A KILKENNY AFFAIR AT TAMAQUA.
Taking cars over the Shamokin branch of the Philadelphia and Reading
road, the ensuing morning, McKenna started for his destination; but,
overhearing a conversation occurring in the seat before his own, between
two rough-looking men who boarded the train at a station not far from
Shenandoah, during the course of which he learned that Muff Lawler had
gone on a short visit to some friends in Pottsville, he concluded it
would be best to shun the locality for the present and proceed at once
to Tamaqua, a city that, thus far, he had devoted very little attention
to. When the train stopped, therefore, at the point named, he took up
his satchel—having left the remainder of his baggage at the hotel in
Girardville—alighted at the depot, and, proceeding at once to the
Columbia House, which he had understood from Dormer was frequented by
the Mollie Maguires when visiting the city, secured a room and made the
acquaintance of the innkeeper, named Marks. Although by this time
somewhat accustomed to rough society and unruly transactions, he soon
acquired the information that, of all the cities, towns, and villages he
had seen in Pennsylvania, to Tamaqua, at that date, must be awarded the
palm for holding prominence in these particular characteristics. It
appeared to be the centre of attraction for a flock of unemployed
stragglers, discharged men from adjacent collieries, tramps, and other
reprobates. Liquor flowed unrestrainedly, and was largely consumed in
the various saloons and taverns. A storm of wind, rain, and sleet
prevailed, and the streets wore a deserted appearance, while the
grog-shops and gambling-rooms were all crowded and in full blast. There
were other disturbing elements at work in the community, one being the
strike of the miners, which had just been inaugurated. A basis for the
settlement of differences existing between the proprietors and the
employés of collieries, had only recently found the miners prepared with
a prompt negative, and, without some agreement—and that seemed far
away—not a man among the laborers would dare begin operations. Hence
idleness prevailed—“an idle brain is the devil’s own workshop,” in the
coal regions as elsewhere—and bad habits, bad deeds, were among the
results accompanying this unsatisfactory state of affairs. While some of
the miners had gone elsewhere, seeking jobs for the winter—a portion to
Luzerne, and others to Columbia County—there were many who, having
families and homes thereabouts demanding attention, yet remained,
waiting for some change to better their condition.
Tamaqua was filled with excited men and exciting whisky.
Not long after reaching the city, who should present himself to
McKenna’s notice but the identical Dan Kelly, left, not so long before,
in Pottsville; the man who became his friend, and who, somewhat earlier,
had backed Fighting Frazer in his contest in Dormer’s house. Of course
they expressed themselves as mutually glad to see each other. The
operative explained to Kelly that the party for whom he was to have
worked in the mountains, on the mythical water basin, was found to be a
first-class deception; and, leaving him in disgust, he had visited the
adjacent country in search of work. All of this Kelly received with
perfect faith in its truth, however untruthful; and that personage told
the detective, in turn, that he was more fortunate, having obtained a
paying job at Boston Run Colliery, less than two miles from the borough
of Tamaqua. In fact, the reason of his visit to town that day was to buy
a suit of shifting clothes.
Kelly at once insisted that the operative should accompany him to a
saloon and partake of something warm and stimulative. This constituted
an invitation not easily refusable under the circumstances. It was
accepted, and the drinkables enjoyed. After this, and following some
talk about mining and acquaintances in Pottsville, the detective went
with Kelly to the train, and saw him safely off for home. Kelly had
remarked that Tamaqua was no place for men like himself and companion,
as there were no friends in the town, the nearest being at Old Mines,
some five miles distant. Occasionally a few straggling brothers
accidentally convened at some tavern in Tamaqua, but no regular
organization had ever commenced or been maintained in the city; several
times, however, the thing had been started, and as often fallen through.
Upon returning to the Columbia House, and while partaking of supper,
McKenna was accosted, in a friendly way, by a man who had been
introduced to him as Gillespie:
“Are you posted as to the standing in the community of the man with whom
I just saw you at the depot—I mean the one carrying the bundle on his
arm?”
“An’ why not?” answered the detective, still maintaining more of the
brogue than was natural for him. “Why not? Do I know Dan Kelly? Sure an’
I lately made meself a companion of his, at Pat Dormer’s place, in the
borough of Pottsville. An’ didn’t he back Fighting Frazer agin me fur
the first bit of a scrimmage I ever enjoyed in Schuylkill County? That
he did! An’ he war gentleman enough not to harbor malice agin me! On the
conthrary, I flatter meself that he an’ I are rather warrum friends at
the prisent moment! What should I be inquarin’ as to his char_ac_ter
for? He’s all correct, isn’t he?”
“Manus has been very unfortunate.”
“Manus who?”
“Manus Kull, sure!”
“Manus Kull? Is that the name ye give the person I saw off on the train,
beyant?”
