Yost lived long enough to say that his murderers were two Irishmen who had been in Carroll’s saloon that evening. He exonerated Kerrigan of the crime, saying one was larger and the other smaller than he. He did not see Kerrigan.
Yost died at nine o’clock that morning; he was then thirty-three years of age.
McParlan was soon on the trail of the Mollies who committed this cruel murder, and Captain Linden, another Pinkerton operative, was also active on the case.
McParlan was at this time under suspicion by the Mollies of being a detective and his work was the most dangerous any man was ever called upon to perform, but he was a hero.
He now affected the role of a drunken man and while sleeping off his debauch listened to a conversation which gave him a clue; he then fell in with Carroll, engaged his wife in conversation and soon learned much of importance.
The next day he learned the names of two of the men who had killed Yost, Hugh McGehan and James Boyle, both of Summit Hill.
The following day he went to Coaldale and visited James Roarty, head of the Mollie branch there, ostensibly to see another person. Here they had a drinking bout, and Roarty told too much, and he was Mollie number three.
Two days later McParlan was back in Tamaqua and lounging about Carroll’s saloon where he got more information from Roarty and Carroll. He then learned that Thomas Duffy was an actor in the crime.
Sunday, July 26, McParlan and Carroll spent some time together, when the latter related the conversation he had had with some detectives (which McParlan had sent there), and boasted about loaning his pistol to the man who did the job. This made Carroll number four.
Soon afterwards Duffy bragged to McParlan of the part he had taken and the fifth Mollie was trapped.