The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-02-22

crowd until / found a man who knew the
wagon master by sight and we set out to
md the man first. Pretty soon we had him
with his two siX-shOOterS. And l sent my
companion off to notify the crowd that
had the victim. They came on the run
whooping and hollering and carrying a
rope 20 lynch him with. l had taken my
prisoner down TO an open space and had
him stand alongside me. l told him to be
quiet, but that when he heard my six
shooter crack he was to grasp the two
guns ! had stuck in my belt and begin to
shoot, too. | halted the crowd and told
them that l was deputy marshal, and
proposed to prevent the lynching. The
crowd howled i'm anger and began to init
mate that they would lynch me with the
wagon-master. / stepped forward and sug-
gested that some Of the crowd would not
witness the hanging If they undertook TO
defy me. Well, they took me at my word,
and the lynching did not occur.
charge of Silver Cliff when that town
was lively mining camp. One day the
miners TO the number of a hundred or
more got out into the main street and
began to shoot at each other. l walked
up the center of the street with two hig
siX-shooters and drove the fighters back
TO the sidewalks and told them that when
! started shooting some of them would
lose interest in worldly affairs. 1t seems
like boasting to mention this incident, but
guess you can get plenty of proof II You
want IT, Among the bad men in Silver
Gin when L came was Riley Fisher of
Texas. and he did not like to have me
interfering with his privileges of running
the town whenever he saw fit. He sent
me word that he would get me whenever
he ran across my tracks. We had a
discussion over the matter one day on the
street as to who should stay, and both
Of us stayed but he got out of breath
first and never recovered. When il was
over l found nine bullet holes ia NV
overcoat. He was sociable enough, Won
see My first shot struck an inch too
hlgh above the heart. and that disturbed
his aim, or i would have died with him
While | was In Silver Cliff the rail-
road war for the possession of the Royal
gorge broke out. and lot of deputy shar-
ifs and guards from Dodge City were
imported to make the fight for the rail-
roads contesting for the right-of-way
were a mighty tough crowd, and the Can.
on city police could do nothing with
them. Barrett. who was town marshal,
wrote to me to come down and help him.
My terms were accepted by the town
council, and l set to work to clean out
the town of about as tough a class OF
were lively for a few days, but | was
lucky ana managed to get the town back
to its accustomed peaceful order. Ex-
press men used to follow me around to
get job of hauling men to the hospital
and morgue, but that only lasted week
or two.
Just when was ready for another iob
l received telegram to come TO Las We
gas N. M, which was the end of the
railroad then, and be marshal at that
place. After conference with the au-
thoritles agreed to give them an oppor-
tunity to sleep nights IL they would nav
me $3.50 month. My price was readily
accepted. and I began by appointing one
OF the toughest men there as chief deputy
lie objected strongly, but / convinced
him that If he wanted to enjoy life he
would have to wear a star, and then he
consented. There had been a number of
stages from Santa Fe held up Just outside
OF town, and / thought the gang must
be living In Vegas. When the town ai-
thorites saw what / had done they were
sick enough, for they thought I had sold
out TO the gang In a few days another
stage was held up, the mails stolen and
the passengers robbed. / took my chief
deputy on tour out of town to a quiet
spot to search for the robbers. When no
one was around to disturb us we had
sociable time. L pulled my gun and
asked for the names of the robbers When
my deputy saw that he must either give
up the names or fill a lonely grave he
confessed. We then went back to town
and arrested six OF the gang and sent them
to Santa Fe for safekeeping.
mad TO resign in a few weeks for the
White River Ute war broke out, and az
/ was member of the Colorado militia
/ felt 1t my duty to return. The Las We
gas people wanted to keep me- but whert
they saw l would not stay they asked
me TO name a suitable successor The
man 1 named was brave enough but un-
lucky, for he was shot within week.