USA > Kansas > Wyandotte County > Kansas City > Wyandotte County and Kansas City, Kansas. Historical and biographical. Comprising a condensed history of the state, a careful history of Wyandotte County, and a comprehensive history of the growth of the cities, towns and villages > Part 27
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terms of the contract Gray was to have possession as soon as $2,000 - was paid, and Gray was then to have the deed from Long, and a mort- gage was to be given by Gray for the balance for three years at 8 per cent, with the privilege of paying the whole or part sooner. Martha M. Long, wife of H. C. Long. did not sign this contract.
On April 28, the time fixed for the first payment under the con- tract, Gray tendered to Long the sum of $500, that being the amount of the first payment under the terms of the contract, but Long re- fused to receive it, and then and there repudiated the contract. After- ward, on December 24, 1881, Long and his wife deeded 31,3% acres of the said land to Elizabeth I. Crockett for the sum of $8,500, reserv- ing and retaining about two acres of the tract. Following this, on March 3, 1882, B. Gray brought an action in the Wyandotte District Court against Elizabeth I. Crockett, H. C. Long and Martha M. Long, to compel them to convey the land to him according to his con- tract with Long. The defendants answered by alleging that the real estate described was, at the execution of the said pretended contract, the homestead of H. C. Long and family, and that Martha M. Long, his wife, did not join in the alleged contract or consent there- to. Certain facts were then admitted in the trial by the parties, among which were the following: That if the land was outside of Wyandotte City at the time of contract between the plaintiff (Gray) and defendant, H. C. Long, it was a homestead, and could not be alienated without the joint consent of husband and wife ;* that on April 22, 1881, the land in controversy was occupied by H. C. Long and family as a homestead; that under the charter incorporating the city of Wyandotte in the year 1859, the land in controversy was within the corporate limits of the city; that in 1879 the land in controversy was excluded from the city limits by an act of the Legislature, ap- proved March 12, 1879. The point then in dispute was as to the con- stitutionality of the law of March 12, 1879. If that law was valid, the land in dispute at the date of sale was outside of the city limits and occupied as a homestead. If that law was void, the land in con- troversy was within the city limits, and therefore not a homestead. Among other facts introduced, it was admitted that at the time H. C. Long and wife conveyed the thirty-one acres to Mrs. Crockett, she (Mrs. Crockett) had notice of the written contract of sale by H. C. Long to the plaintiff, B. Gray.
*By the State Constitution, one aere within the limits of an incorporated city, or 160 acres in the country, constitute a homestead.
17
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The issues formed were submitted to the court upon the admitted facts, and the evidence introduced by the parties, with a request that the court find the facts specifically, and state its conclusions of law. The facts were found to be substantially as admitted, and as stated in the foregoing, and the conclusions of the court were as follows:
"1. By the act incorporating said city of Wyandotte in 1859, such homestead was not destroyed, nor the defendant's rights thereto divested.
"2. Said act of March 12, 1879, is a valid and constitutional law, and in full force as such.
"3. The said contract of April 22, is void and of no avail."
Exceptions were properly taken to these conclusions by the plaint- iff, and the case was appealed to the Supreme Court of the State. The attorneys in the case were B. Gray, for himself, and N. Cree for plaintiff, and John B. Seroggs and Hiram Stevens, for defendants.
The Supreme Court, after thoroughly reviewing the case, concluded that, " The land in controversy was legally included within the limits of Wyandotte City, by the act of incorporation of January 29, 1859; that the special act of March 12, 1879, attempting to exclude it from the corporate limits of that city, was void; that at the date of the contract of April 22, 1881, all of the land in controversy, consisting of about thirty-three acres, was within the limits of an incorporated city, and therefore one acre only, together with all improvements on the same, could be claimed, even if there had been no sale thereof, by Long or his wife as a homestead." The judgment of the dis- trict court was reversed, and the cause remanded, all the justices con- curring.
