Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1907-10-04
#isesllamsnus Rsaaiae.
SAW JESSE JAMES TWICE.
A Boys Meeting With Two Noted Out
laws.


| laws.
mot long ago 1 met up with yount
Jesse James," said a man, the son o
an army officer, who spent his you'll
at western army posts. Young Jess
recently came out at the top Of his Law
class in Kansas City.
HE is a bright. but singularly taci'
turn chap-like his dad before him II
that respect He looks good deal lik'
his father, barring the elder JESSE
beard. and this is boost for him, fol
the outlaw was a handsome man-s
man who, though he came Of stocl
rather below the middling. had the
carved features and many other points
OF the thoroughbred, including remark
ably small hands and feet.
II had two good looks at Jesse
James, the outlaw-once when he was
living and the other when he was dead
And. with my younger brother, I was
once at the age of the terrified and
shrieking victim of famous member
Of the James gang. Wood Hite.
THAT little incident was an odd af-
fair. 1t was due to that desperado's
innate cruelty and his hankering to In
flict torture upon human creatures
for Hite was the most reckless and
merciless devil Of the James gang, I've
often heard it said-that my brother
and I became pretty good swimmers.
my brother was and I was only q
little bit more than 8, and we used to
sneak away from home to go swim
ming in the wicked Missouri river
which flows past Fort Leavenworth
When we got down to our regular wal
lowing spot at the riverside one hot
Afternoon we found huge. red-haired
and red d-bearded fellow sitting in the
shade of a tree close to the verge, fan
ming himself with his sombrero.
He spoke to us in an agreeable way
and we didn't mind him. We stripped
to fool around in the shallow water
The red-bearded man watched US fol-
q while, and then he climbed into an
old leaky skiff that was pulled up on
the river bank.
"Get in. young 'uns,' he said to us
pleasantly-he had an agreeable
speaking voice when he chose to make
It so. and we'n have a little ride
We climbed into the stern sheets OF
the skiff, a pair Of pleased naked
youngsters. without saying a word
the red-bearded man rowed the skiff
out into the middle Of the Big Muddy
which is a mile, or nearly a mile, wide
at Fort Leavenworth, and the current
was as swift as a mill race out there
and filled with sucking eddies. When
he pulled the boat to midstream he
dropped the oars, rose, calmly stepped
to where we sat huddled in the stern
sheets, picked us up one by one and
deliberately tossed us over the side OF
the skiff into the arrowy river.
did we swim? Well, you'll observe
that / am here for one, to show that
we swan all right. We had to swim
There wasn't anything to 1t.
IT don't suppose Hite really meant
to drown us. All he wanted to do was to
torture us. We spluttered and hollered
and shrleked, but we swan. AS we
passed down with the current he pick
ed up the oars and followed us in the
skiff.
1--WE got hold Of the skiff and he
helped us in. He allowed US to breathe
Fo, hn
board again.
"Ie repeated this half dozen times
or more.
I'VE whimpered and begged, but he
paid no attention to that. He'd just
pick us up and chuck us into the swirl
ing stream like as II we were part OF
a skiff load Of cobblestones, take US
when We began to show signs Of COM
plete exhaustion. and then when we'd
rested up in the boat for a short spell,
heave us overheard again. He got
tired of the sport after about three
quarters of an hour at 1t and rowed us
ashore.
1--WE had, of course. no idea who the
man was. About a month later Wood
Hite. killed by another desperate, was
lying in the morgue attached to the
Leavenworth calaboose. My brother
and knew Donovan, the cop in charge
Of the calaboose morgue and he took us
into the dead room. Donovan took the
sheet from his face, and my little
brother and 1 exchanged chalky looks
with each other. He was the man
who'd been enjoying himself that day
by tossing us into the middle Of the
Big Muddy.
when We got out of the dead room
we Immediately began, of course, to
brag to our boy pals about how we'd
been in the same skiff with the dead
desperate of the James bunch, and how
he had chucked us into the water and
all that, and word Of 1t reached my
dad a few days later, and suppose the
two of us were not whaled to a frazzle
or anything like that.
my brother and I were pretty good
swimmers from that time on. The
torturing outlaw had given us SWIM
ming nerve. We had confidence, for
we'd had a stiff test.
1T was only about year after that
when 1 saw Jesse James himself alive
and dead, and both times within the
space Of about a month.
AT the end Of the government mill
tary reservation in Leavenworth an
ex-soldier named JEFF Brunstetter kept
grocery. I spent a lot Of time hang
ing around his store on my way back
to the post from the school in Leav-
enworth.
"One afternoon I was corked off on
heap Of filled sacks Of bran, in the
rear Of Jef's store, reading a dime
novel-curiously enough the dime nov
ell concerning the doings of the James
gang-when one Of the most striking
looking men that 1 ever saw, before or
after, strolled into the store. He was
nearly six feet tall, and, even with the
rather billowy duster that shrouded
him to down below the tops of his
spurred boots, as straight as a lance,
with shoulders so broad that they