and begged to be heard. Shouse’s attorneys prepared a written
avowal of what Sharp’s statement would contain and presented it
to the judge with an argument that in view of the new evidence by
a material witness the case be retried, regardless of the verdict
of the present jury. This was overruled. This document is the only
one from which can be gathered any suggestion as to the character
of evidence probably employed by the defense. Its plea was that
“Shouse expects to prove by said witness (Sharp) that the deceased
Simpson told him about a week before his death that he had some
short time before collared the defendant Shouse and dared him to
cut, that he intended then in a few days to take his pistol and
go over to Shouse’s house and settle him.” This was a plea of
self-defense. But, as already stated, this motion was overruled.
The jury, after due deliberation, found Shouse “guilty as charged.”
According to most traditions, Simpson had more knowledge of the
criminal conduct of the Ford’s Ferry outlaws than it was safe for
one man to have. It was rumored that a large reward was about to
be offered for evidence leading to the conviction of any member of
the band, and Simpson’s confederates feared he would be tempted to
betray them. Shouse, it seems, was selected--or volunteered--to see
that “dead men tell no tales.”
No man of his time was more familiar with the details of the
Shouse murder trial than William Courtney Watts. He furnished
the following statement to a representative of the Louisville
_Courier-Journal_ which published it March 27, 1895:
“Shouse was one of the ring-leaders of the notorious Ford gang and
it is generally believed that Ford deputized him to kill Simpson.
It was observed that after Shouse was sentenced to be hanged, his
attorney, Judge Wyley P. Fowler, spent a large part of his time in
the cell of Shouse. It finally leaked out that Shouse was dictating
to Judge Fowler a history of the robber band to which he had
belonged and that his statements implicated some of the wealthiest
and most prominent citizens in Livingston County. At that juncture
Judge Fowler received a number of anonymous letters in which
writers threatened his life in the event of his ever making public
the communications made to him by Shouse. By the advice of friends
Judge Fowler spent the succeeding winter in Frankfort. Upon his
return Mr. J. W. Cade, the circuit clerk, asked Judge Fowler if
the Shouse history had been destroyed. He replied: ‘No good could
come of its publication. It would cast a shade upon the reputation
of some of Livingston County’s most esteemed citizens.’ Nothing
further was ever heard of the manuscript and it is believed that
Judge Fowler destroyed it.”
It is said Judge Fowler’s notes were based on the dictations the
doomed Shouse intended for the public, and on such reports as were
being openly discussed among the people. Judge Fowler, however,
having been Ford’s attorney for a number of years and having
represented Shouse in his last trial, recognized that any statement
he made would be considered as based on confidential information
received by him as an attorney, and that, in consequence, he would
be unjustly condemned.
What Shouse’s history and confession contained was the subject of
much speculation for a generation or two. There is an impression
among some people living in the lower Ohio River valley that Judge
Fowler’s alleged manuscript on the history of the robber band
still exists. Inquiry recently made among his descendants resulted
in learning that many years before his death in 1880, he, in the
presence of an intimate friend, destroyed all his data on the
subject. Judge Fowler never permitted any one to see his notes and
seldom discussed the matter. It is said that on one occasion when
he was asked whether or not the Ford’s Ferry band was a branch of
the clan led by John A. Murrell, he left the impression that it had
at one time made some preparations to work in conjunction with the
great western land pirate and his band of negro stealers.
