The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1900-04-14
KANSAS NEWS.
A Grave in an Old Indian Gene
terry at Muncie
The Location of Buried Treas
ure For Years.
SUDDENLY OPENED UP.
Followers of James Boys Be-
lieYed to Have Returned
And Secured Money Taken From
a Union Pacific Train.

Muneie, Kas., April 14.-Near this lit
tie town, on the Union Pacific railroad,
few miles west of Kansas City, there
is an old Indian burying ground which
was used in the early days by the
friendly red men and the white settlers
as common repository for the dead.
The grave yard is on the smumit of
the tallest Of a series of hills that over
look the Kaw, and from the little grove
of trees that shelters the mounds the
smoke and spires that rise above Kan
Sas City can be seen to the northeast.
There has not been a burial in the grave
yard for half a century, but the country
people who have settled in the neigh
bOrhoOd and converted hillsideS into
farms have taken care to preserve the
cemetery in remembrance OF the his
toric dead who sleep there, and the spot
has a high sentimental value in the
neighborhood.
1t is not often that the cemetery is
visited, for a big corn field surrounds
the place, and the curious content them
selves with viewing the gloomy head
stones that peep above the shrubbeIy
from the roadside 200 yards away.
Several days ago some of the farmers
in passing the old grave yard noticed
the prints of wagon wheels close to the
fence and saw over in the freshly
plowed ground a number of footprints
leading up the hillside toward the clump
and a new mound was found among the
sunken graves that had evidently been
put there during the night.
| No one was known to have died in
| the neighborlood and the right was not
! accorded anyone to use the cemetery
| for burial purposes, so it was decided
! to notify the authorities and have the
grave opened
Coroner Frank Tracy of Wyandotte
| county, with reporter yesterday made
an investigation of the mysterious
| grave, and while the suspicion that a
| body had been buried there was re-
| moved evidences of a more perplexing
| mystery developed
From a grave-shaped hole at the foot
| Of a big hickory tree six feet of earth
was removed and at the bottom only
| the hard surface of the undisturbed
| clay was found. The peculiar way in
| which the shaft was sunk leads to the
theory that it was not the work of
| ghouls. The hole, some six feet long
and three feet wide at the top, was
| not two feet wide either way at the
bottom and it would seem that the ex-
| cavatiOn was started with the purpose
of going to a certain depth. This fact
and that the hole was several feet
deeper than graves are usually dug,
disabuses the idea that the intention
was to rob any of the graves and the
theory that the mysterious visitors
were after treasure is generally ad-
vanced. - -a-
That but one hole was dug is an in
dication that success followed the
efforts of the decorators, whateN Ell
they may have been exeFted for, and
the manner in which the work was ex-
ecuted is proof that the men knew what
they were after. On the big hickory
tree at the head of the empty grave
there was a hacked mark of peculiar
design that had evidently been put
there for some purpose many years
before. The injury had deformed the
tree and caused a great ugly scar or
the bark Against the trunk were piled
the pieces of several vagrant head
stones that had strayed from the place:
which they were intended to mark. an6
nearby was the grave of an old Indiar
chief who once ruled over the Wyan-
dotte tribe. If a place had been sough
to bury a treasure no better spot coulC
have been chosen in the old cemetery
than where the excavation was dug
for the Identification marks surround
ing could hardly be effaced.
Twenty years ago Union Pacific pas
senger train was held up by the jane
boys at Muncie and the express car
. were looted of many thousands of dol
lars. At the cross roads near the Bogar'
farm one-half mile east of the littl
town and near the old Indian graveyard
. the spoils were divided and the bandit