The Beaver herald. [volume] (Beaver, O.T. [Okla.]) 1895-1923, 1916-01-27

employed on the real battlefield. Law
yers tried condemnation suits with in.
different success, and then reached
out their hands for a new weapon.
Back in the old days. when Ken
lucky was not a state but county, |
land patents had been granted by |
Virginia to men who had never
claimed their property. For two hun.
dred years other men who settled as |
pioneers had held undisturbed posses |
sion. they and their children's chill |
dren Now into the courts piled multi |
tudinous suits of eviction in the names |
of plaintiffs whose eyes had never !
seen the broken skyline OF the Cum
berlands. Their purpose was deceit,
since II sought to drag through long
and costly litigation pauper landhold-
ers and to impose such a CALLING bur
den upon their property as should
drive them to terms of surrender
Men and women who owned. or
thought they owned, a log shack and
fitting cornfield found themselves fac
ing a new and bewildering crisis.
Their untaught minds brooded and
they talked violently of holding by
title of rifle what their fathers had
wrested from nature, what they had
tended with sweat and endless toll.
But Anse Havey and Milt McBriar
knew that the day was at hand when
the rifle would no longer serve They
employed lawyers fitted to meet those
other lawyers and give them battle in
the courts, and these lawyers were
paid by Anse Havey and Milt Nc
Briar.
The two stood stanchly together as
a buffer between their almost help
less people and the encroaching ten
tacles of the new octopus. while Juan
ita, looking on at the forming of the
battlelines, was torn with anxiety.
In Bad Anse Havey the combination
of interests recognized its really most
formidable foe. In the mountain
phrase, he must be "man-powered out
en- ther way" And there we're still
men in the hills who, If other means
failed. would sell the service of their
"rife-guns" for money.
With such as these it became the
care of certain supernumeraries to es
tablish an understanding. In the last
election thing had happened which
had not for many years before hap
pened in Kentucky-a change OF par
ties had swept from power in Frank
fort the administration which owed
loyalty to Havey influences.
Bad Anse Havey was indicted as an
| tn he dsar % l.
win and he would be tried, not In Peril,
but in the Blue Grass. The prosecu-
tion would be able to show that he
had warned the surveyors of his own
place and had picketed his fence line
with rifiemen. They would be able to
show that he was the forefront of the
fight against innovation and that
lesser mountain men followed his
counsel blindly and regarded his word
as law. But, more than that. the Jurors
who passed on his question of life
and death would be drawn from a com.
munity which knew him only by his
newspaper-made reputation.
} So 1t was not long before Anse
Havey lay in cell in the Winchester
Jail. He had been denied bond and
} fronted dreary prospect.
When the trial of Anse Havey be-
gan there was one spirit In the land.
Here was an exponent Of the unjusti.
fable system of murder from ambush.
! In the cemetery at Lexington, where
/ sleep the founders of the western em.
: pire, lay boy whose life had Just be.
, gun In all the blossom and sunshine
OF promise-aEd who had done no
wrong.
, The special term OF the court had
( brought to Winchester a throng OF
3 farmer folk and onlookers. Their
horses stood hitched at the racks
about the square when the sheriff led
/ Anse Havey from the jail to the old
5 building where he was to face his ac
e cusers and the judges who sat on the
e bench and in the jury box
3 He took his seat with his counsel al
a his elbow and listened to the pre
. liminary formalities OF impaneling 8
g jury. His face told nothing, but al
man after man was excused becaus.
0 he had formed an opinion. he read liz
9 tie that was hopeful in the outlook
K He calmly heard perjured witnesses
y from his own country testify that b,
had approached them. Offering bribe,
e for the killing Of young Calvin which
d they had righteously refused He knew
o that these men had been bought b,
Jim Fletcher and that they swore fo
J. the hire OF syndicate money but b,
d only waited patiently for the defens,
II to open. He saw the scowl on thu
e faces in the jury box deepen into con
Q viction as witness after witness tool
d the stand against him. and he saw tn,
o faces in the body Of the room miro
i that scowl.
n Then the prosecution rested. and a
e few of its perjuries we're punctured
the faces in the box lightened thei
1. scowl little-but very little. The tid
e had set against him. and he knew II