The San Francisco call., 1898-07-03

HNHE bad man of the border land
 IS fast passing away. Apache
 Kid and his. gang of marauders
 and cut-throats, who murdered
 some twenty-two settlers; min CTS and teamsters along the Rio Grande border between 1890 and 1897, have gone into their graves. The Lopez band that terrorized the ranchmen and miners in Southern New Mexico and in Western. Texas for ten years, has been put to flight across the Rio Grande. Last month: the Butch Cassidy gang of outlaws of Utah was forever dispersed and the leader shot and killed 200 miles south of Salt Lake. City. Close upon this news has come the information that the last of the horribl, Silva. gang. of Northern New Mexico has gone to the penitentiary at Santa Fe for a life term. .
 :: .Old-timers all say that the Silva gang of'cut-t -throats and thieves was the most perfectly organized ever known in the Southwest For the five years that the . Silva gang was, ia existence in Las ': Vegas the ranchmen, merchants and traders. in. that part of the Territory were in. constant dread that their prop 'erty might be robbed at any time by the unknown thieves. The people who lived on lonely sheep and cattle ranches out in the foothills were afraid to go abroad at night lest they. too, would be found dead at the hands of an un- known murderer. All the cattle ranch men were at their wits ends to dis cover how their herds were lessening.
 ,aI by the way, of the late George NJ. Pull man) and his two stalwart sons were found dead at their ranch home on their sheep range. over thirty miles south of Los CerillOs and their gory bodies had bullets in their heads and stabs in their chests. 1t was generally believed the Pueblo Indians had again revenged themselves on the white men, Vicente Silva himself went about declaring that he would be one of a committee to go and bring the Indians to justice. The Tanchmen were mortified at the crime.
 It tranSpired two years ago, however that the murder was one of the deeds of Silvas gang and that 1t was done because Colonel Adams had discovered who was robbing him and his fellow. sheep .rafsers and was about to expose the robbers. All in all the Silva gang ~ was as desperate and at the same time as sagacious as any band of outlaws yet known in the Territories. How many crimes may be attributed to the gang will never be known, the crimes were so far apart and committed by different groups of men. So many of them also were thought at the time to have been committed by Indians and drunken cowboys.
 Silva, the leader and organizer of that gang, was the last man the people % of Las Vegas would have suspected of being the promoter of all the rapine and blood-shedding in that region. Vii cente Silva was a saloon keeper in Las Vegas. He was born in San Barna- lilo County, New Mexico, in 1845, was tall and well built and had an intelli- gent face and agreeable manners. He = once ran for Sheriff and had a large "v vote. He was reared a neighbor of the :: Navajo Indians, and as youth he saw .. repeated wanton murders, and knew :: all about robberies and rapine. It is natural then that he was an outlaw at 20. He went with dozen other Mexi- : cans to Wyoming in 1877, and was a vaquero there for about year. One