Afterward, B. Gray brought an action against Elizabeth I. Crockett, and H. C. Long and wife, to compel them to convey to him the land in controversy, under the conclusions of law rendered by the Supreme Court as aforesaid, and in July, 1883, he obtained judgment to that effect against the defendants. From this judgment the de- fendants took appeal to the Supreme Court, and the justices thereof, all concurring, decided that their conclusions of law in the original case did not prepare it for final judgment. That upon remanding the cause, there should have been another trial for the purpose of deter- mining what part of the thirty-three acres should be reserved as the one-acre homestead, and what part Long should convey to Gray. The court held also, that the consideration which Gray should be re- quired to pay if finally awarded a decree for thirty-two acres, the
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tract less the homestead, should not be $8,000, the contract price, but that sum should be reduced in the proportion of the value of the homestead acre to that of the entire tract. Judgment was therefore reversed, and the cause remanded for a new trial.
On May 2, 1884, a motion by defendants for a change of venne was sustained, and the cause was sent to the district court of Douglas Coun- ty, where trial was had in July of that year, and judgment rendered .in favor of the defendants for costs. To this plaintiff excepted and took an appeal to the Supreme Court which body held that the plaint- iff (Gray) was entitled to the enforcement of his contract with H. C. Long, and said he did not bargain for or purchase the supposed in- choate interest of Mrs. Long. She did not sign the contract, and was not asked to sign the same. The plaintiff is entitled to what his written contract calls for. The decree, however, for the specific per- formance of the contract, as well on the part of H. C. Long as of Mrs. Crockett, must be so framed as to fully protect such inchoate in- terest of Mrs. Long, as the wife of H. C. Long, whether owned by herself or subsequent to the contract transferred to her co-defendant, Mrs. Crockett. The judgment of the lower court was reversed, and the cause remanded with directions to enter judgment for the plaintiff in accordance with the views above expressed. Accordingly, judg- ment was rendered for the plaintiff at the November term, of the Douglas District Court in 1886 .. The defendant, Crockett, then took the case again to the Supreme Court.
The trial court, in its decree for specific performance, required Gray to pay at once into the court the sum of $500; also $66 for taxes paid by Elizabeth I. Crockett, and $100 for Armstrong's com- mission; also $1,500 in ninety days; and to deposit in court, for deliv- ery to Elizabeth I. Crockett, his note in the sum of $5,500 ($500 being abated on account of the homestead acre), payable three years from date, with interest at 8 per cent per annum, payable annually, said note to be secured by a mortgage upon the premises sold to Gray by Long. Under said decree Gray was also to have the privilege to pay the mortgage, cr any part thereof, prior to the maturity of the note secured by the mortgage. It was shown by the evidence before the trial court that the rental value of the premises from July 23. 1881, to April 1, 1884, was $120 per annum, and from that time to November, 1886, the rental value was $170 per annum.
The contention on the part of the counsel for the Longs and Mrs. Crockett was that Gray should have been required by the decree of the
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trial court to pay the total $8,000 (less the value of the homestead acre), with interest thereon from April 22, 1881. The Supreme Court sustained the judgment of the lower court in part, but held that as Gray was not liable for interest, he should be required to pay Long or deposit in court all that was due for the premises, upon the entry of the decree for specific performances, and thereupon the judgment of the district court was again reversed for further proceedings in accord- ance with the views expressed by the Supreme Court.
This case was five times before the Supreme Court. [See Gray vs. Crockett, 30 Kas., 138; Crockett vs. Gray, 31 Id., 346; Gray vs. Crock- ett, 35 Id., 66; Gray vs. Crockett, 35 Id., 686; Crockett vs. Gray, 39 Id., 659.
There was still some further litigation concerning this property, but it was finally compromised so that Gray became the owner of Long's interest aside from the homestead acre, and the interest of Mrs. Long as the wife of H. C. Long.
