Baxter Springs news. [volume] (Baxter Springs, Kan.) 1882-1919, 1912-08-22
(cOpyrlaht BY F. L Nelson

When got this far into the scheme
called in Johnny Dobbs, Big Jim
Brady, Walt. Herrick and Pete Dur
and, four OF the wisest crooks that
ever lived, and put them onto Pop and
his car, with the idea that one Of
them would stick to him every day and
go away with him on every trip to get
the run Of the business. In this way
Johnny Dobbs picked up in Chicago
that Pop had a weak side. In short,
he was leading a double life.
There was no longer any use Of my
working in the shop, 30 ! quit and
went to chicago to wait for Pop to
turn up. 1t was some weeks before he
landed there, but fixed It so that l
would meet him coming out Of his
home No. Q in Chicago, which gave
me a chance to call him down. He
was not as much surprised as I
thought he would be, and II was not
until he got ready to return home that
he suggested that 1t would be well to
keep quiet what had seen.
l promised never to mention It, and
returned with Pop. It was the first
show that l had to throw out any
feelers. gently, rather playfully.
limited that Pop was carrying q large
amount of money for other people. and
II was a wonder to me that none Of It
had ever stuck to his fingers. Pop
manifested more interest in this talk
than / had ever hoped for. He said
he was tired Of working for nothing.
He limited that II could suggest any
plan to make q big roll Of money he
was willing to listen. Then / gave
him the idea, cold and plain, of hitting
a rap at the Red Star car.
Pop drank in all that ! said like q
very thirsty man, agreed to meet me
the next day and give me his views.
He was on deck at the appointed time,
and promised to furnish me with the
information about the car and its load
of coin, II ] would do the rest Of the
work and fix 1t up so nothing would
point to him. This seemed all right.
Pop went along in the regular way,
as II was arranged that we were not
going to make the strike until the
fall shipment of gold to Chicago. The
time was left to Pop to select. We
got the tip on Monday, that on the
following Wednesday night the Red
Star car would go out from the Erie
depot with the big load Of shiny met
al. We fixed up everything to carry
out our trick. l had q long talk with
Pop. He was so inQuisitive about all
the details of robbery, and insisted up
on knowing everything that We were
going to do before hand, that ] became
suspicious of him.
One of the gang had been on his,
track every day without his knowl-
edge, and had never seen or heard
anything wrong, 30 thought maybe
/ was not fair with Pop to doubt him.
After thinking 1t all over concluded
that the safest way to deal with Pop
would be to fool him by giving him
ghost story about the details. l told
him the train would be tagged about
FIVE miles west Of Port Jervis and
the safes dumped from the car. A
wagon would be in readiness to take
the safes. They would then be blown
open on the road. The plan was to
bury the gold 10 a safe place and
cart away only the greenbacks.
Wednesday night came. The car
pulled out Of the depot with Pop on
the first watch and his partner in the
sleeper. The gang were all in the
smoker. After we got in motion Pop
let us into the car. We started at
once on the big safe and had no trou-
BILE getting into It.