This heavily guarded train sped on at a lively rate, through tunnels, over cuts and fills, coughing a continuous challenge to the groups of strikers gathered along the way to watch it pass. On it went. The soldier-engineer, taking courage from the docile attitude of the strikers, pulled the throttle wide open, while the soldier-fireman was heaving coal into the fiery furnace, even though the steam was at the time “blowing off.” The giant machine leaped forward like a spurred stallion, easily making fifty miles an hour. Daly and Fettin were holding on like grim Death, for the track was rough and the speed unprecedented for that road—a new one.
A bad curve was just ahead, but the speed was not slackened. Like a racing horse on a small track, the engine struck it and leaned toward the inner circle, but an instant later straightened up and flew on its way.
Just as the curve was turned, a few hundred paces ahead, stood a small group of tramps. Seeing the train, they hastily broke and ran for the timber along the edge of the right-of-way, but not before one of them hurriedly stooped and placed something on the track, A hundred eyes were on him, and as many rifles were instantly raised to fire, but Daly was the first to pull the trigger, and the man fell backward down the enbankment, bearing with him that which he had endeavored to place on the rail.
In firing, Daly was compelled to let go his hold, which kept him on the train, and he lost his balance and fell forward, crushed into an unrecognizable mass beneath the wheels.
The train was stopped, and a hundred aching hearts, which had melted in the presence of death, went tenderly to their duty of gathering up poor Daly’s remains.
The tramp had been shot fairly through the head, and he had died holding in one of his clenched fists a deadly bomb, which, but for the presence of mind and quickness of action of the despised recruit, would have sent every soul on the train into eternity.
The next day the Rocky Mountain Daily Eagle contained this Associated Press report:
“The late Private Daly, of Company E, —th Infantry, who was crushed beneath the first train out of Patterson, Mont., while firing at Antonio Bressi, the anarchist, was from New York City, where he has a mother and younger sisters and brothers dependent on him for support. His right name was Leonard Dresel, and the name Daly seems to have been assumed when he entered the Army to conceal his identity. There was no apparent reason for this, as he has an excellent reputation for honesty and industry, and he enlisted in the Regulars because he could obtain no employment elsewhere. He worked for officers of his regiment in order to make additional money that his brothers and sisters might remain in school.
“Antonio Bressi, who died from the deadly aim of Daly, was a noted anarchist leader, prominent in the Cœur d’Alêne riots a few years ago, which were so promptly quelled by the —th Infantry. It is believed that for this reason he endeavored to blow up the train, for it is known that he is not in sympathy with the striking railroad men.”
A week later Company E was paid, and that night a money order payable to Mrs. Catharine Dresel, No. —— Baxter Street, New York, for $150, left on the east-bound train.