Audubon Republican. [volume] (Audubon, Iowa) 1894-1925, 1897-11-18
THREE INDIANS LYNcHED.
Mob Takes Revenge ON Murderers Of
the Spfccr Family.

the Spfcer Family.
Bismarck, N. d., Nov. 15.-Alex
Coudot, Indian half breed, Paul Holy
track and Philip Ireland, full blooded
Indians, the first of whom was sentenced
to death for the murder of six members
of the Spicer family last February, and
has just been granted new trial by the
supreme court, and the latter two self
confessed accessories in the murder,
were taken from the county Jail in EN-
mons county Saturday night and
lynched by mob. The lynching had
been apparently coolly planned and was
carried out without break in the pro-
gramme and sudden and swift retribu-
ton was melted out by the mob to the
murderers. Williamsport, where the
hanging took place, is about 40 miles
from this city and off the railroad.
The men had been under the custody
of Deputy Sheriff Tom Kelly and they
were taken from under his control by
the mob and hanged to beef windlass
several hundred yards from the Jail,
where their bodies were still swinging
to the breeze all during Sunday, the
coroner not having yet arrived and no
one else volunteering to cut them down.
There were about 40 men concerned in
the lynching. They rode into Will
Transport on hoseback late at night and
tethered their horses short distance
from the city that they might secure
them again as speedily as necessary
after the deed was done. The Jail in
which the prisoners were confined is
substantial stone structure and was in
charge of Deputy Sheriff Thomas KEEL
ley. Since the confinement of the pris-
oners therein so great has been the fear
that they might escape in some way
that one man has watched all night
within the Jail, and Friday night KEEL
ley was on watch.
AT about two o'clock in the morning
there was rap at the outer door of the
Jail and Kelley arose quickly and
turned the key in the lock, thinking
that some persons he expected to meet
had arrived. No sooner had he opened
the door than the mob crowded into the
corridors. All of them were masked
and the leaders carried ropes purchased
for the occasion. Kelley at once real
lied that the mob had come after his
prisoners. The lynchers were quiet, but
determined. The leaders presented q
revolver at the head of the deputy
sheriff and told him they wanted his
prisoners, and demanded that he open
the cells which they were confined in.
Kelley demurred but saw that resist
ance was useless and unlocked the
cells.
Two of the prisoners were confined in
one cell and the other in a separate
cell. They had been aroused from sleep
by the entrance Of the men and sat up
half awake and trembling with terror
Holytrack and Ireland were dragged
from their beds, ropes were fastened
about their necks and they were
dragged out on the grounds after being
told to prepare for death. The men
were then dragged to huge beef wind
lass which had been erected to sus-
pend the carcasses of slaughtered
beeves and strung up on cross beam.
Coudot was the first man to be
hanged. 1t is reported that he was
asked before he was hanged whether
Black Hawk and Defender had also
been concerned in the murder for which
he was about to be hanged. He an
swered that they had been. The rope
which had been fastened about his neck
was then thrown over the cross beam
and he was raised off the ground and
suspended in the air. Holytrack and
Ireland were so nearly unconscious
from the effects of the dragging that
they did not realize what was about to
happen when the ropes about their
necks were tossed over the same beam.
They were unable to stand and were
slowly raised from the ground on which
they lay until their bodies swung into
the air and dangled from the windlass
with that of Coudot. The mob then
dispersed, mounted their horses and
rode away.
1.-THE crime for which the men were thus
executed by the mob was the murder of six
members of the Spicer family near Winona,
last winter. The bodies of Thomas Spicer,
his wife, daughter, Mrs. Rouse, and her
twin children, and of Mrs Ellen Waldron,
his mother-in-law, were found at the Spicer
home, all horribly mutlated Paul Holy
track and Phillip Ireland, two of the men
who were lynched, had already confessed
having assisted in the murders Their mar
rative was so revolving as to arouse indig
nation to fever heat. The confession Of the
two implicated Coudot, the third of the VIC
tins last night and two other Indians,
Black Hawk and George Defender, who
are at present confined in the Jail in this
city, to which fact Is due their escape from
the fate of their comrades. The Indians
who were executed were residents Of the
Standing Rock Indian reservation. Two
of them-Holytrack and Ireland-were
mere boys, one 20 and the other II years of
age. Coudot was French and Indian half
breed, and leaves widow and family.l
VIII 4 ADDEAI tn TILE CENATE