The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1889-04-07
PLAN OF DoYLG's DEN.


PLAN OF DoYLE's DEN.
ticed. The disguised public would cry shame
upon the state. The claim would then be
made that the officials had acted, and the
public mind would be at ease till fresh hor-
rors were reported. There were accounts,
apparently well authenticated, of houses like
prisons, defended by strong stockades, in
which wretched girls were held prisoners,
outraged, beaten, whipped and finally muir
dered Many attempted to escape and were
run down by dogs or guards on horses, cow
hided till their backs were bloody and then
forced back to Imprisonment and shame.
Vat length one poor creature who had es-
capped died from wounds and exposure; an
other, who had been arrested and supposed
she was to be taken back to the den, hanged
herself in jail, and several others who had
escaped through the pine woods told tales
which filled the land with horror. Then
from every side determined Investigators
pushed into that wild region. DR.. Kate
Bushnell made a report that reused the
country, and the state of Wisconsin was COM
PEELED to take action It was found that the
dive keepers had such a strong political hold
in that wild region that many local authori-
ties refused to act against them. But some
have been convicted at last, and the horrible
facts have been proved in court
THE MOST NOTORIOUS DEN.
Near Merrill, Wis, is the most notorious
Stockaded den of the lot, established by
Charles lie Claire, but later owned and run
bytIugh Doyle, Of which a correspondent of
The Elrnira On. " Telegram gives this de-
scription:
"a twelve foot stoczade, taking in about an
acre of ground, completely surrounds the
house, and outside of this and shutting out
the house from the view of travellers along
the log road which runs past it, is another
and higher stocEade overlapping the inner
one. The visitor drives to the front of the
house along road running between the two
stockadeS As we entered half dozen men
came trooping into the saloon and dance hall
combined in the frontof the house Not know
ing our errand, and suspicious that it might
mean mischief for themselves and their chief,
they took their stations in front of the sew
eral avenues of escape from the room as if
drilled to the work, as they undoubtedly have
been. Though we were in no particular dan
ger, the sensation arising from this maneuver
~ was unpleasant, to say the least.
1.-THE girls, seventeen in all, were young;
some could not have been past 16. Nearly all
showed by the scared and hunted expression
on their faces how completely they had been
cowed into submission TO the dive keepers
gill As we came from the dive 1 noticed
NJ a dozen dogs lying about the door. One
was a Spanish blood hound, and all were of
enormous size. Small chance q fugitive
would have to escape with such creatures in
hot pursuit"
In this horrible place lie Claire made a
handsome fortune, and Doyle is rapidly ac-
49,. / /
e girl who had been lured to it under pre-
tense Of employment in hotel. Appealing
10 a Chicago drummer who had gone to her
room, he aided her to descend from back
window and then tore OFF a board, and
through a narrow opening thus made they
succeeded in squeezing their way out. They
hurried toward the railroad station two miles
away, but there was no moon and in the
darkness and the thick woods they soon lost
their way. Fortunately their absence was
not noticed for an hour or more and, though
when it was, dogs and men were at once sent
in pursuit, they were not overtaken.
AL night they wandered, and when morning
came it found them in the midst of the dense
forest, and though the man scaled the highest
tree he could find, he could see no sign of
clearing or civilization. All that day and the
ensuing night they walked aimlessly and
YEARLY on. Late in the afternoon of tho
second day they made their way out Of the
woods into the town Of Stevens Point, seventy
miles as the bird flies from Merrill Their
plight was pitiable in the extreme For moro
than ninety hours they had been without
food, and this, with the great strain under
:SFhich they had labored had broken them
completely down.
The evidence almost surpasSes belief The
witnesses tell Of Doyle and his brutal guards
whipping girls to insensibility; of drunken
lumbermen trampling on girls who resist till
their teeth are kicked out, and of girls dying
under such treatment and being buried at
dead of night in the piny woods And some
of these were Yirtuous working girls, lured
there as employees, then drugged, outraged,
beaten and compelled to remain. LIE Claire
had recruiting agents in several cities, and it
\ is claimed that over 100 innocent chamber
maids and waiter girls have been lured to his
various dens in the pineries and ruined. A
few have escaped, others have abandoned
themselves to despair, and many have died.
Yet this man could not be convicted because
his Influence" was too strong in the county
politics A railroad man testified as follows:
'sWhen LIE Claire ran the den, it was no IN
common thing for our train men to pick up
and carry south with them victims of LIE
Claire's lust and cruelty, who, having by
some means got away from the den, had
wandered about in the woods, sometimes for
days. I could not accurately describe for
you the appearance Of some Of these girls
whom have seen after their wanderings in
the woods Their bodies would be covered
by the brutal and sickening marks of the
whippings they had received from LIE Claire,
their thin and fiIusy dresses would be torn
soto a thousand pieces by the dense under
Growth through which they had made their
way, and, the miserable apology for shoes
they had worn when they set out gone, their
feet would be cut and bleeding from the
rough ground over which they had Travelled.
A man with a heart Of stone could not re-
fuse to aid such victims Of abject misery"
The crusade Of DR.. Kate Bushnell, Miss
Frances E. Willard and other ladies hes
aroused such indignation throughout the
country that some Of these demons have been
prosecuted and one sentenced to the states
prison for two years, while others await trial
and sentence