A case containing valuable information concerning navigable rivers, and the right to take therefrom the ice that forms on the same, is that of Robert W. Wood and others against Robert A. Fowler and others. This action was brought by plaintiffs in the Wyandotte District Court to restrain defendants from cutting and removing ice formed on the surface of the Kansas River within certain described boundaries. Trial was had at the April term, 1881, of the court. Plaintiffs alleged in their petition that Matthias Splitlog, as the owner of the land described therein (a tract in Wyandotte City) owned the waters of the river to the middle of the main channel, and by a lease made by him to plaintiffs the frontage of the land and the waters were conveyed to them for the period of ten years, and that the ice which formed upon the surface of the waters was the property of the plaintiffs. They further alleged that they had, at great expense, constructed ice-houses on the banks of the river contiguous to the Splitlog land, and had established a business as ice-packers and dealers at a great commer- cial center, and that the crop of ice which formed upon the Splitlog waters was essential to the prosecution of their business, and there- fore prayed for an injunction to restrain defendants from cutting and appropriating the aforesaid ice. A demurrer to the petition was sus- tained in the district court. John J. Cravens was attorney for plain- tiffs, and Leland J. Webb for defendants. It was argued by defend- ants, in substance, that the Kansas was a navigable river, a fact of which the court must take judicial knowledge, and that rights of
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plaintiffs did not extend beyond the bank of the river into the water, and that they had no more right to cut and remove the ice than any other individual. Plaintiffs appealed to the supreme court, and that body in its review of the case said, "We think the claim of the defendants is correct, that the court is bound to take judicial knowl- edge of the navigability of the stream, * * * and in taking judicial notice we know that the Kansas is the largest river wholly within the limits of the State; that it has been recognized as the prominent geographical feature dividing the State into Northern and Southern Kansas; that in early territorial history it was, in fact, navigated, a few steamboats going up and down its waters; and that its volume of. water is. such that in its natural condition it is capable of being used for purposes of navigation, and so coming within the recognized defi- nition in this country of a navigable stream. * * We know that the lines of the United States surveys do not cross the channel, but that the stream was meandered. It is true in 1864 an act was passed by the State Legislature declaring the Kansas and cer- tain other rivers not navigable; but the plain implication of the act is that the stream had heretofore been considered navigable, and its pur- pose was to sanction the bridging and damming of such streams. It certainly was not the purpose, and the act had not the effect to enlarge the title of the riparian owners, or to recognize them as pos- sessed of higher rights than heretofore. Indeed, where title is once vested a mere change in the condition or character of the current or the uses to which the stream is put will not transfer any title. * * The stream having been meandered, the lines of the sur- veys are bounded by the bank; the patents from the United States passed title only to the bank; Splitlog as riparian owner owned only to the bank. The title to the bed of the stream is in the State.
"The title to the soil being in the State, and the stream being a public highway, obviously the ownership of the ice would rest in the general public, or in the State as the representative of that public. The riparian proprietor would have no more title to the ice than he would to the fish. It is simply this, that his land joins the land of the State. The fact that it so joins gives him no title to that land. or to anything formed or grown upon it, any more than it does to any- thing formed or grown or found upon the land of any individual
* It would seem that the one who first appropriates neighbor. *
and secures the ice which is formed is entitled to it, and on the same principle that he who catches a fish in one of those rivers owns it."
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The judgment of the district court was affirmed, all the justices concurring.
In 1882 was begun the action of the First Presbyterian Church of Wyandotte against the board of commissioners of Wyandotte County, involving the title to a lot of ground 150 feet square in the northeast corner of Huron Place, at the corner of Sixth Street and Minnesota Avenue, in Wyandotte, now Kansas City, Kas. The church claimed title to this ground by virtue of the dedication by the Wyandotte City Company, in 1859, of this tract for a "church lot." A resolution of the Wyandotte City Company in these words: "Re- solved that a church lot be appropriated to the Presbyterian Church, new school, etc.," was introduced in evidence, which together with the parol testimony of a number of citizens, was by the court con- sidered sufficient to identify the First Presbyterian Church as the beneficiary intended. The commissioners claimed title by virtue of a deed, dated April 8, 1868, from the Wyandotte City Company to the county commissioners. They claimed that this deed was a revocation of the dedication; that there being no Presbyterian Church in the city to take the lot under the dedication prior to about 1881, the Wyandotte City Company had perfect right to convey by the deed of 1868; and that the law does not authorize a dedication of land for church purposes in this State.
