, 1888-12-05
ANOTHER MYSTERY.
Ed Joyce, a Miner, Missing for Over
a Year.
Last Seen With $500 in His Pos
session.
Suspicion Points to a Man Thought
to be a Criminal.
THE

THE MYSTERY.
THE LEADER is the first paper to chron-
icle another mysterious disappearance.
This time a Silver Crown miner named
Ed Joyce, and well known in Cheyenne,
is missing and has been for nearly a year.
Another miner well known here is sus-
pected of the murder of Joyce and not
without reason. The entire story. which
may be the means of bringing to justice
one of the most reprehensible villains at
large, is given in the succeeding lines.
The identity of the accused man is con
cealed beneath a fictitious name To
charge a man with the commission of q
cowardly murder. or rather a pair of
them, is extremely serious business. This
journal would be exceedingly 10th to make
a mistake in a matter of such grave
moment,
THE MEN.
From 1888 to 1885 Dave Sexton, a dis
sipated, quarrelsome and desperate man
Of brutal instincts, was employed as a
butcher in this city. In 1885 lie and Ed
Joyce. the missing man, pooled their
issues, quit the own and prospected in
the Silver Crown district, locating. among
other claims, the Carbonate Belle lode.
woMAN's ToNGUE.
Soon after the partners settled perma-
nently at the mines Sexton brought a
woman to their cabin, representing that
she was his wife. The couple frequently
INDUCED in brawls and on one occasion
Joyce heard the female call Sexton "a
numbering ---." Others heard
her apply the same epithet to her lIege
lord.
II HEADLEsS MAN.
This was about the time of the fright
full headless man sensation, and Joyce,
with his native Irish wit and proclivity
for jumping at conclusions, became i'm
bued with the idea that Sexton was the
murderer of the mutilated unknown. On
his next trip to CHEYENNE he inspected the
house formerly occupied by his partner.
The new tenant told him that she had
washed blood stains from the floor. The
cellar was nailed down, but Joyce forced
it open and was Mortified to discover a
bundle of bloody clothing. For some
reason-probably fear and ignorance com
bined-he said nothing to the officers, but
when drunk subsequently, boosted that
he held the key to what was at that time
called the Wyoming mystery.
SEXTON FRIGHTENED.
In course of time the owners OF the
Carbonate Belle sold their claim and the
partnership terminated. Sexton moved
to North Crow, and taking possession of
an unoccupied rench house belonging to
G. +. Fisher. Soon after Joyce parted
with the Southern Belle claim for $I.4OO.
While on a spree with others at Silver
Crown Joyce divulged his suspicious about
Sexton, and wrote a letter to a Cheyenne
friend charging that his late partner is a
murderer. The missive was intercepted
by Sexton and destroyed.
MURDERED o MONEY.
Sexton o urged Joyce to join him in
prospecting. The latter finally consented
and partnership was again resumed, the
miners going to Sections home. Joyce is
known to have had $500 in cash on his
person at this time.
Joyce was suddenly missed a few days
after the new business arrangement and
has not been seen since. Sexton averred
that his mate had been called East, and
claimed to have received letters from him,
but always said that they had either been
burned or lost,
SEXTON EMIGRATEs.
A year passed and Joyce's mother
common ,ed writing letters of inquiry
about her son to Silver Crown miners.
In the meantime Sexton went to Hart
vile and afterwards to Montana.
Joyce has neglected his mining inter.
ests as well as his mother, and the miners
of Silver Crown now firmly believe that
Sexton murdered him and threw the body
in a prospect hole to secure the $500 and
forever still his oftentimes too glib
tongue.
II DEEP SHAFT.
Near Sections last place Of residence at
Silver Crown is a deep shaft which has
been filed for no apparent reason, Sexton
claimed that the earth had been washed
in by a rainstorm, but this could not pos
sibly have occurred. Miners say that the
body of poor Ed Joyce is in the bottom of
that shaft.
The foregoing facts are given THE
LEADER by thoroughly reliable gentlemen.
Justice demands that they be investi-
gated Let the mystery, if there be one,
be cleared away.
7 S. Kellner has the largest stock of la
| dins' and nhildrnn's clnaka in This Terri