Vigilante Days and Ways / The pioneers of the Rockies; the makers and making of Montana and Idaho

by Nathaniel Pitt Langford

Pleased with the pluck and humor of the lad, one of the band threw him a five-dollar piece, and they galloped furiously on towards Florence.

Thundering into the town, they drew up before the first saloon, fired their pistols, and urged their horses into the establishment. Without dismounting they ordered liquor for the crowd. All the by-standers partook with them. Harper ostentatiously threw one of the purses he had just seized upon the counter, telling the bar-keeper to weigh out the amount of the bill, and after a few moments they left the saloon, “to see,” as one of them expressed himself, “whether the town was big enough to hold them.”

This irruption into Florence occurred while that city was comparatively in embryo. The great floods of immigration from the East and West had not arrived. Some months must elapse before the expectations of the robbers could be realized. Meantime they distributed themselves among the saloons and bagnios, and by means of gambling and frequent robberies, contrived to hold the community in fear and pick up a subsistence until the great crowd came.

Leaving them for a season, we will return to Cherokee Bob, whom we left in his ignominious flight from Walla Walla to Lewiston, on a stolen horse. That worthy had established himself in a saloon at Lewiston, and while there, renewed an acquaintance with an old pal known as Bill Mayfield.

Mayfield was a fugitive from justice from Carson City, Nevada, where in the Winter of 1861–62 he renewed an acquaintance with Henry Plummer, whom he had known before that time in California. The Governor of California had issued a requisition for the surrender of Plummer, and a warrant for his arrest was in the hands of John Blackburn, the sheriff at Carson City. Though efficient as an officer, Blackburn, while in liquor, was overbearing and boastful of his prowess. His reputation was bad among the leading citizens of the town. Foiled in his search for Plummer, who, he believed, was in the Territory, and knowing of Mayfield’s intimacy with him, he accused the latter with concealing him. Mayfield denied the charge, and to avoid a quarrel with Blackburn, who was intoxicated, immediately left the saloon where the interview occurred, but as a measure of precaution armed himself with a bowie-knife. Blackburn, rendered desperate by liquor, soon followed in pursuit of him, and at a later hour of the same day found him in another saloon. As he entered the front, Mayfield tried to leave by the rear door. Failing in this, he drew his knife, and concealed it in his sleeve. Approaching Mayfield in a bullying manner Blackburn said to him,

“I will arrest Plummer, and no one can prevent it. I can arrest anybody. I can arrest you if I wish to.”

“You can arrest me,” replied Mayfield, “if you have a warrant for my arrest, but you can’t without.”

“I tell you,” rejoined Blackburn tauntingly, “that I can arrest you, or any one else,” and added with an oath, “I will arrest you anyhow,” accompanying this threat with a grasp for his pistol. Mayfield, with flash-like quickness, slipped his knife from its place of concealment, and gave him an anticipatory stab in the breast. Blackburn then tried to close with him, and being much the stronger man would have killed him had not Mayfield jumped aside and plied his knife vigorously until Blackburn fell. He died almost instantly. Mayfield surrendered himself for trial, was convicted of murder, and sentenced to be hanged.

While awaiting execution in the penitentiary, two miles distant from Carson, a plan for undermining the prison was successful, and he escaped. The friends who effected this were among the best citizens of Carson. They deemed the sentence unjust, and as soon as he was out of confinement, mounted him on a good horse, provided him with arms, and bade him leave the State as rapidly as possible. When his escape was discovered the next morning the jailer started in pursuit. He struck the track of the fugitive, and by means of relays, gained rapidly upon him. Mayfield’s friends meantime were not idle. They managed to be apprised of his progress, followed close upon his pursuers, and by a short cut at a favorable point, overtook him, and, doubling back, concealed him at a ranche in Pea Vine Valley, only forty miles from Carson City. There he remained six weeks,—many of the leading citizens of Carson meantime watching for an opportunity to aid his escape from the State. A careless exposure of his person led to his recognition and the discovery of his retreat. His friends were the first to learn of it, and before the officers could arrive at the ranche, Mayfield was on his way to Huffaker’s ranche on the Truckee River, which was nearer Carson by half the distance than the ranche he had left. While the officers were scouring the country in pursuit of him, he remained there until Spring, sharing a box stall with a favorite race-horse. When Spring was far enough advanced to afford pasturage and comfortable travel, he was furnished by his friends with a good “outfit,” and made the journey unmolested to Lewiston, where he joined his old friends Plummer and Cherokee Bob.

Here he trumped up an intimacy with a woman calling herself Cynthia, at that time stewardess of a hotel in Lewiston, and the fallen wife of a very worthy man.