The commissioners were about to begin the erection of a court- house on this property when this suit was instituted, and a temporary injunction against the commissioners was granted. The defendants moved to dissolve the injunction, but the motion was overruled. The case was tried without a jury at the April term, 1882, of the district court, which resulted in findings and judgment for the church. The case was then taken to the Supreme Court by the commissioners, represented by Hiram Stevens, John B. Scroggs and James S. Gib- son. Day & Troutman, of Topeka, represented the plaintiffs in the Supreme Court. This court affirmed the judgment of the district court. The First Presbyterian Church then took possession of the lot, built a chapel thereon, and occupied the premises until 1890. In 1889 the First Presbyterian Church filed a petition in the district court, alleging that this property had become valuable for business purposes, and that by reason of the building of two railroads, one on Sixth Street and the other on Minnesota Avenne, it had become unsuitable for church purposes, and asking for a decree in equity allowing the property to be sold for $50,000, and the proceeds of the
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sale to be invested in another lot and church building in a more suitable location. The decree was granted, and the trustees of the church were required to give bond in the sum of $60,000, conditioned that the proceeds of the sale be reinvested in another lot and building. The property was sold to the Portsmouth Building Company, and the construction of a large office and business building was begun on this lot in the spring of 1890, whereupon the Land Claim & Invest- ment Company, claiming to own the interests of the majority of the old Wyandotte City Company, and a large number of heirs and as- signees of the members' of the Wyandotte City Company, brought suit against the Portsmouth Building Company and the First Presby- terian Church to enjoin the construction of the business building and the secularization of this property, claiming that by reason of the sale of the lot by the church and the abandonment of it for church purposes, it reverted to the Wyandotte City Company or their heirs and assignees.
The temporary injunction was denied by the district court, and the plaintiffs took the case to the Supreme Court. The case for ejectment and perpetnal injunction was regularly for trial at the June term, 1890, of the district court.
There have been many homicides in Wyandotte County-equally as many, and, perhaps, more than in any other county in the State. To enumerate them all and to give particulars pertaining to them, would require a large volume, hence, only a few of them can be mentioned. There never has been a legal execution of an individual within the county for the commitment of crime. However, several men have been hung under the administration of lynch law.
During the Civil War of 1861-65 Wyandotte County was infested with a gang of robbers and pillagers called Red Legs, and after the war closed they continued to make this county their headquarters, and murder and robbery were the result. The many crimes committed, and the facilities with which the desperadoes escaped punishment, caused the people to take the law into their own hands. The first act in which the people took a part occurred in the spring of 1866. "John Tehan, a section boss on the Missouri Pacific Railroad, went to the livery stable of J. L. Conklin a little after dark and employed Conklin to take him to Kansas City. Before starting Tehan inquired of Conk- lin what time it was. On the way over Conklin was shot in the groin. Tehan, who was under the influence of liquor, rode on to Kansas City. The next day he was arrested, brought to Wyandotte, identified by
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Conklin, put in jail, taken out that night and hung to the steps of the old court-house. A great many persons are of the opinion that Tehan was innocent."
Early in the summer of 1866 Newt. Morrison, a noted Red Leg and desperado, was found one morning hanging from the same place. A few months later two colored men, suspected of being implicated in the murder of one McNamara, were taken from the calaboose, and also hung from the same steps, the steps being on the outside of the building. Afterward they were believed to have been innocent. Though perhaps the innocent suffered, it seems that the action of the lynchers put a stop to the work of the desperadoes for the time being.
A noted man who suffered death at the hands of a murderer was Samuel Hallett, who came to this county from the State of New York. In August, 1863, he began the grade of the Union Pacific Railway near the bridge, where the railroad crosses the Kansas River, in Kan- sas City, Kas. He was a shrewd business man, of great energy, and pushed the work of building the road with great rapidity. On the 27th of July of the following year, while with a number of other gentlemen in front of the Garno Hotel, on the corner of Third Street and Minne- sota Avenue in Wyandotte, one Talcutt who had previously been in his employ as a civil engineer, shot and killed him. The murderer then mounted his horse and fled to Quindaro, and there dismounted in front of a house, hitched his horse, passed through the house and into a cornfield, and made his escape from the posse that followed him. It is said that he kept hid for several months, then went away and secured employment on another line of railroad, and no efforts were made to arrest him. This affair is referred to at length in former pages.
