a settler’s permit had expired, he would be obliged to give new
references. He then gave the name of his daughter, Mrs. Thompson,
of Cape Girardeau, whose first husband was Mr. Winterington,
and General Benjamin Harrison, whose sister married his, Samuel
Mason’s, brother, the owner of a kiln on the Monongahela. He was
requested to cite, if he could, some local people, and he referred
to Dr. Richard Jones Waters, saying he was the man on whose
recommendation he had received the passport three years before, but
admitted that he had known the gentleman only slightly.
Mason’s answers show that he knew more or less about the robberies
that had been referred to, but in each case he managed to explain
how and from whom he received the information. For example, when
the Owsley boat robbery, in which he said Phillips was implicated,
was under discussion, he stated that in May, 1802, two of his sons
were coming up the Mississippi River and were overtaken by two men,
Wiguens and John Taylor, in a boat, from whom they heard of the
robbery. Later, he met Owsley, the owner of the boat, who requested
him to investigate the case. This he did, with some assistance by
a Mr. Koiret, and in consequence he knew where the booty had been
stored and learned many other details.
He more than once asserted he would throw light on a number of
robberies, and not only give the names of the guilty parties,
but would produce them, “if the Commandant assured him he would
spare his life and exonerate him of all misdeeds which rumor had
so unjustly attributed to him.” The Commandant replied that “it
is customary to spare the lives of such confessors and to show
great leniency toward them.” After a somewhat pathetic recital
before the officials of how his many efforts ended in failure
to “justify” himself, and evidently feeling confident he had
impressed the Commandant as an innocent man, and to show that he
could produce a guilty man, he informed the court that one of his
fellow-prisoners, John Taylor, alias John Setton, alias Wells--“and
sometimes going by other names he, Mason, could not recall”--as one
of the guilty parties. That prisoner, Mason insinuated, could give
much information regarding the robbing of Owsley’s boat and other
robberies, for he knew John Taylor was implicated in them.
John Setton, the man of various aliases, was brought before the
Commandant to testify. He admitted that he had changed his name to
John Taylor, but explained that he did so because Samuel Mason
demanded it, and that he suspected Mason had some specific purpose
in insisting upon the name of John Taylor. He also admitted (and
probably in a triumphant way) that Samuel Mason was correct in his
statement that he, “one of Mason’s fellow prisoners, could give
much information regarding robberies.” He said that he had been
with the Masons since May 14, 1802--eight months.
He swore he was an Irishman and had come to America in 1797, and
shortly thereafter enrolled in Major Geyon’s corps but “deserted
near the high coast.” Reaching Nogales (Vicksburg) he “worked for
three weeks for His Majesty the King of Spain,” and then went down
the river in the “row-gally Louisiana” to New Orleans where, during
the winter, he found occupation as a carpenter. After this, for a
period of about two years, he shifted around in Spanish territory,
either working with white people or “hunting with Chaquetaw
Indians.” One day while in Arkansas an American officer recognized
him as a deserter from the army and asked for his delivery to a
Spanish post. He was delivered into the hands of the American
authorities and placed in jail. There he met Wiguens, an American
soldier, and a month later both escaped. They went back to Arkansas
and were shortly afterwards arrested by the Commander of the
Arkansas Post, who considered them suspicious characters and kept
them in jail twenty-eight days. They then found farm employment for
a month with a man named Gibson, who obtained for them a passport
to go hunting on White River. They hunted until May, 1802, when
they came down the river some distance in a boat and then crossed
over the country to “Little Prairie of the St. Francis River,”
where they sold their skins to one Fulsom. They continued their
trip, for he, Setton, “wished to join his family in Pennsylvania.”
When “at the crossing of the Chaquetaws below the river Ares,” they
met, by chance, John and Thomas Mason, Gibson, and Wilson, and he
had been with the Masons ever since.
