THE WALL MURDER MYSTERY.
CHAPTER XXIV.
A FOUL MURDER ON DRY CREEK, IN DOUGLAS COUNTY—A QUIET SUNDAY DESECRATED BY A PAIR OF ASSASSINS—L. K. WALL KILLED BY E. E. WIGHT AND G. H. WITHERILL FOR HIS POSSESSIONS—HE IS SET UPON WHILE HERDING HIS SHEEP AND SHOT BY SUPPOSED FRIENDS—A DESPERATE RUN FOR LIFE ENDS IN DEATH AT THE HANDS OF SHAMELESS RUFFIANS—THE MURDER REMAINS A MYSTERY FOR WEEKS—THE ROCKY MOUNTAIN DETECTIVES AT WORK.
Dry creek is the name of a small and unimportant tributary of Cherry creek, which, like a great many other streams in this vicinity, contains but little water, except during the spring and summer months. It is, however, skirted in places by growths of underbrush and cottonwoods and willows. It heads in Douglas county, near the Divide, and runs for twenty miles in a northeasterly direction, until it joins Cherry creek some fifteen miles above Denver. The region is one for the possession of which ten years ago no one but a few sheep-herders disputed with the prairie dog and plains rattlesnake. Lonely and barren as was the country, it has had its tragedies, and Dry creek tells one of the most thrilling tales of cold-blooded murder which is recorded in this calendar.
Some few years previous to 1871, a quiet and reticent man came to the place and bought a small herd of sheep. He gave the name of S. K. Wall. Occasionally, when business called, he rode into Denver; but he never remained for any length of time. Unlike many men of his calling, and those of the kindred vocation of cattle-grazing, he never staid over to have “a good time with the boys.” He did not buy whiskey with his money, but after paying for his necessities, he would visit the book stores and lay in a supply of reading matter. This he would carry with him to his home up the creek. There he lived, in an unpretentious dugout tent, the life of a hermit, doing his own cooking and tending his own sheep. He had built his hut in a willow copse, near the bed of the creek; and, owing perhaps as much to his retiring manners as to his frugal mode of life, the supposition prevailed in the neighborhood that he had a great deal of money stored away in the place of his abode. His herd had also increased rapidly in numbers and now counted four hundred head of as well-kept sheep as were to be found in the neighborhood. The prize was one likely to excite the envy of those disposed to avariciousness.
Among Mr. Wall’s neighbors in those days were Mr. J. S. McCool, who now resides on the Platte a few miles below Denver, and Mr. LeFevre. Employed by Mr. LeFevre was a young man named George H. Witherill, while Mr. McCool gave work to one E. E. Wight, commonly then known in the neighborhood as Jack Wight. These two employés became the murderers of Wall, whose sheep and supposed hidden treasure of gold they longed to possess.
Witherill was the younger of the two men, being at that time twenty-three years of age, while Wight was about twenty-seven. Both were doubtless bad enough, but to Wight seems to belong the credit of planning the deviltry. He also appears to have found in Witherill not only a willing accomplice but a pliant tool. Wight had come into Colorado the year before from Iowa, and Witherill had recently arrived from the northwest. He was a native of New York, and had gradually drifted westward until he reached Utah and Dakota. For a while he was engaged as a stage driver from Corrinne, Utah, on the Fort Benton route. Afterwards he drifted back to Laramie City, Wyo., and from Laramie came to Denver. The education which he had received as a stage driver in the then almost savage region in which he operated was not calculated to make a refined creature of him.
Witherill and Wight soon became acquainted and were not long in deciding to appropriate Wall’s property which had aroused their cupidity. From the time they first discovered themselves to be of common mind upon this point, they talked over the project continually when they met. Both of them were herders, but for different men, and they frequently contrived to bring their herds together for the purpose of discussing this subject between themselves. They also managed to get days off, when they would stroll about and discuss the matter. They also met at night and debated the fine points, going so far at times as to walk over to Wall’s place and survey the premises. The horrible nature of the crime of murder seems to have never entered their minds. The only point which presented itself was the feasibility of their scheme. They were not anxious to kill, but they wanted Wall’s property, and after discussing various other plans for getting Wall out of the way, decided, as dead men tell no tales, to murder him in cold blood and take the sheep and whatever valuables might be found.
These plans had begun to take root as early as the middle of the summer, but they did not mature until September. The 17th day of that month in the year 1871 fell on Sunday—as bright and quiet a day as Colorado was ever blessed with. The two men had taken the day off for the purpose of putting their long-cherished project into execution, agreeing upon a place of meeting and a plan of proceeding. They came together about 2 o’clock in the afternoon, and about 3 came upon Wall lying quietly upon a peaceful hillside in the shade of a bluff, watching the lazy sheep as they gnawed their Sunday meals out of the tufted grass on the sloping plains below—certainly a picture of peace and quiet. There was nothing there to suggest murder, but on the contrary all was suggestive of brotherly love. The scene was one to call out the warmth and fellow feeling in human nature.
But the two scoundrels had gone to the place on murder bent, and they did not propose to be deterred from their purpose by a Sunday scene or a sparkle of bright sunshine. They went up to Wall, who did not suspect but that they meant to pay him a friendly call, with smiles on their faces, and began a friendly conversation. Even while they talked they were preparing for the murder which they had come to commit, and when the doomed man turned his head, one of the ruffians—which one will probably never be definitely known—pulled his gun, and, leveling at the poor man’s back, fired, the ball striking him in the neck.