The Kalispell bee. [volume] (Kalispell, Mont.) 1900-192?, 1902-08-05

coupled and a party started after
him. When they were about to over
take him, he stopped his engine, re-
versed it and started back. AS he
passed his pursuers, who were on an
other track, he fired two shots
through the cab windows. Men on
the pursuing engine, feeling that they
could not catch him, returned to
Lyons Perry found the steam Civ
ing out and abandoned the engine. He
then started across the country. FL
nally he was captured near Newark.
He was afterward convicted and SEN
fenced to Auburn prison for 40
years and three months. He had
served about year and half when
he was transferred to Mattewan as
incurably insane. He escaped with
five other prisoners from Mattewan,
but was recaptured in Weehawken,
N. j., April 81, 1895.
So far as the records extend, and
they are believed to be complete, the
various railways and express COM
panies having kept a careful account
of their losses in this way, as well as
of their numerous encounters, the
first train robbery in the United
States occurred in Indiana The year
was 1866. One night in September
an express on the Ohio & Mississippi
road slowed up at Brownstown. This
place is 80 miles west of Cincinnati.
Two men climbed on the locomotive,
covered the engineer and firemen
with revolvers and conversed pleas
antly. They were heavily masked.
AS they talked, their companions I'M
coupled the express car and the engi-
neer was forced to haul it down the
road Here the car was entered, the
messenger forced to unlock the safe,
and $4,000 was taken. The affair
caused a fever of excitement all
through the country and the terrible
war had begun against them.
For this crime the members of 4
family named Reno were held to be
responsible, but there was no evil
dence of their guilt and they were
not molested. A few months later,
two boys, inspired by the fire of imi-
tation, held up a train on the same
road and near the same point. They
were taken in hand by their parents,
who delivered them to the authori-
ties along with the $4,000 they had
stolen. No particular punishment was
given them. This was the second
train robbery. A year later three
Reno brothers, Frank, Jesse and Sim,
along with a relative named Ander
son, captured train on the Indian
apolis, Madison & Jacksonville road
at Seymour, which was their home.
! They threw the express messenger
out of the car, broke open the safe
and got $135,000, with which they es-
capped to Canada. In that country,
after a long chase they were over
taken and forced to surrender. Long
extradition proceedings followed.
1t was years after train robbery
became common crime that the
lone robber the percusor of Oliver
Curtis Perry, came into existence. An
instance of the kind was the Draining
of Express Messenger Nichols, on a
Rock Island & Pacific train, near
Joliet, Ill. His assailant was cap
tured, but for some reason was not
hanged. He is now doing time in the
penitentiary Some time afterward
) near Pacific Mo, one man bound and
| gagged an express messenger named
7 Fotheringham and took from the safe
100000 This mans name was Witt
rock, but he was much better known
, as Jim Cummings" under which
7 alias he wrote many letters to the
t newspapers while evading arrest. He
: was finally captured and served 6
e term in the penitentiary. Almost al
? the money was recovered
+ The industry has about died out now
t and in many of the western states
= the crime is obsolete, as the new Law
D atfiXing the death penalty to crime
= against property has proved effica
q cious. The men of the road have
e gone back to holding up stage
= coaches or looting country stores
= Oliver Curtis Perry is the last of tn,
S great train robbers.