The Commandant asked Setton whether or not he was acquainted with
“the man Harpe” and he answered that he had met a man by that name
in Cumberland who had since been killed, but had left a brother,
whose whereabouts was unknown to him. Setton further stated, upon
being questioned, that he did not know whether or not Harpe and any
of the Masons ever had any dealings together or had ever met, but
he felt confident that Harpe had not been around since he had had
the misfortune to fall into Mason’s hands.«27»
Setton, continuing his account, swore that John and Thomas Mason
took possession of all his belongings, and encouraged him to stay
by promising him land on to which he could later move his family
and by giving him a contract “to go after Mother Mason,” who
apparently had some time before refused to live any longer with her
outlaw husband and sons. Setton declared that from the very day
he met the Masons they had kept him like a prisoner. The promised
land had never materialized and the trip for their mother was never
attempted, but he was obliged to linger with them because he found
no opportunity to escape, and the Masons never allowed him more
than two rounds of powder at a time.
He asserted that since he had been with the Masons they had
committed no crimes in his presence. They did not demand that
he steal horses, but apparently expected him to do so. A number
of horses had been brought in and taken away, but he asked no
questions and as he heard no comments made regarding them, he had
no idea how they came or where they went. He knew, however, that
there was an agreement between the Masons and one Burton, of Little
Bay Prairie, who bought at twenty dollars all the horses the Masons
could supply, provided the animals were such that they could be
sold for about sixty dollars.
The Masons occasionally left home “to repair a chimney” and if they
remained a few days they invariably accounted for their prolonged
absence by saying they “could not cross the water,” “lost their
repairing tools,” “were hindered by bad weather,” or “visited
friends,” but in no instance had they given the name of the friend
they claimed to have seen.
Setton related that when he and the Masons were in Nogales,
at the residence of Charles Colin, a Mr. Koiret, an American
citizen, chanced to stop in the house. Koiret impressed the
Masons as a prospective victim, and he (Setton) being permitted
to chat freely with Koiret, soon proved himself “an interesting
conversationalist.” But when Koiret incidentally remarked that
he was simply passing by on his way looking for outlaws who had
committed crimes along the Natchez Trace and the Mississippi River,
John Mason, on a pretext, lured him (Setton) away from the officer,
and, in the meantime, other Masons tactfully managed to “speed
the parting guest.” Turning a corner of the house, he (Setton)
unexpectedly ran into Samuel Mason, who, with drawn dagger,
commanded “silence.” John Mason seized him and the father and son
immediately gagged him, bound his hands and feet, and dragged
him into the house where they held him down on the floor for
about three hours. Feeling that Koiret had got far beyond hearing
distance, they ungagged and untied him, but continued to guard him
closely until the next day.
Setton swore that shortly after he had received this brutal
treatment Samuel Mason prepared a written statement in which he,
under the assumed name of John Taylor, made a declaration that
he, Phillips, Fulsom, Gibson, Wiguens, Bassett, and others were
implicated in one or more of three robberies--the Baker, the
Owsley, and the Campbell and Glass robberies--and in it further
declared that the Masons were in no way connected with any of these
depredations.
After the statement had been prepared the Masons explained to him
that they were going to conduct him to a justice of the peace and
they furthermore convinced him that should he fail to swear to this
written confession and declaration of the three robberies, they
would kill him before he had a chance to inform the officers that
the statements were false and not his own. He related how John and
Thomas Mason, armed with guns, and Samuel Mason, who bore no weapon
at all, forced him to the residence of William Downs, a justice
living below Vicksburg, and that, with seeming calmness, he went
through the form required by the law and the outlaws. He realized
that while he and Samuel Mason were in the house, the two sons were
outside in hiding, prepared to shoot him should the prearranged
signal be given.
The first of the three robberies detailed in the false affidavit,
continued Setton, was the robbery of Baker on the Natchez Trace,
from whom the Masons took “twenty-five hundred piasters in gold,
silver and banknotes.” For this John Mason had been imprisoned, but
by the aid of his brother Thomas and others, made his escape. The
object of the confession was to show that he (as John Taylor) and
others were the guilty men and that Mason was absolutely innocent
of the crime. Notwithstanding his purported statement, he could
prove an alibi, for ten days before the robbery took place, he
had been committed to the Arkansas prison. He suspected that part
of the money found on the Masons by the officials who arrested
them was a part of the booty obtained in the Baker robbery. The
explanation that the money they had was found “in a bag hanging
on a bush near the road” was suggested by Samuel Mason a few hours
before the arrest, saying at the time, “accounting for it in that
way won’t do any harm.”
