CHAPTER LV.
WHITE’S ESCAPE TO DENVER—ARRESTED IN A GROGGERY BY GEN. COOK AND W. A. SMITH—A DESPERATE ENCOUNTER WITH A SMALL MOB—TAKEN BACK TO PUEBLO—STRUNG UP TO A TELEGRAPH POLE AND LEFT AS A WARNING TO THIEVES—DEATH OF ONE OF THE JAIL GUARDS FROM HEART DISEASE.
The telegram quoted at the close of the last chapter was “nuts” for Cook. He knew his man. Taking W. A. Smith—then an honored member and assistant superintendent of the association—with him, they started out in their search. They learned at the depot that a freight train had come in from Pueblo an hour before, and that it carried a passenger bearing the description of White. They had from the first kept close track of Larnigan, and knew his haunts. They knew further that White was most likely to join his pal immediately upon his arrival in Denver, and they started forthwith to search for them both at a joint ten-pin alley and saloon on Holladay street kept by one Green, which Larnigan was known to frequent. Thither they went, and throwing open the door to the establishment suddenly, they walked in. Sure enough, there stood their men before them. The room contained some half a dozen other men, but these two were nearest the door, and they were engaged in earnest conversation when the officers entered. White was standing with his back to the door which Larnigan was facing. Before the latter had had time to notify his pal of the entrance of the officers, which he had observed, Cook had stepped rapidly forward and laid a heavy hand upon the shoulder of White, pulling him around so as to face him.
As may be imagined, a scene followed. Everybody was astonished, and all in the room rushed forward to the assistance of White. The officers had stirred up a hornet’s nest. All was buzz and bustle.
“What is wanted?” demanded White.
“You.”
“Yes.”
“Guess you are mistaken; I am not your man.”
“We’ll see about that.”
“Where’s your warrant?”
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Arrest of Bill White in a crowded saloon in Denver, by Detectives Cook and Smith.
Just then Larnigan jumped forward and thrust his hand into White’s pocket, where it was to be naturally supposed White carried a pistol.
“Draw on him!” said Cook to Smith.
Promptly as clockwork out came Bill Smith’s revolver. “Shall I shoot the s—— of a b——?” he asked.
“Yes, shoot him dead if he makes a move.”
Cook himself wore a tight-lacing military jacket at that time over his pistol pocket and was delayed in getting out his own gun. The crowd was disposed to take advantage of this state of affairs and to assist White and Larnigan out of their awkward predicament. The barkeeper started for his pistol which was lying on a convenient shelf, and the crowd rushed forward for the purpose of cutting off the retreat of the officers with their prisoner. Dave Cook’s blood was thoroughly aroused at this spectacle, and Bill Smith stood with teeth set as if to defy the entire gang. Still holding his prisoner with his right hand, Dave tore his coat open with his left, sending his military buttons flying with a bound in all directions. In an instant the barkeeper was covered by Dave, who still held on to his prisoner with his right hand. The crowd was still in an instant.
“Throw up your hands!” commanded Gen. Cook. “Every one of you!”
When Dave Cook gives a command under such circumstances as these, those who hear it obey it. A dozen hands flew instantaneously into the air. The victory was complete. The capture was made.
“Now search him,” he said to Smith, while he himself held his pistol over the thoroughly awed crowd. The first pocket into which Smith thrust his hand yielded up a paid of burglar’s nippers and five stolen watches.
“Do you want to see our warrant now?” demanded Cook.
“No,” replied White quite demurely, “I guess you’ve got proof enough. But,” he added, “don’t take me to Pueblo; they’ll hang me sure.”
With this the officers marched out of the saloon with their prisoner, and he was soon securely locked up in jail and all the stolen property recovered in less than an hour’s time after the first information of the Pueblo burglaries was received.
The next morning Gen. Cook started to Pueblo with his prisoner, who was greatly frightened at the idea of going back to face the wrath of those whose confidence he had so grossly abused.
“They’ll hang me; they’ll hang me. I know they will.” Thus he pleaded.
“Well,” replied Cook, “you’ll doubtless deserve it. Didn’t I tell you if you didn’t get out of this country, and keep out, I would overtake you? Haven’t I been as good as my word? There is nothing left for you but to go back and stand trial. I’ll protect you while you are in my keeping. Of that you may rest assured.”
