Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1900-02-14
BLACK BART, THE Pos.
The FOotpad Tells of This Famous
HiKhwayman's curious Capture.


The footpad was in such a reminiscent
barkeep handed out the fifteen instead of
the twenty fve-cent liquid The Star re-
porter paid for
Jimmy Hope began the footpad, was
undoubtedly the king of American bur-
glars. Jimmy was an infant in arms COM
pared with Black Bart, the Pos, as the DO
etical highwayman used to subscribe him
self, when it comes 10 deeds. Jimmy got
away with more swag in one of his bank
hauls than Bart crimped in all his life but
Bart was a sure enough hero of the road
when it came to nerve and daredevil dar-
ing in following a road agents profession.
"As you gentlemen of the press know,
most Of the stories we read about the
lone highwayman in the west are beautiful
mental creations, composed in the east be-
cause, forsooth, you gentlemen have your
living to make, the same as We have.
Black Bart, however, is no myth, as the
records of the gloomy prison of San Quen-
tin on San Francisco bay Yill attest. Black
Bart, the Pos, was the original lone high
wayman Of California; all others are poor
smulations. His antecedents We're never
satisfactorily cleared up. but he was a man
of considerable educational ability, who had
tendency to rhyme and to rob, and where
he hailed from he religiously kept to HIM
self when he was finally run to ground.
About fifteen years ago stages We're held
up and the passengers robbed in the most
bold and reckless manner in the central
and northern counties of California by one
man, always masked, who had the nerve
OF regiment of cavalry. After a number
of hold-ups, it was rightly concluded that
the perpetrator was one and the same in
dividual. He was so wonderfully quick in
his movements, robbing a stage here one
day and another fifty miles away the
next, that it was hard to believe that one
man could do the work He used to leave
scraps of doggerel haunting the officers for
not catching him, always signing himself
Black Bart, the Pos
This hide-and-seek business was kept up
for about two years. I think Heavy re-
wards were offered by the state and county
authorities and Wells & Fargo for him, dead
or alive, but the hold-ups continued at
stated periods. The country is wild and
sparsely settled, and the lone man knew
every foot of 1t. This is one reason why
he eluded capture
'@The poetry he wrote tantalized the sher-
IFS, and Bart's scalp was marked for rails
ing by hundred determined men who
vainly sought his trail or tried to be on
hand when he would make his unexpected
appearance. Sometimes months would
elapse between his operations, and the peo-
pie would think he had shaken the dust of
the golden state from his feet for good.
Then he would reappear in some part of
the state remote from his last attack AS
was afterWard learned, Bart spent these in
tervals of well-earned rest in San Fran
CISCO stopping at a first-ciass hotel and
posing as a gentleman of leisure as long as
his money lasted.
But the end finally came, and the moral
of it may come home to roost to any of us.
One day, on the scene Of a stand-up, after
Bart lad lined up his victims by the road
side and relieved them of their valuables a
linen cuff which he had dropped was found
and on it was a laundry mark. That cuff
was systematically taken to every white
laundry in every town In the state north