“The second crime,” resumed Setton, “was the one committed on the
Mississippi at the crossing of the Chaquetaws below the river
Ares,” where the Masons robbed a merchant boat belonging to Owsley.
The Masons tried to show that he and Phillips took the lead in this
affair. He swore he was not connected with the robbery and stated
that he understood Phillips had done nothing more than purchase
two guns from the boatman and was in no way involved with the men
who later bought all the guns that were on the boat, and, with the
newly purchased guns attacked the boat and robbed it.
The third robbery Mason wished to throw upon the shoulders of
Phillips and others by inserting it in the false affidavit, was
the one that occurred on “the road from Kentucky to Natchez,” in
which Campbell and Glass were deprived of several horses, saddles,
and some money. Near the site of this robbery there later was
discovered a sign on a tree, reading “Done by Mason of the Woods.”
The Commandant asked Setton whether or not he thought Mason was
guilty of this hold-up and he answered that he did not know but,
in his opinion, the stratagem fitted Mason, who, if guilty, could
cite it as an instance of the “workings of his enemies” and would
be prepared to prove “that he was elsewhere when the robbery
occurred.” Anthony Glass, the witness thought, was a party to the
deception, for he had been a poor man in Nogales until he came in
contact with the Masons.
On one occasion Mason proposed to Setton that they capture a
certain store boat, drown the owner, rob the boat, and then sell
the goods to Glass, who would pay cash for half its actual value
and never betray them. He asserted that he refused to participate
in the proposed venture, but he suspected that the program was
carried out during one of the “chimney repairing” trips and that
some of the booty could be located by Glass.
He also declared that the pistol the Masons showed Downs and
claimed to be Setton’s had never belonged to him. It was one the
Masons had taken during the Baker robbery and had originally
belonged to Sheriff William Nicholson, whose initials had been
inlaid with silver thread in the handle but had been removed by
the Masons, who were not aware that he (Setton) saw them make the
change. This very pistol, he said, was now among the goods the
officials had taken possession of and was the same one that Samuel
Mason carried to Downs, expecting to use it as evidence against him
when the case came to trial.
Setton explained that two of the saddle bags now in possession
of the Masons were originally tan “and had large tacks fastened
at their corners” and that the tacks were broken off by Samuel
Mason and the leather dyed black. He also stated that the original
color of the trunk they had was red and had been blackened in his
presence by Thomas and John Mason.
Setton, in his comments on the Mason family, remarked that every
member treated him equally bad, except Thomas, who at times seemed
somewhat human. From the conversations of the Masons he inferred
that “the father had been a thief and a rascal for more than
forty years.” On one occasion, Samuel Mason, “after taking three
measures,” boasted to him that he was “one of the boldest soldiers
in the Revolutionary War” and that “there was no greater robber
and no better capturer of negroes and horses than himself.”
On another occasion, after he began to feel his liquor, he
pointed with pride to the fact that he had two partners, Barret
and Brown, who did some killing as a side line and always shared
the spoils with him in consideration of the advice and powder he
furnished them. Setton also stated that Mason had related to him
that when Mason’s eldest daughter was married, he had arranged
with Barret, Brown, and others to steal as many of the horses
of the guests as they could while the guests were feasting at
the bridal celebration, and that when the discovery of the theft
became known, no man displayed more eagerness to pursue the horse
thieves than Samuel Mason himself. A few days later some of the
men who had taken the horses were captured and accused Mason of
being the promoter of the theft, but because of the absurdity of
the accusation Mason experienced no difficulty in proving his
“innocence.”
In his comments on John Mason’s wife, Setton said more than once
she pretended to be sick and requested her husband to send for Dr.
Wales, whom she knew well, but it was his opinion that the woman
simply wished “to chat with the physician” and also “to force the
family cooking upon some one else.”