“Certainly! That’s his name!”
“Well, Mr. Gillespie, I hev regard for ye, but must say that ye labor
under a mistaken idea! It war Dan Kelly, a miner—an’ he has work not so
far from this town—that I saw to the train the day!”
“Oh, I know what I am talking about!” said Gillespie, a little nettled
by McKenna’s unbelief. “He is Manus Kull! I insist upon that, say what
you may! Haven’t I known him since he was knee high to a rabbit? and,
sorry I am to say it, since he came to the age of maturity it is very
little I’ve learned to his credit.”
“Kelly’s the name I’ve always heard him called—Dan Kelly, at that—an’
sure I didn’t take him for wan of those havin’ occasion to dale in
double names an’ deceptions!”
“He is none other than Manus Kull; tho’ since his troubles he may have
adopted some other man’s name, having doubly dishonored his own. And,
what is more to the purpose in my speaking with you, to put you on your
guard, lest you make an intimate associate of him, to my certain
knowledge he has served a term of three years in Luzerne County jail for
biting off a man’s ear, in the course of a rough-and-tumble fight, at
the town of Wilkesbarre. And upon one court-day there were not less than
eight or nine warrants out and in the hands of officers for his arrest,
for offenses ranging all the way from assault and battery to burglary
and highway robbery. He has broken his poor mother’s heart, has Manus
Kull!”
The talk continued in this strain for some moments, during which the
detective learned—as before he had more than half suspected—that Kull,
_alias_ Kelly, was only one among many hard cases usually congregating
at the Sheridan House. Expressing some surprise, however, that he should
be thus misled, he continued his meal in silence.
During the same evening two miners, named Mullhearn and McGinly, arrived
at the hotel from the neighborhood of Mauch Chunk, both in a state of
semi-intoxication and ready for any sort of adventure that might come
within reach. The large bar-room gradually filled with people. Finally
the two strangers, concluding a deal of loud talk plentifully
interspersed with oaths, managed to get up a wrestling match in the
apartment, a ring being cleared for the purpose. Then all was noise and
confusion. Some, not particularly interested in manly sports, were
engaged in drowning sorrow, from lack of work, in deep potations at the
bar. Others sat, nodding stupidly in their chairs. After a protracted
struggle, in which several heavy falls were given and received on either
side, Mullhearn was fairly thrown, his antagonist coming down upon him
with great force, and McGinly declared the victor. The result of this
decision was the formation of two parties in the assemblage, a McGinly
party and a Mullhearn party; this culminated, as might have been
expected, in the usual Kilkenny fight, in which all participated,
battering skulls, blacking eyes, breaking noses, and spoiling
countenances generally. During the prevalence of this hurly-burly, one
Dougherty, who commanded a crowd of roughs like himself, and who was
affected more than those about him by the liquor he had drank, pulled
out a pistol and commenced discharging it into the walls, ceilings,
floors, counters, or whatever eligible objects he chanced to see.
Fortunately, the supply of cartridges was quickly exhausted and nobody
hurt except the ruffian himself. One of the missiles from his weapon,
rebounding from the hard wood of the counter, came back with force,
striking Dougherty in the left hip, inflicting a painful but not deadly
wound. The shooting had been in sport, and, the practical joker, having
received merited reward for his ghastly jest, the disturbance was
quieted, and while his injury was examined almost silence reigned.
McKenna, saying he had some experience in the surgical line volunteered
to dress Dougherty’s hurt. His navy service was again alluded to, and,
as there was no doctor nigh, the duty finally devolved upon him of
staunching the blood and binding up the injury. A little whisky and
water, properly applied, soon performed the first, and a keen pen-knife
quickly laid bare the bullet, which had not penetrated deeply, and it
was deftly extracted by the fingers. Then more whisky and water cleansed
the hurt, while a plaster was procured from a neighboring drug-store,
applied, and, the patient, feeling quite easy, before the borough police
had discovered who had done the shooting, Dougherty resumed his carousal
with his associates.
[Illustration: “_McKenna saying he had some experience in the surgical
line, volunteered to dress Dougherty’s hurt._”]
Marks, the proprietor of the hotel, was able to breathe more freely when
the Dougherty crowd vacated the premises. McKenna earned many plaudits
from Dougherty’s friends for the skill he had exhibited in amateur
surgery, but Dougherty himself said that he had cut him more and deeper
than necessary, and he would never forgive him for it. Unreasonable as
this certainly was, his followers earnestly endeavored to convince the
drunken fellow of his error, but the liquor in him had turned his brain,
and it is presumable that he might have sought to punish the detective,
who had assisted to preserve his worthless life, had not others
prevailed upon him to defer it until the morrow, and finally succeeded
in coaxing and dragging him off to another tavern. In a short time he
was as drunk as ever. Some of the Dougherty crowd said if they ever
wanted a doctor they “would send for that fellow just from the Rocky
Mountains.”
