The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1889-08-07
IN TANEYCOUNTY,MO.
A Recent Circus in the Bald
Knobber Element There.
BILL MILES AND HIS BROTHERS.
How the Bald Knobbers We're First Organized,
and History of the Recent
Split in the Order.

About year ago the whole Bald Knobber
reeion in southwestern Missouri, the center
Of which is fancy county, was stirred up
over the shooting to death of Capt. N. n.
Kinney. the man who organized the order.
Capt. kinney was shot on Aug. q, 1888, by
William n. Miles, a young man of %. People
who were acquainted with the history of the
Bald Knobbers predicted at that time that
the death Of Capt. Kinney would stop all the
trouble, but it has been smoldering ever
since, and recently broke out afresh when
the three Miles boys, Manuel, William NJ.
and Jim, shot and killed Sheriff Branson and
Detective Funk at Kirbyville. near Capt.
Kinney's old home, on July 4.
Sheriff G. E. Branson was one of the
original Bald Knobbers, and was associated
with Capt. Kinney when the order was first
formed. Capt. Kinney was originally sa-
loon keeper in Springfield, Mo. In 1888 he
moved to fancy county, and he became very
much incensed at the depredations which
were committed on life and property. It
was claimed that since the close of the war
all the way from twenty-five to thirty-two
murders had been committed, and in no case
had the murderers been punished. The lives
and property of the people were in constant
danger, and Capt. Kinney argued that this
thing ought TO be stopped. The officials of
the county, on the other hand, declared that
Kinney was not a person to pass Judgment
On the morals Of a community Capt. Kin
ney was warned by his friends that his life
would be in danger, but he replied that he
would have a finger in the pie when the time
came.
In the mean time ]. NJ. Everett, who was
one of Capt Kinney's best friends in For
syth, the county seat of fancy county, and
who was referred to as "a prominent mer-
chant of the town in the liquor business"
was deliberately shot down by one Al Lay
ton, who had been playing billiards in his
place. Layton fell into a dispute with one
Hull with whom he was playing, and while
they were fighting Everett came out and
separated them, holding Layton down
Finally, however, he let Layton up, mis-
take on his part, for, although he was I'M
armed, Layton shot him dead at once. In
October, 1884, a jury returned a verdict of
mot guilty.
THE BALD KNoBBERs FORMED.
Then it was that Kinney determined TO act,
and in January he called together number
of citizens to consider means to protect them
selves and enforce justice. A second meeting
was held on Bald Knob, prominent peak
eight miles west of Forsyth, on April 5,
1885. Hence the name of the order.
The organization proved to be very pow
erful one, and in the secrecy and swiftneSs of
its work, which at the first was only for the
public's good, was terror to all law break
eTs. But the great power which the Bald
Knobbers found themselves possessed of led
them, after they had accomplished the pur-
pose for which they had been organized, to
use 1t to further their own private ends. The
good citizens who had belonged to the order
deserted it, and then arose Bill Miles, one of
the three Miles boys, who determined upon
the overthrow of Capt. Kinney.
Young Miles, who at present is but %