Setton cited another instance of Mrs. John Mason’s nature. He
related that one day in his presence and in the presence of two or
three of the Masons, Barret, who had lately shown signs of being
dissatisfied with the treatment he received, declared he would
denounce the whole family. Mrs. Mason, hearing this, immediately
jumped up in a rage, knocked Barret’s hat off his head and shouted:
“Monster, you are not going to denounce me or any of us!” She was
about to plunge a long knife into Barret’s heart, when Thomas
interfered, saying: “It is better to part as friends than to part
after a fight,” and peace was restored.
After Setton’s testimony had been heard, the Commandant on the
following day, January 20, ordered Samuel Mason to appear again.
Mason admitted that he had, in a way, detained Setton, but did so
in justice to himself and his sons. The Owsley boat, he swore in
his explanation, had been robbed in April, 1802, and immediately
thereafter the rumor had become current that the Masons were
the guilty men. Mason declared that Owsley did not know by whom
he and his five boatmen had been robbed, but in recounting the
affair Owsley referred to two incidents which in themselves were
sufficient to distinguish this robbery from any other. The first
was that after the boat had been plundered, one of the three
robbers returned five dollars to one of Owsley’s boatmen who had
been seriously wounded during the short battle that took place
before the boat was captured. The other incident was that after
the robbery the outlaws placed a sign on a tree, reading, “Done by
Samuel Mason of the Woods.” John and Thomas had heard this account
a number of times and every version had it that Samuel Mason was
accused of the work.
When his two sons first met Setton and Wiguens, who were
strangers to them, Setton told them the details of the Owsley
robbery, including these two incidents, and a few hours later,
after the brothers had made a more favorable impression, Setton
confided in them, saying he and Wiguens and also Gibson were
among the perpetrators of the robbery. John and Thomas Mason,
then recognizing in the two men the outlaws who had committed
at least one of the robberies of which their father was being
accused, decided to entice Setton and Wiguens to join them and
in the meantime seek an opportunity to force them into a public
declaration of their guilt and thus vindicate the Mason family.
They succeeded in detaining Setton, admitted Samuel Mason, but
Wiguens escaped.
Samuel Mason, in his comments on the Baker boat robbery, stated
that a few days after the boat had been pillaged, Colonel Baker
and a number of other men came to the Mason home near Natchez. The
moment Baker saw John he ordered his arrest, saying, “I could pick
him out of a thousand.” The father proceeded to explain to the
Commandant that Baker’s mistake could be easily explained, as John
Mason and Wiguens resembled each other very much, and added that
shortly after Wiguens and Setton first met his two sons, Wiguens
told John confidentially that he, Setton, Bassett, Gibson, Fulsom,
Phillips, and others were in the Baker robbery.
Going into details, Mason explained that, according to Setton’s
version, Bassett, Fulsom and Phillips were the men who bought for
cash all the guns Baker had on hand and left the boatmen under the
impression that these arms were to be used in a search for the
Mason gang. Setton then told him confidentially that he and the
other members of their band, by prearrangement, appeared shortly
thereafter and robbed Baker of all his money and as much of the
goods as they could carry. Fulsom, in order to inspire courage
in the raiders, assured them they need not fear any pursuing
party which Baker might organize, for he (Fulsom) could on very
short notice, muster and command five hundred Chacquetaw Indians
who would easily annihilate the revenge-seeking Baker. Setton,
in concluding his account to the Masons, laughingly remarked
that it was strange that two men looking so much alike should be
“involved” in the same robbery, and that the guilty man should not
be suspected and the innocent one be accused. Shortly after this
Wiguens suddenly disappeared, very much to the disappointment of
the Masons, who now realized the necessity of guarding Setton more
closely.
Samuel Mason (digressing to another Baker robbery) asserted that
after Baker had been robbed on the Natchez Trace, Baker and the
officers came to arrest John. John submitted immediately, feeling
confident that his innocence would be speedily proven. He could
have vindicated himself had not some of Bassett’s friends refused
to declare that they saw John many miles from the scene of the
robbery when it occurred. After he had been in prison about two
months “he was liberated by men who did not make themselves known
to him.”
