The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1904-02-03
Sensational Effort to BIac kmaiI
Southern Pacific.
Brigands Demand That $40, 900
Be Thrown from Locomotive.
AT THE RED LIGHT.
Clever Plan Devised by Robbers
to Evade Capture.
Several Serious Wrecks Have
Already Occurred.

Fresno, Feb. 3.-The motive for the
wreck of the Sunset Limited at Volta
on January 10 was brought to light to-
day by disclosure that demand pre-
viously was made on the Southern Pa
cihc by brigands for 81, 900 ransom.
Three separate anonymous letters
were received by the Southern Pacific
officials and all the letters were mailed
in this city.
The letters carried a threat of de-
struction for every train running
through the San Joaquin valley, and
the initial step at Volta in the execu-
ton of the terrible plot had so thor
oughly alarmed the railroad that its
system from San Francisco to Los An
geles is patrolled by an army of Pink
ertons, deputies and civil officers.
Alarm was spread in railroad circles
and, in fact, throughout the San Joa-
quin valley when it became known that
Pinkerton detectives have been here
for a week watching this end of the
operations of the train wreckers, and a
widespread conviction is settling here
that the brigandS who almost demoliSh-
ed the train at Volta are Matching a
conspiracy to emulate the fearful war
waged on the Northern Pacific by the
Montana dynaniters.
The methods employed are similar
here that in the last letter forwarded
to the railroad, the work of destruction
in Montana was pointed out with an
implied threat that the Southern Pa
ciffc would fare no better in California
if it did not grant the astonishingly
audacious demands.
Every mail box in Fresno has been
guarded by PinkertOnS and local OIL
GERS in the hope of apprehending the
letter writer, and a number of suspicious
oh S1 srO or
have been under close surveillance.
The first of the anonymous letters was
delivered several days before the wreck
of the Sunset Limited. AT first it was
scarcely needed. The circumstances at
tending the Owl wreck were convincing
proof to shrewd secret service men that
the author or authors of the letter had
taken that means of warning the rail-
road that the conspirators meant bust
ness, and each succeeding letter bore
an ominous meaning to the officials.
The wreck at Volta clearly was the
work of a gang of scoundrels who drag
ged a telephone pole several hundred
yards and stretched it across the track.
The night was a foggy one and the
pole was not seen, the engine crashing
into it full force. The wreck was the
worst, in point of property loss that has
ever befallen the Owl. Within a few
days of the Volta wreck a second COM
munication was received from Fresno.
It was addressed, like the first one, to
1.-The Manager of the Southern Pacific
Railroad with no other direction, and
was turned over to a local official of the
road, Who in turn, forwarded it to
headquarters.
This letter was far more explicit than
the first. It outlined a plan by which the
money was to be paid over to the writer.
It demanded that between January IA and
January 20 light engine should be run
through the valley, carrying q sack con-
tanning $4,000 in IS and $50 gold pieces:
Somewhere on the run red light would
be shown. and at that poin5 the sack
pany was to signify its acquiescerce on
the day on which the train was to be run
by displaying a white flag on its day
trains
In the boldest of terms the writer pro
claimed that If his demands were not
complied with he would wreck every tram
running between Stockton ami Los An
geles. It was this second letter that