, 1886-06-04
A "REMINISCENCES.
william Pinkerton's Chase and Cap
ture--An Early Cheyenne Hanging.

H>dTiy cheyenne
Standing in the rotunda of the Inter
Ocean hotel last Wednesday morning.
William Pinkerton, the great detective,
told the story of a Cheyenne crime Of
early days.
In 1867 the well-known mercantile
house of Freund Bros. dealt largely in
small arms of all kinds, and their places
Of business were scattered all along the
advancing Union Pacific line. Their
business at Cheyenne was in charge o.
John W. Trelor, a young Texan of good
birth, liberal education and fine bushes.
capacity. In the early summer of 1867
the Pinkerton agency was notified by
the Frcund Bros. that Trclor had sold out
the stock of their Cheyenne house, peck
eted the proceeds, amounting to some
5000 and absconded.
The famous founder OF the agency, AL
Ian PinkertoD, then in the full zenith OF
his reputation, detailed his son William
to work up the case. William came to
Cheyenne and was soon on the trail OF
TTclcr The fugitive made straight for
the Texas line, and once wirhin the limits
Of that immense state began a series of
windings and turning through cities,
towns and villages which would have baf-
fled a man not trained under Allan Pin.
kerton's own eye. The Pinkerton blood
asserted itself, and with sleuth hound GER
tainty and tenacity the trail of crime was
followed, and in January, 1868, Trelor
was run down and captured in Corpus
Christi.
Pinkerton was provided with requisition
papers from the governor of Dakota, in
which territory Cheyenne was ia 1861.
The creation of the territory of Wyoming
in January, 1865, rendered these papers
null and void, and when the detective
reached New Orleans with his prisoner,
he found that he had no legal right to
hold him.
The then scallawag city government got
wind of the circumstances of the case, and
learning that Trelor had still with him
$4,000 or $1,000 of his plumber, resolved
to secure possession of his person by
means of a habeas corpus, and take the
money as n reward for their trouble.
Pinkerton's detective instincts at once
fathomed the design, and getting his pris
oner into a carriage under some plausible
pretext, he drove him to a railroad station
twelve miles from the city, and boarding
a freight train, in a few hours was across
the Mississippi line. From here he tele-
graphed for his baggage and hotel bill,
and wired a message of regret and condo.
lence TO the Crescent City chief of police.
Leaving his baffied enemies to digest
their chagrin as best they might, the tri-
umphant detective brought his prisoner
through TO Cheyenne without further mo-
lestation, arriving here in March, 1868.
Sending Trelor to Camp Carlin for safe
keeping, Pinkerton put up at the old
Rollins house on Sixteenth street.
where the Masonic hall now
stands. During the night there was a
great commotion in the house. Footsteps
hurried along the corridors and up and
down the stairs; doors were quickly opened
and violently slammed; voices muffled but
eager were heard, and at last a hand tried
the knob of Pinkerton's own sleeping
room. Just then a voice exclaimed,
Come on Jim. What are you doing
there. That is the room of that id
Chicago detective. We don't van lin,
in our business, - and the door-knob was
released, footsteps moved away and shortly
after the house became quiet.
The next morning Pinkerton was stand
ing in the jewelry store OF Charley Miller,
talking with the proprietor, when a sol
der stepped in and casually remarked
that they had hung a man at Camp Car
lin tn. night before and the lynchers had
went out from Cheyenne In an instant
Pinkerton was all attention, and in answer
to his inquiries learned that the victim of
Judge Lynch was a tall man, with a long.
red beard. This tallying with Trelor's
description, Pinkerton at once concluded
that his man was gone, especially as he
now recalled the hubbub in the Rollins
house the night before. Procuring a CON
veyance he hastily drove out to the Camp.
to find that Trelor was still safe and that
the man still swinging and bleaching in
the sun was a freighter named Douglass.
Douglass, it seemed, was in the employ
of a large freighting firm and had formed
such an attachment for the mules he drove
that he had ran off with them. This mule
attachment on hls part had brought a rope
attachment on the part of others, accom-
panied with the tight hug of the strang-
ling moose.
Court Notes.
M. - -