page_title: Deep Creek murders
section_title: The murders
hierarchical_section_title: Deep Creek murders / The murders
caption_attribution_description: English: Diamondfield Jack Davis in Nevada, circa 1904.
context_page_description: The Deep Creek murders was the culmination of a minor sheep war in the borderlands of Idaho and Nevada. On or about February 4, 1896, two Mormon sheepherders were killed by an unknown assailant while they were camping along a creek in what was then part of Cassia County, Idaho. The gunfighter Diamondfield Jack Davis and his associate, Jack Gleason, were arrested, but the latter was released and Diamondfield Jack was pardoned in 1902, after serving six years in jail. The deaths of the two sheepherders are the only confirmed killings attributed to the conflict, however, according to author J. Anthony Lukas, the incident was "one of the last great confrontations in the sheep and cattle wars."
context_section_description: The most remembered shooting incident to take place during the war happened at a place now known as Deadline Ridge. Late in 1895, two Mormon sheepherders named Daniel Cummings and John Wilson crossed the deadline in Cassia County to graze on the Deep Creek Range. A few weeks later, on about February 19, 1896, their bodies were discovered by another shepherd, Edgar "Ted" Severe. Both men died of gunshot wounds and the coroner who examined the deceased said they had been killed on February 4, 1896, or the day after. This was further substantiated by a lumberjack who delivered a load of wood to the sheepherders' camp on February 4. When police investigated the crime scene, they found that only a small portion of the wood had been used for a campfire so it seemed as though the murderer arrived shortly after the delivery and made his attack that night, or early the next morning. Diamondfield Jack was the prime suspect, mostly because in the past he said he would kill the next sheepherders who crossed the deadline in Cassia County. There was also evidence that Diamondfield had bragged about killing the two sheepherders when he turned up in Nevada sometime shortly after the murders.
caption: Diamondfield Jack Davis was the prime suspect.
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