More or less has been written by historians and novelists about
John A. Murrell, but no writer connects him with Cave-in-Rock or
Ford’s Ferry. _The History of Virgil A. Stewart_, a book on the
life of Murrell, compiled by H. R. Howard and published in 1836,
gives an incomplete list of Murrell’s associates. Among the four
hundred and fifty names there recorded there is none familiar to
persons now living near Cave-in-Rock. Tradition says that Shouse
made a few trips between the Cave and Marked Tree, Arkansas, to
meet Murrell or some of his representatives for the purpose of
delivering and receiving messages pertaining to negro stealing and
the disposition of counterfeit money. But whether or not the Ford’s
Ferry band was ever part of the John A. Murrell clan will remain,
in all probability, one of the Ford’s Ferry mysteries.«40»
On June 7, 1834, Judge Thomas C. Brown sent a writ to Joshua
Howard, Sheriff of Pope County: “Whereas ... Judgment hath been
given in our said court that the said Henry C. Shouse shall be
hanged by the neck until he is dead and that execution of said
judgment be made and done on Monday the ninth day of June A.D.,
1834, between the hours of twelve of the clock at noon and four
of the clock in the evening of the same day, at some convenient
place in the vicinity, not more than one-half mile from the town
of Golconda in said county, in the usual manner of inflicting
punishment in such cases....” And on June 9 Shouse paid the
extreme penalty.
Tradition has it that on the day of the hanging thousands of people
came to Golconda from Gallatin and Pope counties, Illinois, and
from Livingston County, Kentucky, and other sections, to see the
first legal hanging in the county and to witness the death struggle
of a Ford’s Ferry and Cave-in-Rock outlaw. Even to this day, a
large crowd in that section of the country is measured as being
“as big as the one when Shouse was hanged.” The execution took
place in the creek bottom immediately north of the town limits, at
a spot where the slopes of the hills converge to form a natural
amphitheatre. About two o’clock in the afternoon Shouse was placed
on an ox-cart and driven to the scaffold that had been built by
erecting two heavy timbers with a cross beam over them. Between
these two upright posts the cart was placed, and into it the
condemned man’s coffin was then shoved, thus serving the purpose
of a platform and trap. Shouse’s hands were tied behind his back;
he was blindfolded and made to stand erect upon his coffin. The
suspended rope was looped around his neck; the oxen pulled the cart
forward and Shouse fell.
Thus terminated the career of one of the members of the mysterious
Ford’s Ferry band, and with it passed away forever bloodshed and
robbery at Cave-in-Rock.
The Cave in Fiction
Historical novels, with some exceptions, present the past in a more
interesting manner than do the formal histories which are intended
as chronicles of actual facts. It has been said, on the one hand,
that “truth is stranger than fiction,” and on the other that
“fiction is often more truthful than fact.” Fiction is undoubtedly
more truthful in the presentation of the manners and social life
of the period portrayed than is formal history. The history of
Cave-in-Rock and the careers of the outlaws identified with the
place is not only stranger than fiction, but is besprinkled
with many tragic and melodramatic scenes which, although almost
unimaginable, are actually true. For more than a century fiction
writers have used the Cave as a background for stories. These
authors by freely discarding the leading facts and drawing on their
own imaginations wrote stories less original than might otherwise
have been produced.
No effort has been made to compile a more or less complete
collection of works of fiction pertaining to the Cave. The stories
and poems commented on in the course of this chapter are only such
as were incidentally found while in search of history. Although
this fiction has very little of facts for a basis, and most of the
scenes are far from probable, nevertheless it necessarily stands
not only as Cave-in-Rock literature, but also as a contribution to
the good, bad, or indifferent literature of America. The fact that
more than one edition was published of the Cave-in-Rock novels here
referred to indicates, to some extent that they represent some of
the types of stories then in demand.
Stories dealing with mysterious murders and highway robberies
have always found many enthusiastic readers. It seems that every
decade of the nineteenth century produced at least one new tale of
Cave-in-Rock. And in our own times the writings of some well-known
living authors show that the Cave is still supplying material for
fiction.
In Irvin S. Cobb’s story “The Dogged Under Dog,” (originally
published in the _Saturday Evening Post_, August 3, 1912, and
shortly thereafter printed in Cobb’s book entitled _Back Home_) one
of the characters, recalling some of the rough men who lived near
the Cave when that country was still new, says Big Harpe and Little
Harpe were run down by dogs and killed and that “the men who killed
them cut off their heads and salted them down and packed them both
in a piggin of brine, and sent the piggin by a man on horseback up
to Frankfort to collect the reward.”
