Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1889-04-25
kilograms to The Star.
THE EXODUS FROM OKLAHOMA.
Starving Boomers Fleeing for Their Lives.
Many Squatting on the Cherokee Strip.
BOULANGER WILL KEEP QUIET.
CoQUELM PRAISES AMERICAN AUDIENCES.
Charges of Discrimination Against the
Baltimore and Ohio.
Starving Boomers Fleeing for Their Lives
Many Squatting on the Cherokee Strip
BOULANGER WILL KEEP QUIET.
CoQUELN PRAISES AMERICAN AUDIENCES
A STAMPEDE FROM GUTHRIE.
and Shelteriess Boomers Glad
to Get Away Even on Cattle Trains.

starving ana ShetterieSS boomers GlaO
to Get Away Even on Cattle Trains.
CHICAGO, April 25-An Arkansas City, Kan,
special says: Chaos reigns, not only in Okla
homa but in the entire tributary country. The
railroad is prostrated and communications are
entirely cut off. The Western Union, with its
crush of train dispatching, would not touch a
message of any other character in the terri
tory, though the earth swallowed a town site.
Guthrie's back seems broken and there is a
furious stampede to get out. People there are
wild from the deprivations that lack of shelter,
water, and food impose upon them. To these
distresses are added the misfortunes of tempest
heat, and the absence of means of flight.
CATTLE TRAIN CROWDED WITH REFUGEES.
When your correspondent reached Willow
springs from the Diamond-bar ranch he
learned from the dispatches that neither the
north nor south bound passenger trains, shortly
due, had been heard from. An hour of waiting
passed when train of twenty cattle cars crept
up from the south. The cars were locked, but
upon the roofs, the buffers amid the coal on
the tender, on the pilot and gangway of the
locomotive, and packed in and upon the
caboose, was a dense and miserable throng of
with its strange load at o'clock in the even
ing, 1t was useless to attempt to enforce the
laws restrictive of railroad travel. The people
were
FLEEING PRACTICALLY FOR THEIR LIVES.
They had added to long periods of privation
the suffering of seventeen hours without food
or protection from the cold. No trains had
passed them and none was in sight behind.
They had left bowling mob in Guthrie baf-
fed in its efforts to join in the flight The use
lessness of proceeding to Guthrie was apparent
and the correspondent secured footing for
one foot and returned to this point with the
laggard train.
Since dark other freight trains have followed,
having made the S5 miles from Guthrie in from
six to fourteen hours. The cars are piled with
fugitives, thirsty and famine-stricken, and Ar
kansas City is crowded as it was before the de-
scent Some experiences are pitiful.
STORM INCREASES GUTHRIE's MIsERIEs.
A terrible storm last night raised the miseries
of Guthrie to almost horror. A violent wind
arose as the sun sunk and filled the air with
the sitting red alkali dust that strews the plain.
A deluge of rain succeeded and through the
night it beat upon the thousands of shelterless.
The railroad is utterly incompetent i'll the
press too slowly to be of use to the unprotected
cURsING THE MARsHALs AND THE RAILROAD.
The fugitives cheer with JOY as they alight
here and rush to the hydrants and eating
houses. Curses are heaped upon the region
and the government marshals, Needles and
Jones. are execrated without stint for the theft
of the land, and the railroad is denounced for
its feeble service.
Guthrie is without form. The original
streets have disappeared and new sections are
being plowed every hour, values have fallen to
practically nothing and confidence is at low
ebb.
WILL GUTHRIE BE DESERTED?
Those who are not going home announce
their intentions of moving upon the Cherokee
strip and report that hundreds of boomers in
wagons have already done so. Scores of men
surrendered their claims to lots i'll Guthrie
without an effort to preserve or dispose of
them.
The south-bound passenger train arrived af
ter time crowded with pilgrims for Guthrie,
and few could be dissuaded by the lamenta-
tions of the fugitives. 1t is impossible to pre-
dict what the next few days will develop in
Guthrie.
ONLY THE POOR LAND OPENED FOR SETTLEMENT.
ST. LOUIS, April 25.-An Arkansas City spe-
cial to the Republic says: A number of claims
have been deserted in various parts of the ter
ritory and wagons can be seen frequently on
tine back trail. Many of the disgruntled
threaten to squat on the Indian lands sur
Oklahoma. Some will fall back on
the Cherokee strip, others will go down into
the Chickasaw country and lease farms from
the Indian commission. That country is being
rapidly settled by farmers who pay an annual
head right or lease for the privilege of tilling
the soil there. The country is as much
superior to Oklahoma as is the Cherokee out
let, and there is great deal of complaint
among boomers that the poorest land in the
Indian Territory should have been the only
land opened to settlement.
Despite this encouragement, however, MANY
contests for possession OF lands are threatened.
An interesting case has arisen where two men
arrived on the same quarter section not five
minutes apart. The first arrival claimed
possession by priority. The second made i'm
provements and claimed that it was the i'm
provement which perfected the right OF occu-
patton. The case will doubtless be taken to
the land Office for settlement.
AS illustrating the ingratitude of a republic,
1t may be mentioned that contests are already
filed against the claim of Capt. Couch, the old
boomer leader. on the curious ground that he
disqualified himself from making an entry by
entering the territory years ago on boom expe-
ditions.
GEN. wEAvERs CLAIM CONTESTED.
Gen. James B. Weaver. OF Iowa, one of the
most persistent advocates of the opening Of
Oklahoma in Congress, has also had his claim
contested and has been accused of attempting
to take the people by the throat. The old-t:me
boomer leaders have not Jared we'll ANY
number Of Paynes men can be found now
lying around Purcell, who have been out-rid-
den and out-ruI by men who have taken the
fruit of their years of sacrifice.
THE MURDER OF BOY
Most of them take it philosophically, but it
means blood, and the murdered boy of nineteen
who was shot when found in possession of one
of these claims, owes his death to that in
justice, whether he was partly responsible for
it or not. The man who killed him had worke ed
it for his own for years past. 1t is broadly
limited at Purcell that the old colonists there
could point out the murderer, and that instead
OF doing SO assisted him to escape into Texas
Twenty claims have been deserted in one
neighborhood, and last night in the depot at
Oklahoma City, a broken homesteader offered
to sell his claim for $25 The contest and ex-
citement over town sites continues, and much
trouble is promised for the future.
THE FIRST PUBLIC PRAYER.
GUTHRIE, OKLAHOMA, April 25.-At the meet
ing Of the committee of citizens yesterday
three ladies requested that before proceedings
began prayer might be offered. This was ac-
cafiad 10 md tho II of n6aII