gamblers and thugs, who were gathered from Oklahoma and Texas and some who were driven out of Arkansas City, gathered about them with knives and pistols and in a moment’s time there were three bodies bleeding on the floor of the tent The gamblers and their friends picked up the bodies and carried them to a public well near by and cast them in. It was but a few moments until thousands of the strippers gathered about the well, when the bodies were taken out Some man giving information as to where the deed was committed a rush was made for the tent, only to find that the gamblers had all escaped. The tent was speedily demolished. Searching parties are scouring the country in every direction. A large number of those who registered Monday went into the strip as soon as it became dark and joined the army of “sooners.” One of those, Willard Meacham, while in quest of a desirable quarter-section, early Tuesday morning, met with an adventure which decided him to forfeit all hope of getting a farm. While traveling across the country about twelve miles south of Hunnewell he saw lying in a draw the charred and blackened remains of five men who had evidently perished in the prairie fires that raged over a portion of the territory last week. He was horror-stricken, and at once ceased hiding from the soldiers who were scouting in the vicinity. He moved promptly into the open, and after a walk of over an hour succeeded in attracting the attention of two cavalrymen. To them he told what he had discovered and conducted them back to the draw. There was nothing on the bodies to identify them and, under the circumstances, it was deemed best to bury them for the present A grave was dug with long-bladed knives and the bodies placed under the earth. A pile of stones was built at the head to mark the spot and the incident was reported in the camp at Chilocco.