The Baker highway robbery having taken place on the American side
and the Owsley robbery on the Spanish side, John, fearing he would
be arrested on either side of the river, took his family and hid
in the woods for a number of weeks. He hoped that in the meantime
his innocence would become established by the guilty parties being
brought to justice. But, instead, suspicion against him and against
the entire Mason family grew stronger day by day.
Samuel Mason admitted that he had brought John Setton before a
magistrate. He further stated that a number of things found in
their possession the day of the arrest in Little Prairie were taken
by them from Setton and held as evidence of his connection with
some of the robberies of which the Masons were accused.
He asserted that after he had urgently requested Setton to declare
his (Setton’s) crime before a magistrate, and thus, perhaps,
receive clemency, “he consented to do so.” He and Setton then went
“about twelve miles below Nogales” to the office of William Downs,
a magistrate. Mason carried with him a pistol Setton told him he
had procured as a part of his booty from the raid on the Owsley
boat. William Downs “received Setton’s confession but was not able
to take his oath, as he had no sheriff on guard with him.” Mason
then, without informing Setton, went in search of Anthony Glass,
who, it was rumored, was part owner of the Owsley boat, to have
him serve as a witness to the affidavit. Mrs. Glass implored her
husband not to act, for she feared his doing so might lead to the
exposure of her brother, one Bassett, who had participated in
various robberies. Glass, however, pacified his wife by telling her
that since Setton was a deserter any sworn statement he might make
would necessarily be ignored, and then insisted that he would go to
Downs and there denounce Setton as a deserter and have him placed
in the hands of the military authorities.
When the two men arrived at the magistrate’s house “they discovered
that Setton, suspecting some trickery, had left.” A few weeks
later, Mason swore, Setton again joined the Masons and had been
with them ever since. After finishing his testimony Mason suggested
that “If Setton told the truth in the testimony he gave in this
trial, our statements must agree.”
The next morning, January 21, John Mason appeared before the
Commandant. The prisoner evidently did not know the contents of
his father’s and Setton’s testimony, but he undoubtedly had some
idea of how his father intended to answer many questions should
they be asked. Most of his testimony agreed, in the main, with
his father’s. He tried to show the Commandant that he had long
attempted to “vindicate” and “establish” himself and to live
“a decent life.” He said he had escaped from prison because he
realized that the defense of his name required his personal
attention. He swore that practically all he knew about the various
robberies regarding which he was questioned, was through reports
he had heard from John Setton, alias John Taylor alias Wells, and
from Druck Smith, alias Smith Gibson. He insisted he had never seen
Phillips, Fulsom, and the other Gibson referred to.
The question of how the Masons came into possession of the eight
horses had not been asked before. John Mason accounted for each by
giving the details of a purchase or trade. He was asked why “he
pursued the two Frenchmen in a boat until they had reached a safe
harbor.” His explanation was that he, Thomas, and Setton were on
the river and followed these men, suspecting them to be robbers
involved in some of the acts of which the Masons were accused. He
hoped that if they were he would succeed in having them verify
Setton’s declaration of his own guilt. When the two men reached
Nogales his boat was on the point of overtaking them. He then
discovered that they were French officials and the pursuit was
dropped without giving the men any reasons for the chase.
He swore that most of the notes and paper money found in their
possession belonged to Setton, who claimed he had “found it in
a bag hanging on a bush near the road,” and who on one occasion
remarked that since then he had more money than he could use. John
Mason added that this statement convinced him that Setton had
stolen the money.
The record of this sworn statement made by John Mason is abruptly
followed by “And the prisoner being asked by the interpreter
whether he had anything further to say or anything to unsay, he
answered ‘No,’ but requested, as his father had done before him,
that we do not hand him over to the United States Government, and
after his declaration was read to him, he persisted that it was
true.”
Thomas Mason followed his brother John and, like him, gave
evidence that agreed, in the main, with his father’s. He swore his
occupation was “farming and harvesting” and “bringing down flour
and whiskey” in boats. He admitted that he had heard of the Baker
and Owsley robberies but claimed he knew none of the details except
those told to him by Setton, and these he repeated.