A NIGHT RAID OF DETECTIVES.
After Whicher's melancholy fate, Allan Pinkerton had motives aside
from those of gain for pursuing to the death the celebrated border
bandits, Frank and Jesse James. In one year, three of the most
courageous and trusted men in the employ of the distinguished
detective had been sent out after the Missouri outlaws, and were
carried back cold in death, after conflicts with the desperadoes.
Whicher and Lull and Daniels were asleep in gory beds. And yet
Frank and Jesse James, and their followers and allies, were free
as the winds that blow, to come and go as interest or caprice
might dictate to them. While this condition of affairs continued,
Pinkerton must have felt that his reputation as a skillful
entrapper of criminals suffered.
About the first of the year 1875, the great detective commenced
a campaign against the renowned brigands which was meant to be
finally effective. The most elaborate and careful preparations were
made. Nothing was left undone which could in any way contribute to
the success of the undertaking. The utmost secrecy was observed in
every movement.
Several circumstances seemed to favor the detectives. Many of
the most respectable citizens of Clay county had grown weary of
the presence in their midst of persons of the evil reputation of
the Jameses, and entered with alacrity and zeal into the scheme
inaugurated for the capture of the Boys. Among those of the
citizens most prominent in the movement which had for its design
the annihilation of the band of which Jesse James was supposed
to be the chief leader, were several of the old neighbors and
acquaintances of the James and Samuels families.
With these citizens, Mr. William Pinkerton, who had gone from
Chicago to Kansas City, to direct the movements of the detective
forces, opened communication. A system of cipher signals was
adopted, and communications constantly passed between the
different persons engaged in the undertaking. The citizens in the
neighborhood of Kearney were watchful, and keenly observed every
movement in the vicinity of the residence of Dr. Samuels, and
daily transmitted the results to their chief, who had established
temporary headquarters at Kansas City.
It was known to some of the immediate neighbors of Dr. Samuels that
Frank and Jesse James were at home. They had been seen occasionally
at the little railway station of Kearney, which is three miles
distant from the residence which had been, and was still claimed,
as the home of the outlaws. Near neighbors, in casually passing,
had seen them about the barnyards. All these things had been
faithfully reported to the chief detective at Kansas City.
At length the opportune time for striking a decisive blow was
deemed to have arrived. Dispatches in cipher were sent to Chicago
for reinforcements, and specific orders touching their movements
after their arrival near the objective point, were given. The
Kansas City division of the forces was held in readiness to
co-operate with the force from the East. The citizens of Clay
county, who had so zealously aided the detectives, received final
instructions as to the part they were to take in the grand _coup_,
by which their county was to be forever relieved of the presence of
the dangerous outlaws.
Extraordinary precautions had been taken to maintain a profound
secrecy as to the movements and purposes of the detectives. No
strange men had been seen loitering about Kearney. Everything
which could possibly be done to allay suspicion on the part of the
outlaws had been done. But the Jameses had friends everywhere in
Western Missouri--keen, shrewd, vigilant men, who noted everything,
and whose suspicions were aroused by the slightest circumstance.
The very quiet which prevailed was ominous of approaching danger.
Somehow, too, they had learned of the sending and receiving of
cipher messages by a Clay county man, at Liberty. This made them
doubly watchful.
The extensive preparations which had been made, and the necessity
imposed upon them of waiting for a suitable opportunity to strike,
had occupied much time, and it was not until the night of the 25th
of January, that the detectives made the final attack.
Jesse and Frank had been seen near the Samuels place that very
evening, and no doubt was entertained that they were at home.
The detective forces destined for the attack on what was
facetiously termed "Castle James," were divided into small squads,
and began to arrive in Clay county on the afternoon of the 24th,
from the East. Coming after night, they were met by citizens of
Clay county and conducted to places of shelter in the most quiet
and secret manner. After nightfall on the evening of the 25th, a
special train came up by Kearney, and on it came another detachment
from Kansas City. These were met by citizens well acquainted, and
conducted to the place of rendezvous.
