The criminals continued their raid down Barren River into the lower Green River country to a point near Henderson, Kentucky, and then, either by land or water, rapidly worked their way to Diamond Island in the Ohio and to Cave-in-Rock, in or near any of which places they evidently had arranged to meet their women.
How many men, women, and children these two brothers killed and what course they followed while rushing through the lower Green River country and the Ohio Valley between Henderson and Cave-in-Rock will never be known. Shortly before reaching the Cave, they committed a murder in Illinois at the mouth of Saline River, about twelve miles above Cave-in-Rock. Twenty-six years later this incident was briefly summed up in the Illinois Gazette, published at Shawneetown: “There are persons living in this country whom we have heard recount the story of the Harpes with great minuteness, and the place is still pointed out, on the plantation of Mr. Potts, near the mouth of the Saline River, where they shot two or three persons in cold blood by the fire where they had encamped.” [[56]]
The many reports—some false and others only too true—of the inhuman acts committed by the Harpes had, in the meantime, put every community on its guard. Captain Ballenger, after pursuing the outlaws a few weeks, found that, owing to the many conflicting rumors, he had been thrown off the trail and was moving in a direction opposite the one taken by the Harpes and, therefore, he gave up the chase.
Captain Young, of Mercer County, in the meantime organized a company with the determination to exterminate the Harpes and all other outlaws, or at least drive them out of the country. Commenting on Captain Young’s expedition, Edmund L. Starling, author of A History of Henderson County, Kentucky, writes: “Captain Young and his men recognized the perils of their undertaking; they understood the wily machinations of the enemy, and, with blood for blood emblazoned upon their banner, started upon their mission of capture or death, utterly regardless of their own personal comforts or the hardships attending a campaign in such a wild and comparatively unmarked country.”
Having met with success in Mercer, Captain Young and his men continued their pursuit and finally reached Henderson County. There they were joined by a number of citizens. The combined forces swept over the entire country, including Diamond Island, driving the outlaws out of that part of Kentucky across the Ohio River into Illinois. A number of the criminals fled to Cave-in-Rock. The character of the men who usually centered at the Cave was well known to the refugees, for many of them had helped to make the place notorious.
Captain Young and his outlaw exterminators having covered the territory they set out to relieve, left Henderson County and returned to Mercer County—a distance of more than one hundred and fifty miles—and were there given a grand ovation. [[124]]
Governor Garrard, however, must have felt somewhat apprehensive regarding the return of the Harpes, for the Executive Journal shows that on June 7 he “deputed Alexander McFarland and brothers” to take charge of “these inveterate enemies of human happiness” should they be found “in any adjacent state.”
It seems quite likely that while in the Danville jail the Harpe women, by some means, sent a message to, or received one from, “old man Roberts,” the father-in-law of Big Harpe, who then lived in Russell County, Kentucky. At any rate, as already stated, they started down Green River shortly after leaving Danville. They paddled their way down that river until they reached its mouth, a distance of more than two hundred miles. After stopping in the neighborhood of Henderson, they continued down the Ohio about ninety miles to Cave-in-Rock. It was in this section of the Ohio Valley that they expected, sooner or later, to meet the Harpes. Tradition has it that shortly after the three women arrived at Cave-in-Rock two of them proceeded up the river, one to Diamond Island and the other to a neighborhood south of Henderson, while the third remained at the Cave; and in this manner they watchfully awaited the arrival of the Harpes. The two women who had been loitering near Henderson and Diamond Island, posing under assumed names as widows, either had left their watching places voluntarily or were forced to flee from them with their husbands. At any rate, they finally arrived at Cave-in-Rock and there, in a very short time, the two Harpes and their three women and three children were once more united.
As a result of Captain Young’s raid through Henderson County, Cave-in-Rock became somewhat crowded with outlaws. Realizing that their number was too great to maneuver with any secrecy and safety, many left the place voluntarily, some continuing down the river, others working their way inland, and a few remaining “to pursue their nefarious avocation.” [[124]]
The Harpes, however, were driven from the Cave. This aggregation of outlaws was doubtless a depraved conglomeration of evil doers, but in the Harpes they found two human brutes beyond even their toleration.