Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-11-05
DYING THE COLD.
Terrible Suffering Of the Liberated
Convicts in Tennessee.
TALES TOLD BY MOUNTAINEERS.
Hardships of All the Half Clothed, Ralf'
Starved Refugees.
CONSTANT FEAR OF BEING RErAKEN

| ESPECIAL TELEGRAM TO THE pIsPATCH.l
KNOXVILLE, Nov. 4.-As this is the day
for paying United States pensioners several
hundred miners, mountaineers and villag-
ers from all parts of East Tennessee were
in this city and lounged about the Custom
| House most of the morning Many of these
people came from the counties to the north
of Knoxville, from the scenes of violence
and outlawry, from the lonely cabins
toward the border line past which the es,
capped convicts have been travelling these
last few days. This coming together fol
| pension money was rare opportunity for
| getting word of the convicts, and as these
mountain people stood about talking they
told many strange things of the flying
criminals, with whom most of them sympa-
thize.
The Briceville convicts have now been
| free four days and four nights, and the
| Oliver Springs convicts two days and two
nights, yet no more than hundred of the
$50 have reached and crossed the Kentucky
line. The rest are still wandering about,
hiding in the mountains and toiling pain.
fully through the unfamiliar and difficult
passes. The mountaineers have told them
of the reward offered by the Governor, and
they are no longer bold about showing
themselves.
| Great Suffering From the Cold.
While the mountaineers sympathize with
the fugitives, they have little food to spare
and no extra clothing. What they had they
gave, either willingly or under compulsion,
and for the first day or so the convicts Jared
pretty we'll. The weather was mild by day
and not too cold at night to make men ac'
customed to extremes suffer, but the last
two DAYS the convicts have been suffering.
| An old mountaineer named Lands, who
comes from the far northern Businesses Of
Anderson county, said that his grand
| daughter, climbing over some rocks in the
mountains half mile from his house, came
upon five halt-clothed men sitting behind a
| great boulder, huddled together. Three
were colored and two white. She stopped
to speak to them, and they told her that one
of the colored men was dying. He was in
the midst of the group and was unconscious.
| They had had no food for day and half,
and they said they could travel no further.
| The girl went on to the house of her sister
in-law, two miles away Itwas too dark for
anyone to take aid to them that night. The
next morning her brother and another man,
returning to the place with her as guide,
| found four of the men gone. The fifth lay
stripped of nearly all of his clothing and
half covered with stones. He had died and
| his companions went on, after taking his
| clothing and burying him as well as they
| could.
The weather has grown colder, and the
mountaineers' stories foreteli that many of
| the fugitives will die miserable, lonely
| deaths.
The Refugees Afraid of Recapture.
Another mountaineer, Tibbs by name,
| who has been hunting on the mountains
| about Wartburg, says that yesterday he
talked with good many mountaineers who
| have cabins in the hollows and on the noun
tain sleeps of that country. He says that
all of them had seen convicts pushing along
through the ravines. Some of these con-
victs ran at any attempt to approach them.
| Others stopped and begged for food and a
little clothing. There were shoeless with
bleeding feet, frozen hands and feet, men
ready to drop with the fever and huff crazy
with sickness and hunger. A few had
begged to be told the way back to the vii
lagos, where they could give themselves up.
| The mountaineers had seen several dead
bodies living exposed among the fallen
| leaves of the mountain side Most of these
| bodies were stripped.
1t seems there are perhaps hundred con-
| victs who have not yet left Anderson
county, while about $50 othen are scattered
over the adjacent counties Of Scott, Camp
bell and Claibourne Some are dead or
dying. Many will settle down to the shift
less life of the wilderness, others will escape
to do all manner of violence and crime, and
about one-half will be returned to prison
within the next week.
Governor Buchanan is receiving kilograms
from the authorities of many villages in
the northern part of the State and in
Southern Kentucky, announcing the capture
of convicts and inquiring anxiously about
the reward.
Jellico Miners Their Best Friends.
There are more convicts in and around
Jellico, 90 miles above Coal Creek, than in
any other place. The Jellico miners are
strong friends of those who mobbed the
stockades, and many of them are said to
have gone over to help their friends out,
both on Friday and Sunday nights. The
convicts who happened to go that way have
had the best kind of treatment. The Jellico
miners have openly sworn they will allow
no convict to be arrested in that part of the
country.
Rufe Hicks, formerly an employe of the
Tennessee Mining Coal Company, at Coal
Creek, was going up toward Jellico on the
train yesterday. He saw six convicts climb
on the train few stations this side of
Jellico to beg ride of the conductor. He
at once saw chance to make $3.50. He put
four of the convicts under arrest at the
point of the pistol, the other two escaping
to the woods, and he paid their fare to
Jellico, intending to turn them over to the
authorities and claim his reward. As he
was marching them up from the railroad
station some miners saw him. They told a
constable about it, and also began to
assemble mob. The constable took ad-
vantage of a pistol which Rufe Hicks had
slightly displayed, and arrested him on a
charge of carrying concealed weapons. The
convicts were told to "make tracks," which
they did. Then the mob began to collect,
and Rufe saw he was il danger of losing his
life. He broke away from the constable
and managed to get on passing freight,
which carried him to Newcomb, but the
news followed him there, and he was again
put under arrest. Again mob started for
him, and again he broke away. Someone
fired revolver, and the bullet lodged in
his hip. He fell and was dragged to the
Jail and locked up. He will be tried to-
morrow for carrying concealed weapons.