The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1898-06-14
Great Bend Murd efer Hung On the
Public Square.
POPULATION TURNED OUT
A THOUSAND SPECTATORS WIT
MESSED THE EVENT.
Five Hundred Citizens Assisted In
the Lynching-The Murderer Was
John Becker, Who Brutality Muir
dered a Young Girl-Exciting
Chase and Battle With Sheriff.

Great Bend, Kan, June 1S.-In the
public square fronting on the principal
business street of this city, murderer
was lynched at o'clock this evening
by mob Of probably 500 persons. 1t
is estimated that at least 1000 of Great
Bends population of $500 persons wit
messed the tragedy.
The victim was John Becker, white,
aged so, who. on April 8. killed Myr-
tie Huffmeister, the 16-year-old daugh-
ter of William Huffmeister, a farmer
living midway between Great Bend and
Ellinwood, the second station east Of
here.
Becker was employed by the farmer
and professed passionate love for the
daughter, and the tragedy followed the
girls refusal to accept his advances.
When the girl came to the stable in the
evening Becker shot her to death, send
ing eight bullets into her body. after
which he set fire to the farmers sta
hes.
At first it was reported that the muir
derer had shot himself and that he had
died in the flames, but later it became
known that he had fed, and search
was instituted. On April 19 a posse of
farmers captured the murderer near
ST. John, Stafford county. and, for safe
to Hutchinson, as there had been many
threats that he would be lynched il
brought here.
FARMERS ASSEMBLED.
This morning Becker was brought
here from Hutchinson to be put upon
his preliminary examination Early in
the day farmers from the neighborhood
of his crime began coming into town,
and by o'clock this evening the streets
were thronged. Then, when it became
known that the murderer had been
granted a change of venue to Lyons,
and that Sheriff Aber would take his
prisoner east on the Santa Fe train
this evening, there were signs of
threatened trouble, as a big crowd be-
gan to gather at the railroad depot.
Sheriff Aber, approaching the danger,
took Becker into a buggy and started
for a crossing east of the city, intend
ing to flag the train there. By this
time the crowd at the depot was
openly threatening lynching. When
the train pulled in the purpose OF the
sheriff's strategy had become apparent
to all. The would-be lynchers, quick
to act, boarded the train and rode on.
When Sheriff Aber, at the crossing, saw
that the train was crowded to the
guards. he did not flag it. but hurriedly
drove back to Great Bend with his
prisoner.
At Dartmouth the lynching party left
the train and started back to this city,
having hired all the conveyances avail
able there.
In the meantime Sheriff Aber had
hurried back and had lodged his pris-
oner at the county jail.
SURROUNDED BY THE MOB.
A few minutes before O'Clock the
mob was swarming around the jail.
Evidently believing that he could out
wit the lynchers by flight, the sheriff
rushed Becker out of the jail to his
buggy. which was in the street, but
he had no sooner done so than he aud
his men and the prisoner were sur
rounded The sheriff, aided byyhis dep
uties, made "a stubborn defense, and
the prisoner, realizing the fate that
threatened him, fought desperately
with them. After they had fought
their way back almost TO the entrance
tc the Jail, the mob, through sheer
force OF numbers, prevailed.
HUNG FROM A TREE.
Securing the murderer, they bore him
away to the public square. There a
rope was drawn around Becker's neck,
and after he had been beaten almost to
insensibility. the rope was thrown over
a limb of a big tree. and he was drawn
up. Some one in the crowd gave the
body a push, and as the murderer was
being drawn up, his body repeatedly
swung back scraping upon the trunk OF
the tree.
The sheriff and his men kept close
upon the heels of the lynchers, but they
were held back for fully Is minutes.
when, it being apparent that Becker
was dead, the mob quickly melted away
and the murderer's body was cut down.
Though guns We're drawn and threats
were made, no shots were fired by the
sheriff and his men in their struggle
against the lynchers. Many of the
lynching party must be known to the
county peace officers, but tonight there
is no very strong talk of arrests. The
sentiment here seems to be that IL ever
a man deserved lynching, Becker did
Becker is said to come of a prosper
Gus family at Marion. Ills. Attorney
w. w. Duncan was here from Marion
to defend him and it is stated that in
sanity was to have been the murderer S
defense.