The Bluffton news. [volume] (Bluffton, Ohio) 1875-current, 1947-10-02
True Tales About Ohio
Concluded from page u

listen to their story.
The passengers once ashore, both
boats were started towards San
dusky. Not far from the island,
however, they were cut apart and
the Island Queen was scuttled. The
Philo Parsons went on alone.
Refuses To Aid Pirates
Captain Orr was taken aboard the
Parsons and ordered to act as pilot.
This he refused to do. From other
captive members of the Philo Par
sons crew he learned how the boat
had fallen into the hands of the
pirates.
Four men had boarded the boat
at Sandwich, on the Canadian shore,
and 90 more, with a large, heavy
trunk, at Maiden. The men and
trunk excited no suspicion because
there was then much wartime travel
between the United States and
Canada.
The trunk, however, contained
guns and ammunition and in getting
it away from the baggage room a
clerk in the purser's office was shot
through his cheek. I
There were "a pirates in all, head
ed by John Yates Beall, wealthy
Virginian and graduate from Vir-
ginia University, and Jacob Thomp-
son, an agent for the Confederate
government in the upper lake
region. Beall was one of the four
| who boarded the Island Queen.
Thompson remained on the Philo
Parsons, in charge of the pirates
there. H.
Seek to Liberate Prisoners
1t all was a part of the conspiracy
to rescue the 2,4O0 Confederates inn
prisoned on Johnson's Island, near
Sandusky. Johnson's Island was
guarded only by the small gunboat
"Michigan"-the only Federal war
vessel on Lake Erie.
After capturing the Philo Parsons
and the Island Queen the pirates
were to take the Michigan, then
| storm and liberate the prisoners on
the island and with them, on stolen
horses, make a long raid down
through Ohio to join the Confeder-
ate army to Virginia, burning and
pillaging cities as they went. San
dusky and Cleveland were the first
| cities that were to be burned.
But for the over~zealous nervous
ness of a Titusville oil man named
Cole, who was to handle the finer
preparatory work on the Michigan"
the plot would have succeeded.
Fifth Columnist
Cole, socially prominent, but Sc
cretly a rebel sympathizer, worked
his way into the confidence and
comradship of officers on the Mich
igan by lavish entertainment and
many wine suppers.
He had arranged bounteous
banquet for them on the Michigan
to be held the afternoon of Septem-
Der 10. All was ready and the wine
heavily drugged. In pouring the
wine Cole was so shaken that he
spilled and stopped it around in
filing every glass. This excited the
officers suspicious and Cole was ar
rested. The officers did not drink
the wine and so did not become
stupefed. No signal to attack was
given the Parsons or Queen
Cole was held prisoner in the brig
of the Michigan for some time be-
fore trial. He only was saved from
execution by influential friends IN
Sandusky who had his sentence
changed to imprisonment--on John
sons Island.
Flee To Canada
| When the signal for them to at.
tack the Michigan did not come
Beall, Thompson and the other
pirates, all of whom were sympathi-
zers with the South, turned the
Parsons towards Canada, steamed
right past Middle Bass Island and
the stranded passengers, put Captain
Orr, of the Queen, and the others
who had been kent aboard, off on a
small uninhabited island and landed
at the Canadian shore. There they