USA > Idaho > Vigilante days and ways : the pioneers of the Rockies, the makers and making of Montana, Idaho, Oregon, Washington, and Wyoming, Vol. I > Part 7
USA > Montana > Vigilante days and ways : the pioneers of the Rockies, the makers and making of Montana, Idaho, Oregon, Washington, and Wyoming, Vol. I > Part 7
USA > Oregon > Vigilante days and ways : the pioneers of the Rockies, the makers and making of Montana, Idaho, Oregon, Washington, and Wyoming, Vol. I > Part 7
USA > Washington > Vigilante days and ways : the pioneers of the Rockies, the makers and making of Montana, Idaho, Oregon, Washington, and Wyoming, Vol. I > Part 7
USA > Wyoming > Vigilante days and ways : the pioneers of the Rockies, the makers and making of Montana, Idaho, Oregon, Washington, and Wyoming, Vol. I > Part 7
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A NEW candidate for bloody laurels now appears in the person of Charley Harper. He arrived in Walla Walla in the fall of 1861, A young man of twenty-five, of medium size, of erect carriage, clear, florid complexion, and profuse auburn hair, he could, but for the leer in his small inexpressive gray eye, have passed in any society for a gen- tleman. His previous life is a sealed book ; - but the readiness with which he engaged in crime showed that he was not without experience. He told his landlord that he had no money, but that partners were coming who would relieve his neces-
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sities. The second night after his arrival, several hundred dollars in gold coin were stolen from a lodger who occupied the room adjoining his. While intoxicated, the next day, he exhibited by the handful eagles which he said were borrowed from an acquaintance. No one doubted that he had stolen them : - but where officers were be- lieved to wink at crime, prosecution was useless. Charley was not even arrested upon suspicion. The money he had obtained introduced him to the society of the roughs, with whom he became so popular that he aspired to be their leader. This honor was disputed by Ridgely, whom we left wounded in the last chapter, and by " Cherokee Bob," both of whom claimed precedence from longer residence and greater familiarity with the opportunities for distinction.
Circumstances soon occurred which enabled Charley, without disputation, to assume the rôle of chief of the Walla Walla desperadoes. Che- rokee Bob, heretofore mentioned as an associate of Plummer at Lewiston, was an uneducated Southerner. His mother was a half-blood Chero- kee, - hence his name. With a hatred of the North and the Northern soldiery born of preju- dice and ignorance, and a constitutional faith in the superior prowess of the Southern people, and
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Charley Harper.
with mercurial passions inflamed by the contest that was still raging, this ruffian was nearly a maniac in his adherence to the cause of Seces- sion. He could talk or think of little else than the great inferiority of the Northern to the South- ern soldiers, and was continually boasting of his own superior physical power. He would often taunt the soldiers of the garrison near Walla Walla. In ingenuity of vaunting expression, he far excelled Captain Bobadil himself ; - but like that hero of dramatic fiction he was destined to experience a reverse more humiliating, if possible, than that of his great prototype. With shotgun in hand and revolver in his belt, it was his fre- quent boast that he could take a negro along with him, carrying two baskets loaded with pistols, and put to flight the bravest regiment of the Federal army.
No person who has witnessed a theatrical per- formance in a mining camp can forget the general din and noise with which the audience fill up the intervals between the acts. Whistling singing, hooting, yelling, and a general shuffling of feet and moving about are so invariable as to form in fact, a feature of the performance. So long as they are unaccompanied by quarrel- some demonstrations, and do not become too
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boisterous, efforts are seldom made to suppress them. The boys are permitted to have a good time in their own way, and the lookers-on, accus- tomed to the scene, are often compensated for any annoyance that may be occasioned, by strokes of border humor more enjoyable than the play itself.
Cherokee Bob, eager for an opportunity when he could wreak his demoniac wrath upon some of the Federal soldiers, with the aid and complicity of Deputy Sheriff Porter, who like himself was a Secessionist, contrived the following plan as favorable to his purpose : it was agreed between them, that on a certain evening Bob and his friends should attend the theatre, fully armed. Porter, under pretext of quelling disturbances between the acts, should by his insulting lan- guage and manner provoke an affray with the soldiers present, in the progress of which he would command Bob and those with him to assist, and thus under the seeming protection of law, save them from the consequences of any acts of vengeance they desired to commit. On the evening appointed, six or seven soldiers were seated side by side in the pit, a single one occupying a seat in the gallery behind them. Porter was near them, and Bob and his associates
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in a position convenient to him. When the cur- tain fell upon the first act, the usual noises commenced, the soldiers joining in making them. Porter sprang from his seat, and striding in front of them, vociferated,
"Dry up there, you brass-mounted hirelings, or I'll snatch you bald-headed."
