Morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven [Conn.]) 1848-1894, 1892-04-01

terson walks around the house about siI-
teen hours out of the twenty-four, and
knows everything thstssis going on. He Is
short, thick man of thirty-eight He
wears a corduroy suit of lavender color
and plain black tie, without jewelry of
any kind. He is an lIlinoisan by birth,
but has been in the toughest section of the
west for twenty years. There is no blow
or swsgger about him. He Is of unusual
ly pleasant address, and his language Is
that of O man of uncommon education.
His department and bearing are such that.
despite the fact you know his record, you
could never summon hardihood enough to
ask him sbout some of his escspsdes. But
all the toughs and thugs fear him as they
do no other dozen men in camp. Let an
incipient riot start and all that Is necessa-
~ to quell it is the whisper, There comes
Mssterson."
Mssterson has been living a quiet and
uneventful life at Denver for the past ten
years, serving most of the time as depp-
ty sheriff of Arapahoe county. He has
never been desperate in the sense of
other men with whom his name has been
connected. He doesn't stand accused of
train robbery and such like deeds of law
lessness. But many is the man who did
commit these deeds that he has met and
vanquished. He has been in nearly every
rough town of the west since 1872 as q
gambler 'tou the inside" as the sports
term 1t, and he has come through many a
shower of bullets unscathed, but his pis-
tol has caused innumerable of the "oppo-
sition" to bite the dust. Perhaps the mos.
doggedly dangerous man he ever encoun-
tered WAS A. d. Webster, of Dodge CITY,
Kan. Webster, in the palmy days, was
running a saloon and gambling house in
DODGE MaSrArsnn nd nr,tn -
business rivalry sprang an animosity be
tween the two men. In a town election
Webster defeated Mssterson for marshal.
Not content with his political victory,
Webster declared boldly that he and Mas
terson could no longer live in the same
town. The day after the election the de-
fested candidate went to visit Luke Short,
another n.rvy man, in Texas. While
away he heard OF the threats Webster had
made, and tine railroads couldn't bring
him back to Kansas fast enough. Some of
the marshals friends saw Masterson on
the train going out of Kansas City west
and wired him this brief but ominous
message:
'Masterson on the train bound for
Dodge"
This was enough for Webster. He
knew that it meant the fight of his life
He rallied the boldest OF his friends
aTbunu hltus armed them 10 tne teeth and
awaited the trains arrival The msrshsl's
posse We're in Webster's saloon, close to
The depot. To get to his own place Mas
terson was compelled to walk right by the
saloon that was for the noncs a yeritable
arsenal. He knew the men were in there
The doors and windows were thrown wide
open, and he saw the devilish gleam of
their shotSuns and pistols. But it didn't
phazs him. He stalked boldly up to the
saloon with q six-shoOter in each hand,
looked into the door, and walked leisurely
on to his own place of business, a half
block away. His AudAcious nerve saved
him If he had falter-d in his walk he
would have been riddled with sings and
buckshot. The next day the friends OF
Webster and Masterson got them together,
and, unsrmed, they rode TO q secluded
spot on the outskirts of Dodge, patched
up their differences, and lived together in
the same town until Webster died of pneu-
monia.