Engaged in such conversation as this they journeyed on down the narrow gauge—then the baby road, indeed—to Pueblo. They met only a slight demonstration there, and officer and prisoner were encouraged to believe that all apprehensions of violence had been unfounded. White was turned over to the jailer and was locked up. No unusual demonstrations were made, and after remaining at the prison for a little while and observing that all was quiet, Gen. Cook withdrew.
The next day the preliminary examination of the prisoner took place before Justice Hart, and resulted in his being bound over, on seven separate indictments, for burglary, larceny, etc., in the sum of $8,500, to appear for trial. He was remanded back to jail.
Gen. Cook was detained as a witness, and was thus compelled to remain over two nights in Pueblo.
The evening of the second night he spent with several friends, including Sheriff Allen.
He was absent from his hotel until about 12 o’clock, and was just returning to it in company with Allen, when the somewhat notorious “Hoodoo” Brown rushed up, with the exclamation:
“There’s hell to pay at the jail!”
Gathering an idea of the situation in an instant, Cook and Allen were off for the jail. That institution was half a mile distant, but they ran every step of the way, and rushed in just in time to find one of the guards at the jail untying the other.
“Just got loose,” he muttered. “They came in, about twenty of ’em, with guns and pistols, overpowered us, took us completely by surprise, tied us here, got the keys, marched into White’s room. There was one big man in the crowd. He looked seven feet high. Why, he just went up to White—White’s a little fellow, you know—and he seemed to be moaning and crying, and he just picked him right up—he had gone to bed—and said: ‘Come to me arms, me baby,’ and carried him out, his bare feet dangling down to the big man’s knees. Oh, it was awful, sir. I guess they hung him.”
Recovering himself somewhat, the speaker explained briefly all he knew about the transaction. He said that his name was Redfield, and that he was the jailer, and that he was sleeping in the jail, having retired about 10 o’clock p. m. He was awakened by the assistant jailer, A. W. Briggs, who told him there was a mob outside. Redfield went to the door and asked, “Who’s there?” when a voice replied, “Zach Allen, the sheriff; let us in.” Not doubting but that the voice he had heard was Mr. Allen’s, and supposing that he had a prisoner, Mr. Redfield turned the key of the door and opened it, when a number of men rushed in dressed in calico and masked, and in a moment the jail was in possession of the mob. Their first act was to bind Redfield and his assistant, hand and foot; leaving them gagged and helpless on the floor. One of the men stooped over and hissed in the ear of Briggs:
“Lie still and you shan’t be hurt, but give the alarm and I’ll blow your brains out!”
After leaving Redfield and Briggs, the mob started for White’s cell, the key of which they seemed to find without any trouble. They walked White out with his shackles on. When the miserable man reached the front entrance, and fully comprehended the terrible fate soon to be visited upon him, he turned around and desired time to pray, but this request was sternly denied. He was picked up by one of the party and taken out in the darkness, the stern avengers closed around him in a solid mass, the word “forward” was given, and that was the last ever seen of White alive.
The officers listened to this narrative with impatience, and when it had been finished, asked to know the way the mob had gone. The man pointed in the direction of a telegraph pole a hundred yards away, and Cook and Allen started towards it.
The sight which met their gaze is described in the full-page cut accompanying this chapter. The gentleman who hangs limp from the telegraph pole, with his bare toes reaching for terra firma, is the late Mr. White. The vigilantes have done their work and have departed. They are nowhere to be seen. White is gone beyond the hope of recovery, and nothing is left but to cut him down and bury him.
But White was not unaccompanied to his last resting place. His jail guard, Briggs, followed close upon his heels. He had lived to confirm Mr. Redfield’s story of the jail delivery, as above related. He was subject to heart disease. The excitement had been too much for him, and the next morning he fell to the floor a corpse.
So there were two burials in Pueblo the next day, and people said of one death, “It was deserved;” of the other, “It was an accident; poor fellow!” Such, in brief, were the public funeral orations passed upon the two. There was a sigh for one. There was no sigh for the other. So passes the world away. It is the fortune of the detective to see death as well as life sharply contrasted at times.
When Cook returned to Denver he found that Larnigan had disappeared. He had received the news from Pueblo. He took the hint and left, and has never since been seen in Colorado.
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Lynching of White at Pueblo.
THE RETRIBUTION OF FATE.