Nancy Huston Banks in _Oldfield_, 1902, devotes a few pages to
Cave-in-Rock, the Harpes, and a character she calls “Alvarado,” a
mysterious Spaniard who frequented the lower Ohio valley and who
was suspected of having been a comrade of Jean Lafitte. Mrs. Banks,
in her next historical novel, _’Round Anvil Rock_, 1903 (in which
Philip Alston is one of the leading characters) refers to that
section of Kentucky lying opposite the Cave as having been the
“Rogues Harbor.”
The Harpes, Masons, and the Cave are introduced in _The Ark of
1803_, by C. A. Stephens. This book for boys, published in 1904, is
intended as a picture of romances and tragedies incidental to early
navigation on the Ohio and Mississippi. It serves that purpose
fairly well, although practically no statement made by the author
regarding the Harpes and the Masons is in accordance with history
or tradition.
[Illustration: VIEW OF CAVE-IN-ROCK AND VICINITY, 1833
It shows a landscape interesting in itself but false to the actual
scene
(Reproduced from Charles Bodmer’s drawing)]
Our earliest item relative to fiction pertaining to the Cave was
found in a review published in _The Port Folio_, February, 1809, of
Thomas Ashe’s _Travels in America Performed in 1806_, printed in
London in 1808. The critics in Ashe’s day, and ever since, declared
the writer of _Travels_ a literary thief, bone thief, and infamous
prevaricator and ridiculed his work on the ground that it was
filled with incredible stories grafted onto authentic incidents and
actual facts. This general condemnation gave the new book a wide
circulation for a few years. The editor of _The Port Folio_ devotes
a dozen pages to his “entire contempt both of Mr. Ashe and his
work.”
Most of the travelers who appeared after Ashe’s day and examined
the Cave detected in his sketch a combination of facts and fiction
that helped spread the name and history of this interesting and
picturesque rendezvous of outlaws. Many a visitor still goes to
the place expecting to explore the “upper cave” but soon discovers
that its size has been wildly exaggerated by Ashe. His account
of the Cave is one of the longest ever written and will always
be of curious interest no matter from what standpoint it may be
read, other than history. The reproach to Ashe is that he gave the
hoax out as veritable facts encountered in his travels and never
corrected this impression or acknowledged his purpose. About half
of what he says concerning the Cave is at least highly probable;
the remainder is wholly fictitious.
A casual investigation of the stories published after outlawry
terminated at Ford’s Ferry, brought to light two novels and a
long poem in which the Cave serves as a background. Viewed from
the standpoint of today their plots have the consistency of a dime
novel. Browsing in the field of fiction also led to the discovery
of the one time celebrated romance of _Harpe’s Head_.
_Harpe’s Head_, by Judge James Hall, was first published in America
in 1833, and the following year was printed in London under the
title of _Kentucky, A Tale_. It was later republished in America
in Judge Hall’s volume, _Legends of the West_. _Harpe’s Head_ is
the only novel in which the notorious Harpes are introduced as
characters. It is a story of a small emigrant family traveling from
Virginia to western Kentucky over the route then endangered by the
Harpes. All the characters are fictitious, except the two outlaws
and their wives. No reference is made to their career at the Cave.
The romance is written in a dignified and graceful style.
_Atkinson’s Casket_ for November, 1833, in its comments on the
book says “it has some masterly scenes,” and quotes one in full--a
Virginia barbecue. Among other interesting sketches of pioneer
times woven into _Harpe’s Head_ is one of “Hercules Short” or
“Hark Short, the Snake Killer,” a half-witted boy who performs
extraordinary feats and who labors under the impression that he is
a son of Big Harpe. On one occasion “Hark” remarks that his mother
told him, “If anybody was to rake hell with a fine-comb they would
not find sich a tarnal villain as Big Harpe.”
