Aberdeen herald. [volume] (Aberdeen, Chehalis County, W.T.) 1886-1917, 1910-02-14
MON7ESAN0 GOSSIP
CONDITIONS IN COUNTY DEMAND
CALLING GRAND JURY.
Road Building Plan Is Commended.
GOhI Assumes Pose OfperSeCuted
Innocence. Commissioners Grasp
Proper Idea of Guarding Public In
tereStS in Use of Roads.

MONTESANO, Feb. 12.-The ac-
tion of the county commissioners in
deciding to issue bonds and build
needed roads is generally commend
ed in this locality, the consensus of
opinion being that the investment
will be a wise one, if the work is
carried out on business principles
and politics kept out Developing the
country on both sides of Grays Har-
bor and shortening the distance be-
tween Elma and the Sound IS miles
is large undertaking, but will prove
a profitable one il done capably and
honestly.
Your correspondent was impressed
with the different attitude assumed
by the board of commissioners to-
ward a logging company in the mat
ter of using county roads, and that
taken when dealing, in a wholesale
way, with Boss Abel and his Inter-
urban company. At the meeting last
Monday, the Vance Lumber company
was permitted to use $50 feet of the
MoX Chehalis county road, and, very
properly, the company was put un
der bond conditioned that it would
replace any part of the road it's Oper-
atons disturbed and take suitable
precautions for safeguarding the pub
lie interests. This commedable ac-
tion is respectfully recommended for
use when the Interurban franchise
comes up for hearing on the 21st.
The stellar attraction this week at
the court house has been William
Gohl, accused murder of Chas. He'd
berg. With the interviewers VINO
have been admitted to see him, Gohl
poses as d much abused peaceable
citizen whom a bunch of Aberdeen
politicians are trying to hound into
the penitentiary, if not to the gal
lows. The pose is amusing to those
who followed his career in the sum-
mer of 1906, when every paper print
ed on Grays Harbor was filled with
his lawless doings, and when his re-
markable escape from going to the
penitentiary was and is popularity
believed to have been due to his ac-
tivity in voting his henchmen and
sailors the right CD way in the cleo
tions Of that year.
In this case of Gohl, much dissats
faction is expressed by law-abiding
citizens at the fact that the police
of Aberdeen and the sheriff's Office
are reported working in disharmOny,
so much so that it is feared that the
ends of justice may be defeated by the
personal or political ambitions of
petty officials, whose personality or
political dreams are of no public i'm
port. The sentiment is that GOhl
should have an absolutely fair trial
before an unbiased jurY,and,if acquit-
ted, after every peace office has done
his full duty, the public mind viii be
satisfied But, should the petty
chickering's between those in whose
charge is the protection of life and
property frustate the demands of
Justice, tho guilty parties will drop
with q dull thud next November.
1t is rumored here that County At
torney Campbell viii, in the near flu
ture, ask that a grand jury be called.
and the feeling seems to be general
throughout the cOunty-so far as
your scribe can discover by talking
with visitors at the county seat from
all parts of the cOunty-that 1T is
full time Chehalis county had a
house cleaning. RumOrs of all kinds
of rascality have filled the air for
the past ten years, during which per-
iod it is asserted not an honest cleo
tion has been held in the county, and,
in this connection, the names of citi-
zens prominent in social, profession
al and business circles are openly
banded about In Justice to those
men. if innocent, the matter should
be thoroughly probed and their in
nocence declared.
A grand jury, empowered as it is by
law, could throw the searchlight of
investigation on all the rumors afloat
as to the crimes of Gohl; dishonest
election officers, and the crookedness
we all hear talked of in the county
offices. Such a body has full author
ity in all those matters, and, if its
inquisitions were honestly and ably
conducted. those rumOrs would be
laid at rest, or the guilty parties in
dicted if guilt be shown.