This insulting language produced the desired ffect. Smarting under the implied reproach it Conveyed, one of the soldiers sharply inquired,
" Why do you single us out, when there are others more boisterous ? "
Porter waited for no further provocation, but drawing and cocking his revolver with one hand, and seizing the soldier nearest to him with the other, he dragged him ignominiously into the circle where he was standing, ordering the deputy city marshal and Bob and his friends to assist in arresting him. The soldiers offered resistance. An immediate melée was the con- sequence. The women and children in the audience screamed in affright. The other soldiers present rushed with drawn pistols to the rescue of their comrade. The one in the gallery sprang upon one of the officers with the ferocity of a wild beast. Cherokee Bob with a pistol in one hand and a bowie-knife in the other, his voice
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wildly ringing above all other sounds, was in his true element. More than a dozen pistol shots followed in quick succession. Two of the sol- diers were killed, and others fearfully mangled. Porter and his deputy assistant were each shot through a leg, the latter crippled for life. The work of blood was progressing, and but for the interference of an officer of the garrison, would have ended only with the death of the assassins.
The next day the soldiers appealed to their commanding officer for redress. He ordered those of them engaged in the affray to be placed under arrest, and dismissed the subject from his thoughts. Indignant at this unexpected treat- ment, abont fifty of the soldiers armed them- selves, and marched into town, with the determin- ation to capture and hang Cherokee Bob, whom they knew to be the chief mover of the murderous assault. Disavowing all riotous intentions they informed the citizens of their design and com- menced a thorough search for the murderer. He, meanwhile, fearful of their revenge, eluded them by leaving the town before the dawn of morning on a stolen horse for Lewiston.
The year before his appearance in Walla Walla Ridgely was living in Sacramento. During his sojourn there he acquired notoriety for his thier-
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ish and villainous propensities. One of the police corps, detecting him in the commission of a larceny, arrested him. He was convicted, and sentenced to imprisonment in the county jail. He vowed revenge against Gilchrist the policeman, but on his release fled to the gold mines. Soon after his arrival at Walla Walla he fell in with his old enemy, and secretly renewed the deter- mination to take his life. ,Calling upon a friend to accompany him, he boldly entered a saloon where he knew Gilchrist to be and fired several shots at him. Gilchrist fell at the first fire. Ridgely, believing he had killed him, left the saloon, saying as he went, "I have thrown a load off my mind, and now feel easy." Gilchrist was badly wounded, but recovered. Ridgely, escap- ing arrest on the night of the assault, crossed the river into Oregon the next day, beyond the juris- diction of the authorities of Walla Walla, which was in Washington Territory. From thence he went to Lewiston and joined Plummer.
Cherokee Bob and Ridgely being out of the way, Charley Harper, as next in rank on the scale of villainous preferment, became the Walla Walla chief.
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Cherokee Bob.
CHAPTER VIII.
CHEROKEE BOB.
GOLD EXCITEMENT - ROBBERS GO TO FLORENCE -- - ROBBERIES BY THE WAY - CHEROKEE BOB AND BILL MAYFIELD -CYNTHIA -JEALOUSY - A STRANGE HISTORY - BOB " SETTLED IN BUSINESS."
INTELLIGENCE of the discovery of extensive placers on the head waters of Salmon river, excelling in richness any former locations, had been circulated through all the border towns during the winter. The excitement consequent thereon was intense. Such was the impatience of the people to effect an early arrival there that many left Walla Walla and Lewiston in mil- winter, and on their way thither perished in the snows which engorged the mountain passes. Others, more cautious, awaited the coming of warm weather, and made the journey, - tedious, difficult, and dangerous at best, - with compar- ative safety. Among the latter number were Charley Harper and his band of brigands. Mounted on strong, fleet horses which they had
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acquired during the winter, the criminal caval- cade with its chief at the head dashed up the river valley, insulting, threatening, or robbing every one so unfortunate as to fall in their way. Of the number prominent in the riotous column were Peoples, English, Scott, and Brockie -- men whose deeds of villainy have blackened the crim- inal records of nearly all the larger cities of the Pacific slope. With none of the magnanimity which characterized Joaquin Murieta and the earlier brigands of California, and with all their recklessness of crime and murder, a meaner, baser, more contemptible band of ruffians per- haps never before disgraced the annals of the race. No crime was too atrocious for them to commit, no act of shame or wantonness was uncongenial to their grovelling natures. They were as totally depraved as a long and un- checked career of every variety of criminal indulgence could make them. Afraid of nothing but the law, and not afraid of that in these new and unorganized communities, they were little else than devils incarnate. Insensible to all appeals for mercy, and ever acting upon the cautious maxim that " dead men tell no tales," the only chance for escape from death for those whom they assaulted was in their utter inability
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to do them injury. Human life regarded as an obstacle to their designs, was of no more impor- tance than the blowing up of a safe or any other act which stood between them and their prey. Of course it was impossible that such a band of desperadoes should pass over the long and deso- late route from Walla Walla to Florence with- out adventure.
