To Mrs. Berry the whole story of the tragedy in the thicket that Sunday morning was repeated. In response, she said,
"I never thought he would be taken alive. He has said a great many times that he would never be taken alive."
Then ensued a scene deeply affecting. The robber had those at home who loved him. The wife and mother began to weep bitterly, and the wailings of her little boy and five little girls, made a scene calculated to touch the deep chords of emotion in the breasts of the stern men, who in the performance of lawful duty had been compelled to inflict all this misery on the family of the robber.
They searched the house, but they found no hoards of money. Then Glascock and Carter returned to Kazy's, a conveyance was procured, and the officer and his posse with their wounded prisoner set out for Mexico, where they arrived late in the evening. Berry was placed in a room in the Ringo House, and received the attention of Dr. Russell, of Mexico. Berry's wounds were painful, and he did not rally from their effects. On Monday, gangrene supervened, and a little before 1 o'clock Tuesday, October 16th, 1877, Jim Berry, one of the robbers of the train at Big Springs, quietly passed over the dark river, and the records of his stormy career were closed forever.
Sam Bass escaped from Buffalo station, and finally, after many thrilling adventures, reached his haunts in Texas. A little more than one year afterward he met his fate in a manner equally as tragic as the event which closed the career of Jim Berry.
Of the seven men who plundered the train and its passengers at Big Springs, Billy Heffridge, Jim Collins, Jim Berry, Sam Bass, and one other, have met violent deaths. The robber who went by the name of Jack Davis has disappeared. The seventh man—the only one whose name was never ascertained by the detectives—succeeded in getting away. Who he was, from whence he came, and whither he went, are, until this day, unanswered questions.
Much speculation in regard to the identity of the seventh man, whom we shall call the Unknown, has been indulged in, and the question has been asked, Was it Jesse James? or was it Jack Bishop, Dave Pool, John Jarrette or Jim Cummings? We have no means of answering such interrogatories. Whoever the Unknown is or was, he has probably not a single comrade of the occasion alive, and is therefore in little danger of being betrayed.
There are people who believe that Jesse James was with the Big Springs bandits. Upon what particular grounds such belief is based, we have been unable to ascertain. He may or may not have been present. Our readers may well be left free to draw their own inferences. But certain it is, a mystery, which perhaps may forever remain such, surrounds the personality of one of the daring raiders who accomplished one of the greatest robberies which has yet taken place on any American railroad.