The Emporia weekly news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1881-1889, 1881-06-16
THE oIL-FEVER TIMES.

THE oIL-FEVER TIMES.
G How Old AIan IsenninehOn of Pennsyl
vanIa was Robbed of a Cool Half
Million,
Chicago Times
Ct hate scum" said q Wabash avenu
horse car driver, as he threw himself O
his brake to keep from running into
stylish carriage in witch were seatel
two loudly-dressed women, who wcr
urging the liveried coachman TO acceleI
ate the speed of his tired horses. THE,
needn't put on style neither. l knew
! them when their dad couldn't buy hal
yard of jeans to halfsole the basemcn
of.his trousers with, and when molasse
On their corn bread was luxury onl,
INDUCED in about once n year"
"Who are they 90 inquired a Teporte
who happened TO be standing on thi
front platform while the eloqIently in
dignant mule-compeller was delivering
the observations quoted above.
"Who are they? Why, they are the
daughters of poor good lOr-nothing cusS
who struck oil during the great OIL ex
citement fourteen or fifteen years ago
He had a little patch of ground on Oil
creek, Pennsylvania, and it made him
1 WI III - vi bNO AAHCLN uay
He had sense enough 10 die before the
thieves got a chance at it, and there goes
some of it. The old fellow lived near
Benninghoff when that old stiff was rob-
| bed. Maybe you have heard of the Ben
| ninghotf robbery?p said the driver sud
denly, noticing the interest the latter re.
mark had excited.
The reporter admitted tia he had
whereupon the man grew communities
tive. He knew all about the robbery,
| and proceeded 10 -narratc what proved
an interesting chapter of ancient Grimm
al history.
Il was teaming about Petroleum Cen
tire in 1866" said he, land used 10 see
odd Benninghoif,' as everybody called
him, every few days. He was an isno-
rant, stupid old Dutchman, who had
lived in Il miserable hut on his little
side of hill, for years, with his wife and
son and daughter. They were poverty
stricken, like everybody else in that
part of the world, and never knew what
it was to have a dollar. When the oil
excitement broke out, the country was
flooded with men and money, and us old
Benninghoif was right in the middle of
the Oil-field he was among the first 10 be
benefited. He got a royalty on every
barrel of oil that came from his place
and before he had time to turn around
the money began pouring in on him.
1t made him the most miserable man in
the world. He was afraid to trust the
money in the banks, and when it got too
bulky to carry around on his person, he
took to burying it in outOfthc-way
places. That, too, failed to prove
satisfactory, and the old FEEL
low hit on a brilliant idea
He bought two ponderOus safes with
barn door locks, and took them to his
cabin. Then he dug up his treasure;
put it in his safe, and hired two men To
stand guard night and day. The old
chaps freak was the talk of the country,
and a thousand stories were told about
him. Meanwhile the money kept piling
up, until he got $S00,000 in the two
safes. Riches made little change in his
style of Lying. He had no more use
for it than Fijee islander When his
income was $4,000 day from the wells
on his farm, his wife used to go out in
to the woods and gather berries to take
to town and sell. 1t is said that she
did a driving business in the sale of
punches of wintergrcen, picked on the
surrounding hills, while the old man
and childrin turned dime or two by
digging sassafras roots and peddling
the bark at Petroleum Centre for the
people to make tea of. One day old
Benninghoff was driving his old horse
up the hill from town to his house,
when a man carrying ham and bag of
potatoes asked him for ride. When
he got out, the passenger asked him
how much the charge would be. About
10 cents will do, guess said the own
er of $500, 900 in cash, and the man paid
it.
at went along this way for a while,
until one day everybody was startled by
hearing that the old idiot had been rob
bed. 1t was what had been predicted,
but the reality sort of daZed the CON-
munity. 1t was pretty generally known
what he had in his safes, and when the
news started there was the widest ex-
citement. One evening when young
Benninghoff was Oft Mt Il prayer-meeting
party of masked men surprised the
guards and gagged the old man and his
wife, and tied them, and, blowing open
one of the safes, got away with $500, 900
in currency. The safe, though big
one, had very common lock, and the
robbers had little trouble getting into
it. The news flew like wild-firc, and the
next day Bennington Offered n reward
of 100000 for the arrest of the gang or
any members of it. This brought 10 the
Centre the best detectives in the COun-
try, and before long II was discovered
that the robbery had been committed by
a party of six men from Siegcrstown, Il
village fifty miles to the northwest.
The scheme had been concocted by Jim
Saeger, who took with him Il brewer,
shoemaker, and three other
fellows he knew and could trust.
Hundreds of arrests were made, and fin
ally nearly all of the little fishes We're
taken in, but Saeger, who had taken
the detectives. Nothing was heard of
him for years, though officers secured
Europe and America. Reports reached
the Center occasionally that he was in
Germany, or Turkey, or Paris, or Aus
tralia, or some other distant point, but
nothing came of it. Five or six days
ago the man turned upin Denver, where
he was recognized and arrested, but,
Benninghoff having died and his estate
having been wasted, the officers refused
TO go To the expense of bringing HIM
back, and he was released. They said
that all the important witnesses were
dead, or scattered, and that he could not
be convicted. Besides, there was no
chance at the 100000. Anyhow, Sac
ger got off scott free.
1T seems tnat alter rODDlnS the Dcn-
ninghoff safe Saeger got into a canal
boat and went down the Allegheny
river to Pittsburg, where he took
passage with his two valises full
of stolen money on a scow that
landed him at Cairo. From there he
went to New Orleans, and then jumped
to Havana and Rio Janeiro, where he
| cut it fat for a while, and then skipped
to Mexico. Next moved into Texas and
went into the cattle business. He was at
| Denver selling cattle when arrested. Sac
ger WIS a tall, swathy, black whiskered
man, with Spanish features, and he had
no trouble in passing himself off for a
| Spaniard. Only one of the robbers was
| ever punished, that heard Off
"What became of Saeger?''
at don't know. He dropped out OF
sight after they let him go at Denver, and
| is probably in Texas or Mexico, where
he will not be annoyed again by sheriffs
| He may be worth million for all ]
know" With this the intelligent histo-
rian shifted his mules to the other end
of his car, and prepared 10 take the back
! track, he having reached his journeys
/ end while the chance discourse was in
progress.
THE READJUSTERs.
| AIahOne's Authorizations of PrInei
Piles, &C., sc.
RICHMOND, Va, June 2.-There art
over 700 delegates present, including
seventy-fiye colored men. Paul, in hi.
4 \ 81, u -