Secretly as these movements had been conducted, the ever-vigilant
Jesse had his suspicions aroused by some trivial circumstance,
which would have escaped the attention of almost any other man.
Convinced that some formidable movement was going on, designed to
consummate his destruction, Jesse James, his brother, and another
member of the band rode away from the Samuels house after nightfall
that very evening, and at the hour when the detectives arrived in
the vicinity of the place where they expected to capture them, the
Jameses were riding in the cold, well on their way to the house of
a friend, miles away.
The detectives had no intimation that their intended victims had
taken the alarm and departed from the place. They were assured that
the outlaws had been seen in the vicinity of their home at a late
hour in the afternoon, and it was believed that they were there
still.
The night was cold and dark. It was late--perhaps near midnight,
when the detective force arrived at the farm-house. There were nine
men selected from Pinkerton's force because of their shrewdness
and courage, and several citizens of the vicinity who, like the
detectives, were fully armed. The assailing forces took up their
stations completely surrounding the house. Some balls of tow
thoroughly saturated with kerosene oil and turpentine had been
prepared, and the detectives carried with them some formidable
hand-grenades to be used in the assault. Two of the assailants
approached a window at the rear of the house. The slight noise made
in opening the shutters and raising the sash aroused a negro woman,
an old family servant, who was sleeping in the apartment. She at
once set up a shout of alarm which speedily brought to the room
Mrs. Samuels, her husband, and several members of the family, some
of them young children.
[Illustration: Night Attack on the Samuels Residence.]
Just then a lighted ball of tow and oil was thrown into the room.
The place was instantly brilliantly illuminated. The inmates
of course, having just been aroused from slumber, were greatly
agitated at this unexpected assault. The situation was truly
appalling. Another lighted ball was hurled into the room. The
younger members of the family cried out piteously as they fled
aghast from the lurid flames that shot toward the ceiling. Mrs.
Samuels quickly recovered her presence of mind, and began to
give directions and personally to exert herself in the work of
subduing the flames. She was permitted only a moment to engage in
this employment. There was a sudden crash as a great iron ball
struck the floor, followed in an instant by a terrific explosion.
Instantly the room was filled by a dense cloud of smoke, through
which the white flames of the fireballs gleamed with a lurid red
hue as if tinged with blood. There was a wail of agony from within
that pandemonium of midnight horrors which might well have called
emotion to a heart of stone. The piteous moans of childhood in
dying throes, were mingled with the deeper groans of suffering
age, and the shriller cries of terrified youth. The work of the
assailants in that particular line of attack was complete. And yet
the noted outlaws did not appear. It was at once concluded that
they were not present or they would have shown themselves under
such circumstances. The attacking force did not wait to ascertain
the result of the explosion of their terrible missile. They
realized only that the game they sought had escaped them, and they
retired from the place without caring to learn anything more about
the consequences of their effort. They had failed, and that was all
they felt interested in ascertaining.
When the smoke had cleared away and the fires which had been
kindled about the house were extinguished, the extent of the
execution done by the explosion was fully revealed. The spectacle
presented was awful beyond any power of our pen to describe. There,
lying on the floor, in a pool of blood, poured out from his own
young veins, was the mangled form of an eight-year old son of Mrs.
Samuels, in the very throes of death; Mrs. Samuels' right arm hung
helpless by her side, having been almost completely torn off above
the elbow. Dr. Samuels was cut and bruised; the aged colored woman
was wounded in several places; in fact, every member of the household
was more or less injured. Blood was everywhere. Death was in the room;
and pain and grief combined smote upon every soul in that stricken home.
Whatever the crimes of the boys of ill-favored reputation, they
afforded no justification for this terrible assault in which
innocent childhood was made the victim for the deeds of others. And
the people of the state, without any exceptions, condemned the deed
as wholly unjustifiable. The detectives made haste to leave the
country, and the citizens who had assisted them returned to their
homes and kept counsel with themselves.
The dead boy was taken away, and in his little grave under the snow
they left him lying, the sinless victim of sin, over whose untimely
fate many hearts have swelled with emotions too big for utterance.