On the second or third day after leaving Walla Walla, when nearing Florence, they met a company consisting of five men and a boy of sixteen, who were on their way to a neighboring camp. The brigands surrounded them, and with cocked pistols well aimed, gave the usual order, "throw up your hands." This order being obeyed, two of them dismounted to search the persons of their victims for treasure, the others meanwhile covering them with their revolvers. Five purses, containing amounts varying from fifty to five hundred dollars, were taken from them. The boy was overlooked, and had seated himself on a granite boulder by the roadside.
Scott, as he tells the story himself, approached him more from curiosity than expectation, when the following conversation ensued : -
"Come," said Scott, addressing him, "draw your weasel now."
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Cherokee Bob.
" How do you know I've got any, stranger ?" queried the youth.
" No fooling, I say. Hand out your buck- skin."
" You wouldn't rob a poor little devil like me, would you ? "
" Don't keep me waiting longer, or I'll eut your ears off," -and Scott drew his bowie as if to carry the threat into execution.
" Well, I only get half-wages, you know. Is your heart all gizzard ?"
" Get off from that stone and shell out, or I'll blow your brains out in a minute," said Scott.
The boy sprung up hurriedly, and with affected reluctance thrust his hand into his pocket.
" Well, stra-an-nger," he inquired with a pecul- iar drawl and quizzical expression of the eyes, " what do you take Salmon river dust at, any- how ?"
With this he drew forth an empty purse, and han ling it to Scott, said : -
" If you think I've got any more, search me."
Pleased with the pluck and humor of the lad, one of the band threw him a five-dollar piece, and they galloped furiously on towards Florence.
Thundering into the town, they drew up
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before the first saloon, fired their pistols, and urged their horses into the establishment. With- out dismounting they ordered liquor for the crowd. All the by-standers partook with them. Harper ostentatiously threw one of the purses he had just seized upon th counter, telling the bar- keeper to weigh out the amount of the bill, and after a few moments they left the saloon, "to see," as one of them expressed himself, " whether the town was big enough to hold them."
This irruption into Florence occurred while that city was comparatively in embryo. The great floods of immigration from the east and west had not arrived. Some months must elapse before the expectations of the robbers could be realized. Meantime they distributed themselves among the saloons and bagnios, and by means of gambling and frequent robberies, contrived to hold the community in fear and pick up a subsistence until the great crowd came.
Leaving them for a season, we will return to Cherokee Bob, whom we left in his ignominious flight from Walla Walla to Lewiston, on a stolen horse. That worthy had established himself in a saloon at Lewiston, and while there, renewed an acquaintance with an old pal known as Bill May- field.
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Mayfield was a fugitive from justice from Car- son City, Nevada, where in the winter of 1861- 62 he renewed an acquaintance with Henry Plummer, whom he had known before that time in California. The governor of California had issued a requisition for the surrender of Plum- mer, and a warrant for his arrest was in the hands of John Blackburn, the sheriff at Carson City. Though efficient as an officer, Blackburn, while in liquor, was overbearing and boastful of his prowess. His reputation was bad among the leading citizens of the town. Foiled in his search for Plummer, who, he believed, was in the territory, and knowing of Mayfield's intimacy with him, he accused the latter with concealing him. Mayfield denied the charge, and to avoid a quarrel with Blackburn, who was intoxicated, immediately left the saloon where the interview occurred, but as a measure of precaution armed himself with a bowie-knife. Blackburn, ren- dered desperate by liquor, soon followed in pur- suit of him, and at a later hour of the same day found him in another saloon. As he entered the front, Mayfield tried to leave by the rear door. Failing in this, he drew his knife, and concealed it in his sleeve. Approaching Mayfield in a bullying manner Blackburn said to him : --
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" I will arrest Plummer, and no one can prevent it. I can arrest anybody. I can arrest you if I wish to."