As much to get out of the way of the intoxicated men as from any other
reason, McKenna, the hour still being early, left the bar-room and
hunted up Pat Nolan, to whom he bore a letter from Dormer, finding the
man soberly at his home. Nolan read the epistle and said he was happy to
meet any friend of Dormer, but was sorry to say that work, for the
present at least, was simply out of the question. They had some quiet
games at cards, and passed a couple of hours pleasantly, when the
detective bade all good-night, and, at about eleven o’clock, went back
to the Columbia House. Before midnight, leaving the place well filled on
the ground floor, he retired to his bed—but not to sleep, as fate or
circumstance ordained. Too much noise rang upon his drowsy ear to make
slumber possible. He had been between the sheets, tossing uneasily from
side to side and enjoying such brief intervals of repose as he could
catch betwixt waves of uproar and riot rising from the depths beneath
him, during a couple of hours, perhaps, when there was a resounding
rattle at his chamber door. Without moving, he asked, in no pleasant
tone:
“Who the divil’s there?”
The answer was not particularly reassuring:
“We want to get in!” said somebody in a thick, gruff voice.
McKenna quickly appreciated the fact that Dougherty and his unruly crew
were looking for him.
“Go away, an’ don’t bother me!” shouted the operative. But this had no
other effect than to increase the force that some person was exerting
upon the bolts of the bedroom door. Visions of sanguinary Mollie
Maguires, and an unpleasant feeling that they might possibly have
penetrated his disguise, discovered his deception, flitted through his
weary brain. But instantly dispersing all such thoughts as mere dreams—
——“Interludes, which Fancy weaves
When the monarch, Reason, sleeps”—
he leaped from the bed, making considerable stir, lighted a lamp, and
said, in a loud, determined, and unfaltering voice:
“Now, get away out of that, ye spalpeens, or I’ll jist blow the head off
some of yez!”
The shaking of the lock soon ceased, and the steps of several persons
were heard retreating. Once more seeking his pillow, the weary man
endeavored to obtain some repose. But in a little while he again
distinguished the stealthy fall of human feet nigh the entrance of his
apartment. Dougherty, for the second time, was trying to force admission
to his presence.
“We _must_ get in!” exclaimed the drunken man.
Exasperated at this long-continued annoyance, McKenna turned out, struck
a light, donned a portion of his garments, suddenly unlocked and opened
the door, and brought the forbidding, dark muzzle of his heavy
seven-shooter plump in Dougherty’s face, demanding his business with him
at such an hour and such a place. Hesitating somewhat, and dodging his
head from side to side to escape McKenna’s aim, he faltered out:
“I can’t find me partner! Didn’t know but he might be in this room!”
“I don’t know anything about your partner, if you have wan, an’ I give
ye due notice that I’ve had plenty and to spare of you an’ your eternal
racket! So get out of this, quick! An’ don’t ye come banging about here
any more! Sure, an’ if ye do, I’ll make serious trouble wid ye!”
Perfectly quieted down by the pistol, the detective’s undaunted front
and resolute language, Dougherty and his companions took themselves off,
invoking anything but compliments upon the man who had sent them away so
unceremoniously. Again McKenna extinguished his lamp and courted repose.
For a short time he slept fitfully and ill at ease, but, about an hour
before daylight, he was aroused by sounds of a desperate row in progress
below stairs. Pistol-shot after pistol-shot echoed along the corridors
and through the rooms, making the hearer think that a small army of
bushwhackers were attacking the house, and practising to see how many
bullets they could lodge in the weatherboarding. He finally started up,
unable longer to bear the confusion, and, after putting on his clothing,
took the light in his left hand, and with the right resting on the butt
of his revolver, which he held ready for immediate use, in his outside
coat pocket, noiselessly opened the door, made his exit, and moved
toward the supposed scene of conflict. Not much accustomed to the sense
of fear, the detective thought, as he bent his steps in the direction of
the warfare, and as the jar and other evidences of deadly strife smote
more clearly upon his ear, he really experienced a feeling akin to that
of a soldier when receiving the “baptism of fire” upon his initial
battle-ground. At least there was a queer creeping of the flesh, a
chilly blast over his back and shoulders, a novel rising up of the
scalp, as he entered the dark, deserted bar-room, and still heard, as
though in the distance, the rattle of small arms. The fight was
evidently losing none of its intensity. “Perhaps it has been transferred
to the kitchen or dining-room,” he thought. It must be in one or the
other, and in which he could not decide. Upon opening the entrance of
the latter place, however, the mystery was quickly solved, and a strange
spectacle presented itself to his vision.
————●————