Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1890-05-31
THE CEDAR KEYS DRAMA AGAIN

1eh REC0RD-UNION the other day gave
a few details of the remarkable career Of
the autocrat of Cedar Keys, who is now in
hiding, and for whom a corps of United
States marines is searching. In the whole
history of bulldozing there has not been
such a case as CottrelPs. 1t was stated
that he usurped Office, compelled the peo-
pie to twice elect him Mayor of the place,
seized real estate and houses, took what he
wanted and when, regardless of ownership,
terrorized the little city, and ruled it more
absolutely than ever a Gar ruled Russia.
When he was last elected Mayor he APP
pointed another ruffian as City Marshal,
and the two domineered over every man
and woman IN the place. 1t was, literally,
an instance of two men cowiDg and con-
trolling two thousand people. His normal
condition was that of drunkenness. 1t was
common thing for the Mayor to compel
negroes to strip othe waist, and butt their
heads together in the public square, until
one or the other fell senseless. If they
refused he would shoot their toes off. If
men displeased him he would COW them by
threatening to fog their wives and
sisters. He compelled, strange as it
may seem, every man in the place
to walk the streets armed, and yet
not one of them, for three years, dared to
draw and stand the rufian up against
wall, or to shoot him on the spot. In his
second term he proposed to fog the clergy
men of the town, and doubtless would have
done so if the United States Government
had not taken a hand in the case. He
committed all sorts of outrages upon the
whites, and as for the negroes, he treated
them as dogs, and worse. lie went SO far
finally as to appoint the day when the
wife of certain respected clergyman
would be fogged on the plaza, he propos-
ing to WELD the whip himself.
In the county eight indictments hung
over this bravado Mayor, but he was never
brought to trial on any of them. 1t was
known that he had murdered his brother
in-law, but no one dared arrest him for
the crime. The Governor of the State was
appealed to, but not even he ventured 10
down the ruffian. Under the Cleveland adj
ministration this marvellous Mayor was
also Inspector of Customs. His interior
ence with his successor in Office was what
finally brought the United States Govern
ment down upon him, and the dispatch of
a revenue cutter to Cedar Keys, with
corps of marines, to capture the rascal,
dead or alive. At that, coward that he is,
he fed to Tie swamps, taking his rufian
Marshal with him. Probably had the
smallest man in Cedar Keys summoned
courage to walk up to Cottrell, smite him
in the face and ordered him to throw up
his hands, the rascal would have cringed
and begged for mercy but such was the
cowardice of the people of the town that
not man In the place could be found TO
brave him.
1t is to be hoped that Cottrell will be
captured, and that the people Of Cedar
Keys will be shown what a coward he is,
and that they have been terrified by man
whose valor was all in the shotgun with
which he was accustomed to parade the
streets of their city. Some idea of the
reign of terror maintained by the fellow
can be gained from the statement tele-
graphed to an Eastern journal, that since
the fight of the bulldozer real estate in
Cedar Keys has risen IS per cent, business
has revived, the churches have been re-
opened, and public thanksgiving services
have been held. The Collector of Customs
and the Postmaster have come out of hid
ing and resumed their offices, and now dare
to walk the streets with their heads up. If
such story as this had been dramatized
and placed upon the stage, all the people |
would have exclaimed against it as unreal,
impossible, and the fancy OF crazed inn
agination