News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1886-09-09
THE BURNING FORESTS.
THE ROASTING OF HANK COON.
His Pursuers Set the Forest Afire, and
the GalIows Lost a Subject.

About every other man one meets here
nowadays, says letter from the Wis
consin burned district, is singed and
blistered as the result of close contact
with forest fires. The air is heavy with
the smoke, and at night the sky is lurid
with the glare of flames, some of which
are near at hand. While everybody is
alert on the subject and when a sudden
shift of the wind may mean the entire
destruction OF the town, the old settlers
funds of anecdote have been drawn on
very freely.
''The best job ever knew woods
fire to do" said old Jerry Bassett, twas
in the fall of 80 when one of them
licked up Hank Coon the murderer
Lots of you fellows wasn't here then,
and the saw mill hadn't eaten into things
the way is has since A man hunt in
those days was a terror. Hank was a
crook, and had been around this section
some time. Everybody suspected him.
Finally, one day old man Hardness, of
Michigan, turned up murdered. He
had pine lands up here. and had been
on the spot seeing about the putting up
OF a sawmill. No man was likely to
have much money here, but Harkness
had a fine watch and chain, and of
course some cash, and when his body
was found these were gone. AS Hank
was missing, nobody thought twice
about who had been doing that killing,
and we set out with the idea of catching
him before he could get out of the
| woods.
"There were about dozen of us. and
we lost no time in getting on the trail.
About month before the murder of
Harkness, one OF the men who was
working for Lander, Swede, who had
not been here long, was lost in the
woods, and we had just given up our
search for him when we heard of the |
crime and changed off onto Coon. |
There had been some fires that fall, but !,
they had not scared us much. After !
we had been on the track of Coon about
week we came one morning onto what .
everybody said was his body The re-
mains were hardly recognizable, but !
the clothes were his, the boots and hat
were his, and big hoin ring on one of
| the fingers was one which we had all
seen him wear. Thinking he had
starved to death, we resolved to scar h !
the clothing for Harkness's money and |
jewels, but as they were not to be found
we came to the conclusion that he had
buried them, with the expectation of /
returning as soon as he thought he
could do so with safety Then we left
him where he was, and, returning to
camp, told our story.
''About month after that one of our
men came running in with story about
seeing Hank Coon in the woods No.
body believed him at first, but he was
SO certain about it that we concluded
to go out with him. After a long and
careful search we came upon him sure
enough, the same man exactly as he was
when we saw HIM last, except that his
clothing was changed. We had him
covered and he had to surrender, after
which, in explanation of his strange
appearance, he said that he had come
ap9n ap9 ttnt the body Of the mlssin2g Swede
anu tnat as the latters clothes were
better than his own, he had changed
with him for the fun of the thing. He
denied most positively that he had had
anything to do with the murder, and
expressed the greatest will .ngness to
accompany us back to camp On the
way he was talking so glibly that most
of us forgot that he was our prisoner,
and, watching his chance, he made a
bAHS lOi IAC aliu " 40 ouG VI
sight before we could realize what he
was up to.
" Burn him outp somebody cried.
and then quicker than l can tell it we
agreed to spread out so as to surround
the place, for we knew he would hide
after little, and then set fire to the
woods. We figured that if he did hide
that would be sure way of getting
h i'm hot tbar Of
and as for ourselve., we were to be the
judges when it was time for us to skip.
An hour after that the smoke was ris-
ing from half dozen different quarters.
The woods were dry, and by little
careful watching we kept the blaze
under sOIue sort of control Toward
dark brisk wind sprang up, and before
10 o'clock the old forest was a going off
like artillery and musketry. l was on
the lee side, and as there were no back
fires burning, had the prettiest view of
the blaze that a man ever had. 1t was
terrific, and l began to fear that the
boys on the other side might not get
| away, but as there was nothing for me
to do but keep out of danger myself, l
just stood as far back as it was ncces-
sary to do, and saw the flames spread.
~ " 90 W OloC IhttL q t'o"bCl iilIll. 1llC
heat, even where | was standing, was
almost insufferable, and every few min
utes I had to turn my back on the blaze
ahead of me, which seemed at timc to
be wall of fire, reaching from earth to
sky. The reflection that sudden
change in the wind might place me III
the same rerilots predicament that we
had sought to put Coon in, made me
ch lya for hut + IL
over the hot track of the fire and looked
about me for the purpose Of taking my
bearings. On all sides the black and
spindling trees TODD out b re and
ghostly, and as I locked aloft few
drops of rain splashed in my face
Later the downpour increased, and in
ten minu es the rain WIS coming down
in torrents. | fed from the bIackened
| track of the fire to the cover of the
woods at one side, and from a thicket
saw, half with pleasure and half with
| regret, the fires burning DINNER, and
at last sinking into sui en- glare, which
promised soon to disappear altogether
| If the deluge continued. While thus
straining my eyes to observe if possible
| if there were any of my companions in
sight, | saw an object drop from one If
| the charred trees at some distance to
ms left, and heard it strike the ground
with heavy thump. The wind had
risen fresh and strong from the south
east, and made up my mind that some
of the burned limbs were being shaken
down. Afterward, however, | got to
thinking of Coon, and | couldn't get it
out of my head that he might have
been the thing tn dropped. The rain
continued all night, and by daylight
there was no fires in that vicinity worth
me Itioning. AT the earliest opportI
nity stole across the burnt stretch to
the tree that | had been watching, and
there at its base, burned out of all sem
blance to a human being most, was
Hank Coon. | knew who it was, for
right by his side was gold watch and
chain, half buried in the ashes. He had
climbed that tree when overtaken sud
denly by the fire in the hope of sticking il
out up there and from all appearances lie
had roasted as he sat in crotch of the
limbs He must have been dead long
before he fell. and | presume | had
walked around there with the dead man
right over my head. As the track of
the fire was not over 400 feet wide at
that point. we made up our minds that
he had either been asleep when he
found that it was on him and rushed to
his death before he thought of the dan
ger he was running, or he waited in
| some hiding pia so long that he onlv