The record-union., 1892-01-15
KNIGHTS OF THE ROAD.
The High Toned Robin Hoods Of the
Earlier Days.
How They Plundered Stage Coaches
and Travelers-Shasta a Fayorite
Locality for Highwaymen.

Fifteen to twenty years ago Shasta
County was a favorite field for highway
men, generally denominated stage-rob-
bers, as their attentions were confined
almost exclusively TO the treasure-boXes
of Wells, Fargo & Co. and the United
States mail bags, NJ that time carried
hundreds OF miles through the mount
aims in the stage coaches.
Twenty years ago Shasta County was
remote from communication by rail. and
thousands of secluded canyons and silent
forests, were of easy access ana afforded
reasonably safe retreat for outlaws. At
this period, too, the placer mines were
becoming exhausted, and many advent
urous spirits were compelled to abandon
mining at time when there was no other
apparent means whereby they could suS-
tain themselves. Sometimes fortunate
ones, who had met with fair success III
the mines and were possessed Of snug
sums in gold or bags of dust, fell the
prey to shrewder gamblers than them
selves at the gaming tables.
THE GAMING FEVER.
peration or despair as gambling-when
the gambler loSeS-while winner is
sometimes rendered so cautious as to be-
come cowardly. 1t was no uncommon
occurrence for miners, after successful
seasons work, to risk their hundreds or
thousands in the course of few hours on
the turn Of the cards; and as there were
always plenty Of professionals" who
manipulated the same with deXterity and
science, the equally reckless but I'M
sophisticated lost with remarkable
promptness and regularity. Probably
the gaming tables have furnished more of
our dauntleSs and industrious desper-
ADDE'S than any other one thing under the
sun.
The man rendered desperate by gam
bling may possess standard quality, and
be i'll other respects judicious, temperate,
honest and generous; and he is almost al
ways brave. The cautious, discreet and
timid individual seldom RISKS his all-he
is not blOoded or thoroughbred; if he
ventures to gamble it is on very small
scale, and he never gets desperate. The
man who merely squanders his money
for drink is never dangerous desperate;
he may degenerate into almost anything,
but never becomes a-highwayman.
THE MEN WHO ROBBED STAGES
In the mountains twenty or thirty years
ago were often educated, intelligent, and
generally shrewd, active, brave and
honest" They adopted stage robbing
when everything else failed, perhaps. and
1t was their ultima hute-a profession
they did not like, but there was nothing
else visible to them by which they could
fairly earn or even exist. Such men
would have scorned TO rob a poor man,
and no instance is recorded of a respect
able highwayman ever having robbed an
obscure cabin. sluice-boX or single in
dividual.
The express company was to them a
giant corporation which they had helped
to create and sustain. but from which
they could exact no dividend except by
the process they adOpted-the last some
times the first) argument to which kings
resort. Ii they sometimes rif1ed the mail
bags, it was when the eXpresS-box was
light and unprOmising, and then they Sc
lected the money packages exclusively.
Uncle Sam, in their opinion, as COM
mon carrier, should make the loss good
to his patrons. When they adopted the
profession of stage-robbing, they were,
like most of humanity, Adventures, or
spectators or gamblers-but
THEY HAzARDED THEIR LIVES,
Instead of capital, and relied upon their
own talents for protection. Their motto
was that it is as honest to steal in one
way as another, if done on the square.
DeCD III our H6dELS W t IIluSI ACKNOWLEDGE
them as good, and perhaps Drawer, than
the knights Of earlier ages, who. as far as
can be learned, seldom rislled their lives
to rob king treasury, but might do al
most anything else within their power
without much. hazard. If there had
been rifles IN those, times, by which a
weaker party could have held his own
with the plumed knights in their metal
cases, the latter would not, perhaps, have
achieved half their renown.
THEY WERE NOT SLAYERs.
1t was seldom that our knights of the road
shed blood, unless pursued, and then in
seIf-detense. An instance is recalled
when, upon being ordered to halt, the
stage-driver failed to comply readily, on
account of his wagon being on the down
grade, and the masked inspector of stages
fired a charge of fine shot, which lodged
in the drivers neck and head, whereby
he lost an eye, but was not otherwise Sc
verely wounded. This, however, occurred
in 1874, when knightly gentlemen had
begun to degenerate.
SOME SPECIMEN HIGHwAYMEN.
In the numerous robberies of fifteen or
twenty years ago Shasta was the resort OF
such celebrated gentlemen as Shorty
Hayes, ''Sheetiron jack Milt Shepard
son, Black Bart, and many others who
havelleft neither their addresses nor sigma
lures on ieCoiu-Hotulng put a rev scraps
of their history, which is likely to remain
unidentified.
One of the gentlemen was killed on
Trinity Mountain, by Wells Fareo's mes
senger, and was evidently true knight
of the road, well-dressed intellectual in
appearance, with soft, white hands. and
81 800 on his person. which he was proba-
bly, saving up for some unknown but
| doubtless charitable purpose. He was
solitary and alone, and was shot by the
messenger from the inside OF the coach
while he was transacting his brief but
impressive business with the driver. a
! Coroner's inquest failed to establish his
| identity. but he was believed to be Black
| Bart, until that worthy bobbed up and
stopped stage shortly after.
IL 1873 one man robbed three stages on
/ different roads, and covered Il distance OF
/ twenty-eight miles in about twelve hours.