At nine o’clock Craig Tolliver had stationed this force at every point of vantage. Then he and Bowling appeared at the front door with Winchester rifles gleaming in the sunlight. For the first time the inmates of the house seemed aware of the presence of the enemy. There was apparently no chance of escape. Every door was securely guarded. Tolliver was met at the door by the brave Martin girls who demanded an explanation for the intrusion. Tolliver demanded the surrender of Cook Humphrey and any other man or men that might be with him. The girls stoutly denied the presence of any one save the members of the family. Tolliver knew this to be false. With his own eyes he had seen Rayborn that morning. He charged the girls with duplicity and forced his way into the house. No one was found on the first floor. Then they attempted search of the upper story. At the stairway a shotgun suddenly belched forth fire and flame into the faces of the Tollivers. Craig’s face and part of his body was filled with shot, the gun stock shivered to pieces in his hand. He sank upon the steps and rolled helplessly at the feet of his companions. Bowling miraculously escaped unhurt.
Craig Tolliver was immediately placed upon a horse and sent to Morehead for repairs. The others, not daring to force the stairway, went outside and contented themselves with firing through the doors and windows. The fusilade continued incessantly for a long time. Black smoke hung like a cloud over the premises. If the Tollivers hoped to force the surrender of Humphrey and his companion by mere intimidation, they soon saw their mistake. These two men were brave to the core. Besides, they preferred to die fighting rather to being mercilessly butchered as helpless prisoners. They remembered the fate of John Martin.
Finally Humphrey managed to make himself heard through the din and crash of battle. He informed his assailants that he was there in the house and that by virtue of his office as sheriff of the county none but the coroner had the legal right to arrest him. The Tollivers sneered at this speech. They had not come to uphold the law; they had succeeded in trapping the enemy, and meant to use the advantage they had gained. Hours thus passed. All day the guns roared into and from the house. The sun was sinking rapidly toward the western horizon; the shades of evening grew longer. As long as daylight lasted the assailants had kept covered and protected, held at bay by the brave defenders. But in the dark of night, the end must come. They could not prevent a simultaneous attack from the entire force of the assailants. Surrounded on every side, escape seemed well-nigh impossible. Yet Humphrey essayed to make a sortie with his companion, hoping thereby to draw the fire of the enemy upon themselves and to thus at least relieve the women in the house of further danger of death which had threatened them every moment throughout that long day. It was a desperate undertaking, with ninety-nine chances in a hundred against its success. But Humphrey was brave, and so was Rayborn. As expected, the instant they emerged from the house a shower of balls greeted them. They ran for their lives. Rayborn sank, rose and fell again, to rise no more. His body was riddled. Humphrey, however, seemed possessed of a charmed life. Though his clothing was torn to shreds, his body received not a scratch.
Satisfied now that there were no more men in the house, the Tolliver clan crowned their infamous day’s work by setting fire to it. The inmates escaped without even necessary clothing. The body of Rayborn was left lying where it had fallen until the next day, protected from mutilation by dogs and hogs by a rail pen which had been built around it by the heroic Martin girls.
The excitement that prevailed in the county when the news of the cowardly attack upon the Martin home became known, can better be imagined than described. The lover of law and order was terror-stricken. The question was asked in whispers—“Where will it all end?” The County Judge was a well-meaning man, but utterly incompetent as an officer, possessing none of the qualifications for such an office in a county like Rowan at such a time of lawlessness and anarchy. He was weak and timid. Always in fear for his life, he completely lost his head.
Warrants were at last issued upon the affidavits of the Martin girls against Craig Tolliver, Jeff Bowling and a number of others, charging them with murder and arson. An examining trial followed. At that time such trials were held before two justices of the peace. One was said to be a Martin sympathizer; the other stood accused of being under the thumb of the Tollivers.
The court’s decision gave color to these suspicions. One of the magistrates decided for commitment of the prisoners to jail without bail; the other declared that no offense had been proven. Under the law then existing this disagreement of the court permitted the murderers to go free.
The trial was a pronounced farce. Afterwards some of the parties were indicted by the grand jury for arson, but none was convicted and the murder charges against them all fell.
Jeff Bowling, one of the most desperate of the Tolliver faction, removed from the county of Rowan a short time afterward, and settled in Ohio, where he continued his career of crime, evidently believing that there, as well as in Kentucky, none dared molest him. He saw his mistake too late.
It appears that his mother-in-law had married a wealthy farmer named Douglas, of Licking County, Ohio. It had been due to the persuasion of Douglas that Bowling left Kentucky and settled in or near his Ohio kinsman. Bowling had resided there but a short time when Douglas was found one morning in his barn—murdered. The finger of suspicion pointed to Bowling as the only one who had a tangible motive for the commission of the crime. He was promptly indicted, tried and sentenced to death, but the sentence was finally commuted to life imprisonment. He served seven years of his time and moved to Texas.