Year: 1875

accordingly, while the other parties
waited outside, two of the robbers en-
tered the mine Mt midnight, obtained the
money and conveyed it back to the
grocery store already mentioned. AS
they were about to count it, they en-
countered an interruption, and they went
up stairs into cold loom, leaving the
money i'll a cracker barrel down stairs.
The parties who caused the interruption
were three old men who came in to sit
down and smoke their pipes, rs is Gus
tomary i'll country stores. Presently
they commenced discussion on crack
ers, Ill the course of which the merits of
good and bad ones brought forth n lively
dispute, much to the annoyance of the
men up stairs who overheard the story,
who feared every moment that some of
the disputants would go to the barrel, in
which the money lay, TO take sample
cracker to sustain his argument. The
thieves were afraid that another division
of the spoils would be necessary to shut
the old men up, but fortunately the
cracker controversy was cut short and
another argument commenced. The dis
putants We're long-winded, and no fire
being up stairs the robbers were shiv-
ering with cold, and one of them pro-
posed to 60 down and "clean the old
men out" They finally left, having ex-
hausted popular topics. and the thieves,
trembling with the cold, descended and
warmed themselves by the stove. The
money was again removed from the
cracker barrel, and it was about to be
counted over again, when another rap at
tho door prevented it. The robbers on
this occasion thought they would notrun
the risk of another freezing, and accord
ingly those that were not known in that
section of the town pretended to be un-
der the influence of liquor, and one of
them laid his head on the knees of his
confederate while those who interrupted
remained in the store.


This interruption was caused by the
wife of the proprietor of the store, who
came i'll to get some potatoes which lay
in the barrel next to that in which the
feared that the woman would put her
hand into the wrong barrel, so they were
again i'll agony until she left.


After her departure the door was lock-
ed, and the thieves resolved under no
circumstances, would any one be ad-
mltted until they counted their funds.


The money was counted and divided
without further interruption, and the
party broke up at the peep of day, each
setting out in different direction for
his home.


One of the parties set out for Bing-
hamton, where he was captured week
later, and his share of the money found
in a stable. Another was arrested at his
house, and his share of the money was
| discovered in snow bank, frozen over,
Mt short distance from his house; an
! other portion of the money was recover
ed through the instrumentality of the
third robber, it being concealed among
his friends. The share of the fourth
party was found in an earthenware Jug
in the cellar of his house.


There was subdivision of the money.
also, into sums of fifty, one hundred and
two hundred dollars, and number of
those who were engaged in the first
plot for the proposed night-robbery sus-
pecting those who were engaged in the
actual robbery insisted on receiving
their shares, and so black mailed the sue
cessful thieves, until their shares dwindled
down to very small proportions.


In addition to this the thieves began
to steal from each other, and so succeed
ed in mixing up the different shares
until it became complicated problem to
trace the actual sum in the possession of
each one.