Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1876-09-06
The " Mollle Magulres."

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For a number of years a band Of incendi.
aries and assassins known as the Mollie
Maguires has existed in the anthracite coal
regions Of Pennsylvania. These men were
associated together for the purpose of doing
the bidding Of the "bodymasters Of the
murderous gangs, whether it was brutal beat
ing, incendarism or assassination. There
are not says the Philadelphia Ledger, in all
the annals Of crime more deliberate, cruel
cold-blooded and in all respects, infamous
murders than those brought TO light in the
prosecutions now going on in Schuylkil
county. There was not even in the dark
ages and in the worst conditions of Euro
pean society in any country, anything more
repulsivc and appalling than the proceedings
Of the "Mollie Maguires." Some of the evil
dence ia the trials of the assassins reads like
the production of writer of sensational
fiction. A mine boss doing his duty by
Kidding his works of the presence Of villains
who were present only to hinder good and
industrious men from doing their work
comes under the ban Of a secret and bloody
band Of men who have methodized assassin
alton. a meeting Of the murderers is called
the proceedings are opened with prayer, the
word is given that the faithful boss is to
be killed, requisition is made for a detach
ment Of assassins in as cold-blooded a way
as if it were wild beast that is to be shot,
the men are named generally from some
distant place., the victim is shot down, some
times near his own house and in sight of his
wife, his mother or his children, and then
the bloody villains hold subsequent meet
ings TO decide which of several riuai claim
ants is entitled to the reward for the murderl
All this continues the Ledger, has been
proved in court-proyed by evidence beyond
all dispute. 1t bears truth on its very face,
and has been corroborated in the most con
vincing way by collateral testimony Of time,
place and circumstance. A number Of the
murderers are now under sentence Of death,
aud not less than dozen members Of the
various gangs have been convicted Of crimes
varying from conspiracy to kill, up to the
worst form Of deliberate murder itself
Scores of them are in prison, aud other
scores are fugitives. These gangs have dom
mated Schuylkill county for many years.
and portions of other counties They die
tated nominations and controlled elections,
acting sometimes with one party and some
times with the other. They had their men
in office, some of them being chiefs of police
and county commissioners, and they even
ran one Of them for the office of associate
Judge for the very court that is now trying
them for their lives. They terrorized that
county. They feared no law, human or di-
vine. 1t was destruction and death to in
terfere with them. The murderers killed
their opponents openly, for they were able
to prove aiibis, or anything else, through the
ready testimony Of their co-conspirators,
who, being redhanded assassins, would not
stop at perjury.
That the Mollie Maguires" are now
paralyzed-that they are either in prison
awaiting trial for their lives, or convicted
murderers waiting for the gallows, or fugi-
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tracks wherever they be in the wide world
that Schuylkil county has been relieved
from an appalling murderous despotism, are
all due, says the Ledger, first, to the persist
ent will and determination, the ability and
intelligence of the President of the Reading
Railroad Company, who has been tracking
the assassins for years, until he at last hunted
them down and, next, to the skill, marvellous
tact and wonderful courage of young Irish
Catholic detective in the employment of
Pnkerton's agency.
The Ledger says that the Mollie Ma
guires are suspected of being an interior
circle of the Ancient Order of llibernians,
or of being an excrescence upon it, yet still
closely attached to it, The suspicion is now
so strongly grounded that nothing but the
clearest and strongest reputation by that
Order can relieve it from the odium of being
near of kin 10 the assassins. That repudia-
ton must come, and come promptly, or the
Order will go down beneath load of public
execration."
Whoever may be responsible for the exist
ence in any portion of our country of such
, an organization as the Molie Maguires -
are represented to be, it is matter of con
graduation that their days are numbered
and that in all probability some of the
assassins will be compelled soon to suffer the
punishment which their deeds so Justly merit