Nothing perhaps has ever created so much excitement in Wyandotte County as the strike of the workmen on the Missouri Pacific and other railroad lines in the spring of 1886. Thousands of men in the employ of the railroad companies joined together in a demand for higher wages, and agreed that if the demand was not complied with, they would all, at a certain time, quit work and leave the companies without force to run their trains. The demand was made, but not complied with, whereupon the workmen "struck" and left the railroad com - panies helpless for the time being. All freight trains were stopped. This caused much inconvenience and greatly damaged the business, not only of the railroad companies, but of the entire country by stop- ping the movement of commerce. The strikers not only ceased work themselves, but did all in their power to prevent others willing to
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take their places from working, while some of them went so far as to damage railroad property and even to commit murder.
On the night of April 26, 1886. six men (strikers) attended a meet- ing of the Knights of Labor in Kansas City, Mo., and then crossed over to Wyandotte, passed down the Missouri Pacific Railroad to a point south of the Wyandotte bridge, and there displaced the spikes, fish plates and iron rails upon the track of the Missouri Pacific Rail- road. ' At this place the railroad runs upon the bank of the river at ' the foot of the bluff, and makes a curve with the outside next to the water. The displacements were made on the outside of the curve, so as to throw the train toward the water and probably into the river. According to evidence given on the subsequent trial, a train passed over the road just about the time the wreckers began their hellish work, and six or eight shots were fired into it. But the evidence did not reveal the names of the persons firing the shots. Having finished their evil work and being satisfied that a wreck would be the certain result thereof, the wreckers dispersed and went to their respective homes and awaited results, fully expecting to hear of a wreck the next morning, and their expectations were fully realized. Before morning Benjamin Hortou and George Carlisle, two men in the employ of the railroad company, attempted to run an engine over the road, and at the place prepared by the wreckers the engine was derailed and completely wrecked, and Horton and Carlisle were instantly killed, their bodies being crushed. This was wreaking vengeance upon the "scabs" as well as upon the railroad company. The next day great excitement prevailed, and the wreckers, not being known, had an opportunity of looking with satisfaction upon the result of their fiendish work.
Efforts were now made to ferret out the guilty parties. The rail- road company employed detectives, one of whom, George A. Fowle (known as Brother Alfred), was sent by Chief Detective Furlong to endeavor to discover the identity of the train wreckers. He reached Kansas City, and, making the acquaintance of certain Knights of La- bor, represented himself as a special envoy sent by Powderly, the great leader of the Knights, for the purpose of discovering who were the Knights that were connected with the train-wrecking, and remov- ing them to parts where they would not be likely to be found by the - officers of the law, if they should be discovered as the guilty parties. Passing through the two Kansas Cities and other points, and mingling with Knights of Labor, he succeeded in winning their confidence to
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such an extent that he selected the men he believed to be the guilty ones. Thereupon Chief Detective Thomas Furlong filed his affidavit in the office of F. B. Anderson, a justice of the peace in Wyandotte, charging in substance that on or about April 26, 1886, Robert Geers, Fred Newport, Michael Leary, Oliver J. Lloyd, William Vossen and George Hamilton displaced the spikes, fish plates, and iron rails upon the track of the Missouri Pacific Railroad in Wyandotte County, in the State of Kansas, and caused the death of George Carlisle and Benjamin Horton. Upon this information the parties above named were all arrested, and on July 29, 1886, they were taken be- fore Squire F. B. Anderson for preliminary trial. This trial con- tinued two days. Vossen waived examination. The Justice found sufficient reason to commit the prisoners, and therefore bound them over to the district court. It was believed that George Hamilton was the principal or leader of the train wreckers, and he was the first one brought to trial. He was tried at the December term, 1886, of the district court. The lawyers engaged on the part of the State were James S. Gibson, county attorney, Judge Henry D. Laughlin, Mar- shal F. McDonald and Col. R. S. McDonald, all of St. Louis, and Bailey Waggener, of Atchison. Those engaged on the part of the defense were C. F. Hutchings and L. W. Keplinger, of Kansas City, Kas .. Gov. Charles P. Johnson, of St. Louis, and Maj. William War- ner, of Kansas City, Mo.
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