Jem Kelly was present at the execution of his friend, and when all was over, he was marched by the guard, down to an unfinished house in Nevada. Here a halt was called, and the necessary arrangements for the whipping were quickly made. Being asked to take off his shirt, he said, “—— the shirt, leave it on;” but on being told that it would be spoiled, he removed it. The culprit’s hands were now tied together, and made fast to a beam overhead; after which five men inflicted the punishment, each giving ten lashes with a raw-hide. Kelly showed no fortitude whatever, roaring and screaming at every lash of the hide. At the termination of the flogging, he remarked, “Boys, if I hadn’t been so fat, I should have died sure.” Nevada was no home for this low-minded villain, who left with all speed; and resuming the career most congenial to a man as fond as he was, of gold without labor, and horses without purchase, he came to the same end as his companion, Brady; but there was this difference between them—Kelly was a thief and murderer by trade; Brady was an honest man, and had never before ventured into the path of crime. Many felt sorry for his fate; but the old miners who heard of Kelly’s execution, shrugged their shoulders and muttered, “Served him right; he ought to have gone up long ago; I don’t believe in whipping and banishing; if a fellow ain’t fit to live here, he ain’t fit to live nowhere by thunder—that’s so, you bet your life,” etc., etc., which terse and technical series of interjectional syllogisms contain more good practical common sense than many a calf-bound folio, embodying the result of the labors of many a charter-granting, plunder-seeking body, humorously styled a “Legislature,” west of “the River.”
CHAPTER XXV.
THE SNAKE RIVER SCOUT—CAPTURE AND EXECUTION OF JEM KELLY.
“The pitcher that went often to the well was broken at last.”
Irish Proverb.
In the month of July, 1864, the coach going from Virginia to Salt Lake was robbed, and a large booty in gold dust was the reward of the Road Agents. This was no sooner reported to the Committee, than prompt measures were taken to pursue the perpetrators of the crime.
A party of twenty-one of the old veterans who had hunted down Plummer’s band, left Nevada, on Sunday, the 28th day of August, and camped at William’s Ranch for the night. On Monday, the party rode all day, never halting from breakfast time till evening. The rain fell in torrents, rendering cooking impossible; so a hard bite was all that was available, and each man coiled himself up in his blanket with his saddle for a pillow, and growled himself to sleep as best he could. Four guards came into camp with the stock, at daylight; whereupon the troop saddled up, without taking breakfast, every one of the “crowd” being at the same time wet, “dry,” hungry and saucy. One of the boys had managed to bring along a bottle of (contraband) whiskey, as he said, in case of snake-bites; but, under the circumstances, as far as can be ascertained, no one refused a mouthful of the aqua vitæ. They had forgotten the “weights and measures” of their school days, and at that camp, it was found that there was no scruples to a dram. As one of the party observed, it was “big medicine, you bet.” A ride in the wet of fifteen miles, brought them to Joe Patte’s and breakfast, which latter being despatched, and the former having received their adieux, the “boot and saddle” once more sounded, and they proceeded on their journey, changing horses at the Canyon Station, and finally halting on the banks of Medicine Lodge Creek, in the midst of a heavy rain storm, without shelter.
In the morning everybody felt wet, of course, and unamiable, probably; but as “business is business” when Montana Vigilantes are afoot, nothing objectionable to morality was offered, except an odd oath, caused by a stiff-legged cayuse or a refractory buckle, which, it is charitably hoped, the rain washed from the record. The probabilities favor the supposition, if the angel made the entry in his book on the banks of that creek. If not, provided he was a good angel, he took no notes till after breakfast and dinner, at Camos Creek, had somewhat soothed and mollified the water-soaked, but irrepressible rangers.
Saddling up once more, the party loped along a little more cheerfully, reaching Snake river at ten P. M., where they, “their wearied limbs to rest,” lay down—in a haystack.
After breakfast, they turned their horses’ heads down stream, and camped in the sage brush, without water, and with poor feed for stock. The Vigilantes were supperless. On Friday, they borrowed the necessary “batterie de cuisine” from the Overland station, and cooked their breakfast after which they rode to Meek and Gibson’s Ferry, where they camped, and turned out the stock in Fort Hall bottom.
A suspicious character having entered the camp, two of the boys tracked him to his own “lodging on the cold ground;” finding however, that there were no evidence of anything wrong about his halting place, they returned.
At the Ferry, the Vigilantes met an old friend—a brother of the early days of ’63-4. He was freighting poultry and hogs to Virginia, from Salt Lake City. Glad to see his old comrades on their righteous errand, he presented them with a thirty pound pig. A family of Morrisites living in a cabin at the Ferry cooked it for them, and it was consumed with immense zest. Here they learned that Jem Kelly had boarded in the house, and on being asked to pay, he had threatened to whip the old man. He said that he had a partner coming from Salt Lake, and that when he arrived he should have a plenty of money. He also intimated to one of the men living there that his partner was one of the men who robbed Hughes, when a passenger in the coach. Kelly also said that there was a big camp of emigrants, with a lot of mules, near there, on their way to Oregon. He proposed that they should stampede the stock, and that if the men offered a large enough reward, they should return them; but if not, they would drive them off and sell them. The man refused to have any hand in the matter, and was traveling towards the Butte, to buy some lame cattle from the emigrants, when Kelly who started with him, fell behind, and drawing a pistol, presented it at him. The man turned at once, and Kelly, who saw something that scared him in the expression of the man’s eye, had not nerve to shoot, though he wanted his money. He therefore turned it off as a joke.