Little Falls transcript. [volume] (Little Falls, Morrison County, Minn.) 1876-1894, 1883-10-12
Cord Oh vs.. .f Farsi all i

Il J
=. Cord D. Of iarl ms apo lis, 81 the
charge Of atteInp q d efflayt,, the gov
ernnlent in securing s pane lands, the lat
tor gentleman has y itten several letters
which have appeared 80 print, intWhicch
it was strongly hinted that Marshall was
moi. the incorrup ble's fraud hunter that
he represented himself 10 he. Ia a re-
cent published interview betWeen.on ed
itor of The Pinoeer Press and Marshall
several statements were made by The de-
tective ;whicli did not suit Gordon, and
he wrote. the 'etterswhicll appears below
to the Pioneer Press editor, whosrefused
topubl IL ST. ... Il appeaasd, however, in
the ST. Paul Globe =on 81 d l1aaenday q last;
TO the Editor ofthe piissnser Press -. -.
! I have just read youfsi terYiew with
Detective Marsha IN 1 i q ttanaeer
oi Oct. 8, in which he 50 thatalio has
not settled The cases against Wentworth
Il Mcclure, Capt, Sleeper, Morris Thorn.
as and others. Technically. NJ arshall's g
statement may be true, hut in effect It is
false, as you will easily find by inter
viewing the parties naaed and the Unit
ed States district attorney. Thomas and
bis partner, Johnson, both told me yes
terday at the Merchants hotel that they
had compromised with Marshal, at his
request, on the. following basis: They
to keep all the land they had proved up
and entered and Marsh all agrees rot to
interfere with their entries but let them
go to patent. On the other hand they
promise to be good boys and not do so
any more. The same sort Of a compro.
mise has also been made with Went
worth and Mcclure. Marshall himself
will not deny that these men have &C
qujred many thousands of acres of valu-
able pines by pre- emptions within the
last two years, and he dare not affirm
that either Mitchell or myself have evet
acquired an acre by such m.ans. His
charge is simply that we attempted to
do So.
He now in his usual hypocritical way
insinnates that these parties have con
fessed their guilt, and he very maynani-
mousy adds that the door is still open
for Mitchell and myself to get down On
our knees and confess to his holiness
that we too are guilty. and place our
selves at the mercy Of this new man of
Nazareth. He adds that the govern
ment is only anxious to break up these
frauds in tim Der entries and IS deter
mined to do SO. All parties may come
forward" &C., &c.
Mr.. Editor, as one Of the parties
charged By Marshall with consp1rjng TO
.Gcfraud the Estsite,l States have. a. con.
fession to maAe ana ! propose to make it
publicly Il is this: After + was ar
rested on the charge of conspiring with
Mitchell & Lovejoy 10 defraud the gov
eminent, personal friend Of Gov. MAJ
shall, whose name [ regret that | i'm not
at liberty to state approached me, as he
said, on behalf of Gov Marshal and ad-
vising NE that if would go to Narsha3l
and make confession duplicating
Mitchell and fixing the charge on him
beyond escape, that nay case would be
quietly dropped. He informed me that
Marsha1l's chief desire was to fasten the
charge on Mitchell and prevent his get
ting his commission as receiver of the
Duluth land office, 1T is needless to say
that / treated the proposition as an in
suit. claim to be an honorable man.
[ knew Mr.. Mitchell, as Well as myself,
was entirely in, ocent, although on ac-
count Of some purely friendly acts done
by him for me, there was some slight
ground upon which to build a suspicion
against him in connection with myself
My reply was: Il defy Marshall to do
his worst. I say tonce for I'll that the
fight is On, and I will stay in till Will
liam e. Marshall has got enough of it
and throws up the sponge" I meant
what I said, and I most emphatIcallg
mean il now. I fight, but I never sur
render. And nov, MFR. Editor, as the
aole object of the Pioneer Press, as |
have frequently been informed by you,
is to throw light on these pine land
frauds, I have certain statements max e,
and call the attention Of the public and
of the grand jury row in session to the
following facts: 4
WIN. R. MARSHALL AND LAND FRAUDS.
tits fact we'll known to all the pine
land rnen in Duluth and to the presen /
and late registers and receivers Of the
Duluth land Office that the titles of the
Minnesota Iron company to nearly all
their thousands Of acres of land at and
about Vermillion lake were acquired by
pre-emption within the past few years.
During the etinae that Marshall has act,
ed as special agent to detect such frauds
up 10 recent date he occupied desk
in the office of thai company in Gilflll-
ants block, in ST. Paul, and was at cer-
tain times In the employ of that conapa :
ny aud borrowed from a prominent
officer of the company, from time to
time, ia ali about $4,000, which has not
been repaid and probably never will be
When they were making 9 fight in the
legislature last winter for an extension
Of their land grant, n d, 1s Marshall
was lobbyfng for them sn ghs and day,
and working 8 like abeayer in their inter
est. He and q % faent officer Of that
company ct that tirae, told me that he
expected to b LAND eommissio Of
their railroad yEf. a. Baasatt, OF sDu.
3iltl one Of he Iron com pany's trusted
men, nforrned me that he personally.
took Vrn r. NIarshal II February.