Edmund L. Starling, in his _History of Henderson County, Kentucky_,
1887, says: “The history of the Harpes in this portion of Kentucky,
has long ago, and repeatedly found its way into the histories of
Kentucky and other states, in pamphlets and the newspapers of
the country, and at one time was even dramatized for the American
stage. But it was so desperate and appalling to all rational
sensibilities that it was abandoned by the drama.” I did not find
any pamphlets or dramas regarding the Harpes.
The earliest novel found using Cave-in-Rock for a background
is _Mike Fink, A Legend of the Ohio_, by Emerson Bennett, who
for a time was a well-known writer of thrilling romances. This
melodrama was first published in Cincinnati in 1848, and although
now a somewhat rare book, it ranked, judging from the number of
editions issued, among widely-read stories of the middle of the
last century. Its popularity was not due to any high literary
merit, but to its wild and extravagant plot. The greater part of
the story deals with bloody battles between a band of outlaws and
the flatboat crew and passengers led by Mike Fink. Practically all
the action takes place in or near the Cave, and for that reason “A
Legend of Cave-in-Rock” would have been a more appropriate subtitle.
Shortly after _Mike Fink_ was put into circulation there appeared
in the _Alton_ (Illinois) _Courier_, 1852, a prize serial entitled
_Virginia Rose_, by Dr. Edward Reynolds Roe. Having gone through
a pamphlet edition, this Cave-in-Rock story was published in book
form in 1882 under the title of _Brought to Bay_, and in 1892 the
same story was republished and its title changed back to _Virginia
Rose_. Dr. E. R. Roe--not E. P. Roe with whom he is sometimes
confused--was a citizen of Illinois, practiced medicine and wrote a
number of books. He died in Chicago in 1893 at the age of eighty.
He lived in Shawneetown a few years, beginning in 1843, and it is
said he prepared the greater part of this manuscript while residing
there.
The book has no preface and the presumption is that all the
characters are fictitious. The story deals with the career of
a girl, Virginia Rose, who was kidnapped in Shawneetown by her
father, the leader of the Cave-in-Rock outlaws. He takes her to
the Cave, and it so happened that shortly thereafter the New
Madrid earthquake of 1811 occurs. The citizens of Shawneetown,
suspecting that the stolen Virginia Rose may have been taken to
the Cave, so runs the story, organize a rescuing party. Upon their
arrival at the Cave, they, to their great surprise, find the place
abandoned. Boxes and barrels were scattered around, their contents
undisturbed, and the general appearance indicated that the place
had been abandoned suddenly.
In the words of the author: “Remnants of a feast which had never
been eaten were lying upon a table; lamps were hanging around burnt
out for want of oil.... The hatchway overhead, which communicated
with the room above was not closed ... but the avenues which led
from it to the inner cave had disappeared. The rock had fallen from
above in vast masses and closed all connection between the upper
cave and the outer world forever.... What was a hill back of the
cave bluff now appeared to be a hollow or depression, as compared
to the ground around it.... The outlaws had met their fate--they
had perished in the earthquake [except the leader and his daughter
who were on the Mississippi at the time] perhaps in the midst of
gay festivities, perhaps in the hour of music and dancing! Who
could say? Not a soul was left to tell the tale. The men who had
come to execute vengeance could not now avoid sympathy for the
dead.”
Thus did the author of _Virginia Rose_ make the New Madrid
earthquake wipe out the Cave-in-Rock’s “inner cave” or “upper
cave” that had been “discovered” and is so extravagantly described
by Thomas Ashe!
Between recorded history on the one hand and stories of fiction on
the other stands the book _Chronicles of a Kentucky Settlement_,
1897, by William Courtney Watts. It is a historical romance based
solely on local tradition. Although this work is somewhat faulty in
its general construction, and may be, at times, somewhat crude in
its literary style, it is, nevertheless, one of the most faithful
historical sketches of early Kentucky.