" You can arrest me," replied Mayfield, "if you have a warrant for my arrest, but you can't without."
"I tell you," rejoined Blackburn tauntingly, " that I can arrest you, or any one else," and added with an oath, " I will arrest you anyhow," accompanying this threat with a grasp for his pistol. Mayfield, with flash-like quickness, slipped his knife from its place of concealment, and gave him an anticipatory stab in the breast. Blackburn then tried to close with him, and being much the stronger man would have killed him had not Mayfield jumped aside and plied his knife vigorously until Blackburn fell. He died almost instantly. Mayfield surrendered hin for trial, was convicted of murder, and sentenced to be hanged.
While awaiting execution in the penitentiary, two miles distant from Carson, a plan for under- mining the prison was successful, and he escaped. The friends who effected this were among the best citizens of Carson. They deemed the sen- tenee unjust, and as soon as he was out of con- finement, mounted him on a good horse, provided
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him with arms, and bade him leave the State as rapidly as possible. When his escape was dis- covered the next morning the jailer started in pursuit. He struck the track of the fugitive, and by means of relays, gained rapidly upon him. Mayfield's friends meantime were not idle. They managed to be apprised of his progress, followed close upon his pursuers, and by a short eut at a favorable point, overtook him, and, doubling back, concealed him at a ranche in Pea Vine valley, only forty miles from Carson City. There he remained six weeks, - many of the leading citizens of Carson meantime watching for an opportunity to aid his escape from the State. A careless exposure of his person led to his recognition and the discovery of his retreat. His friends were the first to learn of it, and before the officers could arrive at the ranche, Mayfield was on his way to Huffaker's ranche on the Truekee river, which was nearer Carson by half the distance than the ranche he had left. While the officers were scouring the country in pursuit of him, he remained there until spring, sharing a box stall with a favorite race-horse. When spring was far enough advanced to afford pasturage and comfortable travel, he was fur- nished by his friends with a good " outfit," and
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made the journey unmolested to Lewiston, where he joined his old friends Plummer and Cherokee Bob.
Here he trumped up an intimacy with a woman calling herself "Cynthia," at that time stew- ardess of a hotel in Lewiston, and the fallen wife of a very worthy man.
In June, Cherokee Bob, accompanied by May- field and Cynthia, left Lewiston for Florence. Soon after their arrival the jealousy of Mayfield was aroused by the particular attentions of Bob to his mistress. On his part Bob made no con- cealment of his attachment for the woman, and when charged with harboring an intention of appropriating her affections, boldly acknowledged the soft impeachment. Cynthia possessed many charms of person, and considerable intelligence. She had, moreover, an eye to the main chance, and was ready to bestow her favors where they would command the most money. Bob was richer than Mayfield, and this fact won for him many encouraging smiles from the fair object of his pursuit. Mayfield's jealousy flamed into anger, and he resolved to bring matters to a crisis, which should either secure his undisturbed possession of the woman, or transfer her to the sole care of his rival. He had confidence
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enough in Cynthia to believe that when required to choose between him and Cherokee Bob, her good taste, if nothing else, would give him the preference. He had not calculated on the strength of her cupidity. Confronting Bob, in her presence, he said, as he laid his hand on the butt of his revolver : -
" Bob, you know me."
" Yes," replied Bob with a similar gesture, " and Bill, you know me."
" Well now, Bob, the question is whether we shall make fools of ourselves or not."
" Just as you say, Bill. I'm al'ys ready for anything that turns up."
" Bob, if that woman loves you more than me," said Mayfield, " take her. I don't want her. But if she thinks the most of me, no person ought to come between us. I call that on the square."
" Well, I do think considerable of Cynthia, and you are not married to her, you know," replied Bob.
" That makes no difference. If she loves me, and wishes to live with me, no one shall interfere to prevent it."
" Well, what do you propose to do about it ?" asked Bob, after a brief pause.
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" Let the woman decide for herself," replied Mayfield. " What say you, Cynthia ? Is it Bob or me ?"
Thus appealed to, greatly to the surprise of Mayfield, Cynthia replied : -
" Well, William, Robert is settled in business now, and don't you think he is better able to take care of me than you are ?"
This reply convinced Mayfield that his influence over the woman was lost. The quarrel terminated in a graceful surrender to Bob of all his claim upon her.