The leading characters are Joseph Watts and Lucinda Haynes, who
were first thrown together in 1805 when children on their way from
North Carolina to the West, Joseph going to Tennessee and Lucinda
moving with her parents to Kentucky. A few years later Joseph Watts
began a search for Miss Haynes and found her near Salem, Kentucky.
After a courtship such as none but lovers in a new country could
experience, they were married and became the parents of the author
who tells their story. Among other characters is Charles H. Webb,
who gave Watts an account of his capture at Cave-in-Rock and escape
from the outlaws and who later married the daughter of James Ford.
The gloomiest tragedy in the book concerns the unfortunate Lucy
Jefferson Lewis, sister of Thomas Jefferson, whose two sons killed
a slave on their farm near Smithland, Kentucky, and cut up the body
in an attempt to conceal their crime. One of the Lewis brothers
committed suicide on his mother’s grave and the other escaped
after he had been arrested for murder and placed in jail. All the
characters in _Chronicles_ are presented under fictitious names.«41»
It is probable that every person who saw the landscape of which
the opening of the Cave forms a part had his sense of romance and
poetry stirred by the sight. To what extent attempts were made to
express this emotion in the form of poetry or verse is not known.
Only one poem has been found--“The Outlaw,” by Charles H. Jones,
of Cincinnati. It comprises about one thousand two hundred lines,
published in 1835 in a neatly bound booklet called _The Outlaw and
Other Poems_. In the October, 1835, issue of the _Western Monthly
Magazine_, of Cincinnati, Judge James Hall devotes two pages to a
eulogistic review of the book, encouraging the young poet in his
work. A more enthusiastic reviewer might have called this an epic
of Cave-in-Rock.
In his introductory note Mr. Jones briefly refers to the then
well-known fact that the Cave had been for many years the resort of
a band of outlaws all of whom were finally either killed or driven
out by the Rangers. As to his authorities he states that “the
ravages of the robbers are still fresh in the recollection of many
of the inhabitants of the lower Ohio valley.”
About one-half of the poem is an “effervescence of poetic fancy,”
with here and there a real gem. The plot is dramatic. The story
begins in Virginia. Our hero shoots his successful rival in love
immediately after the wedding ceremony. Believing he has killed the
groom and that the shock has proven fatal to the bride, he flees to
the wilds of the West. He drifts down the Ohio, joins the band of
outlaws at the Cave and soon becomes their leader--The Outlaw.
One “dark tempestuous night” a flatboat passing the Cave is
attacked by the robbers; a fierce and bloody combat follows.
The Outlaw discovers among the passengers the very girl who had
discarded him for another--and still alive. He stabs her in the
heart and then--
“He raised her body from the floor,
And hurled it to the foaming wave,
Her white robe red with streaming gore,
A fitting shroud for such a grave.”
The battle continues. The Outlaw kills man after man, when to his
surprise he finds himself facing the very man he thought he had
killed in Virginia. The two recognize each other instantly. They
draw daggers and The Outlaw is slain. And the boatmen, so runs the
story, exterminate the band of robbers at the Cave.
“The morning breaks, the fight is o’er,
Peace smiles again upon the shore ...
Yon arching cave is lonely now,
The tenants of its holds have fled,
Or on the hill-top’s rocky brow
Are sleeping with the dead....
No more those cavern’s walls will ring
With sounds of mirth and rioting,
And peacefully along the tide,
The laden barks will slowly glide;
Their crews no more will deem they see
A robber’s form in every tree,
And grasp their rifles and prepare
For deeds of blood and carnage there;
But as they pass along the shore,
Will pause and rest upon the oar,
And tell of many a bloody tale,
The legends of yon gloomy vale;
And travelers, with curious eyes,
Will view its chambers in surprise,
And scarce believe that where they stand,
Was heard the clash of brand on brand,
And yonder yawning cavern’s gloom
The Outlaw’s dwelling--and his tomb;
But rather all they hear they’ll deem
A fable, or a fairy dream.”
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