" You fall heir," said he to his successor, "to all the traps and things there are around here."
Cherokee Bob insisted upon paying for them ; and Cynthia, true to the course of life she was pursuing, tried to soften the pangs of separation from her old lover by reiterating the question if he did not " think it the best thing that could be done under the circumstances."
Cherokee Bob forced a generous purse upon Mayfield, who left him with the parting injune- tion to take good care of the girl.
The woman shed some tears and, as we shall see at a later stage of this history, showed by her return to Mayfield that she entertained a real affection ; and when, a year later, she heard of his
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violent death, was heard to say that she would kill his murderer whenever opportunity afforded.
An explanation of the circumstances under which Bob became "settled in business " is not the least interesting part of this narrative. The senior proprietor of the leading saloon in Oro Fino died a few days before Bob's arrival. He was indebted to Bob for borrowed money. Calling upon the surviving partner soon after his arrival, Bob informed him of the indebtedness, and de- clared his intention of appropriating the saloon and its contents in payment.
" How much," inquired the man, "did you lend my partner ? I'll settle with you, and pay liberal interest."
" That's not the idee," rejoined Bob. " Do you think me fool enough to lend a fellow five hundred dollars, and then after it increases to five thousand, square the account with a return of what I lent and a little more ? That's not my way of doing biz. How much stock have you got here on hand ?"
Bob carefully committed to writing the invoice verbally furnished.
" Now," said he, putting the memorandum in his pocket, "I'll hold you responsible for all these traps -the whole outfit. You've got to close
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up and get out of this without any delay. I'll give you twenty-four hours to do it in. You must then deliver everything safe into my hands."
The unfortunate saloon-keeper knew that the law as administered in that mountain town would afford him no redress. He also knew that to refuse compliance with the demand of Cherokee Bob, however unjust, would precipitate a quarrel which would probably cost him his life. So when Bob, accompanied by two or three confederates, came the next morning to the saloon to take pos- session he was prepared to submit to the imposi- tion without resistance. Walking within the bar, Cherokee Bob emptied the money drawer and gave the contents to his victim. He then invited his friends to drink to the success of the new " outfit," and finding himself in undisturbed occu- paney, increased the amount of his gift to the man he had expelled to several hundred dollars. This was, the manner in which he became, as Cynthia said, " settled in business."
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Florence.
CHAPTER IX.
FLORENCE.
FLORENCE - RULE OF THE ROUGHS - MURDER OF A GERMAN MINER - ONE ROUGH SHOOTS ANOTHER - BROCKIE KILLED BY CHAPMAN - HICKEY KILLED BY " SNAPPING ANDY " _ MATT BLEDSOE - DIFFI- CULTIES OF MINING -- EXPOSURES - PACK TRAINS - ROBBERY OF MCCLINCHEY'S TRAIN - ROBBERY OF BERRY BROTHERS, BY SCOTT, PEOPLES, AND ENG- LISH.
FLORENCE was now the established headquar- ters of the robbers. Its isolated location, its distance from the seat of government, its moun- tain surroundings, and, more than all, its utter destitution of power to enforce law and order, gave it peculiar fitness as a base to the criminal and bloody operations of the desperate gang which infested it. At all hours of the day and night some of them were to be seen at the two saloons kept by Cherokee Bob and Cyrus Skin- ner. When one company disappeared another took its place, and at no time were there less than twenty or thirty of these desperadoes at one
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or both of their haunts, plotting and contriving deeds of plunder and robbery which involved . the hard earnings, possibly the lives, of many of the fortunate miners of the vicinity. The crowd from both east and west had arrived. The town was full of gold-hunters. Expectation lighted up the countenance of every new comer. Few had yet realized the utter despair of failure in a mining camp. In the presence of vice in all its forms, men who were staid and exemplary at home laid aside their morality like a useless gar- ment and yielded to the seductive influences spread for their ruin. The gambling shops and hurdy-gurdy saloons - beheld for the first time by many of these fortune-seekers -lured them on step by step, until many of them abandoned all thought of the object they had in pursuit for lives of shameful and criminal indulgence.
The condition of society thus produced was fatal to all attempts at organization, either for protection or good order. Wholly unrestrained by fear or conscience, the robbers carried on their operations in the full blaze of mid-day. Affrays were of daily occurrence, and robberies took place in the publie streets. Harper, the acknowl- edged chief, stained with the darkest crimes, walked the streets with the boldness and confi-
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