PLOT TO DESTROY THE CATAWISSA BRIDGES
Before the opening of spring, McKenna fully recovered his health—at
least was well enough to join his friends in many of their midnight and
other carousals and sprees. It was afterward remembered by his
associates, that as soon as any dark deeds were done, he generally
managed, sick or intoxicated, to make his appearance in the vicinity of
the occurrences. But these slight eccentricities in the behavior of the
wild Irishman of the mountains passed at the time unnoticed by the
Mollies. That he came and went they knew, but questioned not the why or
wherefore. So little were they on the alert for anything Jim McKenna
might do, that, in reality, they seemed to think the very act he
performed the most natural for a man of his supposed character under the
attending circumstances. While looking after the threatened destruction
of the high and costly bridges of the Catawissa Railway—of these more
hereafter—the detective had a queer adventure, in the neighborhood of
Ringtown Mountain, that his reports make no mention of, but a
description of which the writer has verbally received within the past
few months. Chancing to be in Girardville, on a visit to Jack Kehoe, the
operative encountered Frank McAndrew and a miner named Maguire—the
latter being a Mollie by name as well as by nature—both of whom were
perceptibly the worse for much spirits they had imbibed during the day,
and they found it very difficult to guide their own movements, unaided,
over the homeward road, which was still deeply covered with snow. Kehoe
saved the almost helpless men from freezing to death, by taking them
into his house and seating them by the stove; but, through later
absorption of a few more drinks at the bar, they were left, in the
course of a few hours, in as poor condition for locomotion as before
entering the tavern.
“See here, McKenna,” said the County Delegate, “I don’t see whatever I’m
to do wid these fellows! Sure an’ they insist on goin’ home this very
night to Shenandoah, beyant, at all hazards, an’ I know, as well as I
know I’m now spakin’, they’ll be stone dead, if they ever live to get
off the mountain, wid the cold an’ the whisky! You’ll hev to go in their
company, an’ see they don’t fraze up enthirely!”
“Faix an’ I am the lad that kin do that same!” answered the Secretary!
“But how am I to act wid the obstinate bastes if they jist lie down in
the snow an’ refuse to move? That might bother me! The divil can’t match
a drunken man fur obstinacy!”
“Oh, fur that matther,” said King Jack, with a cruel blaze in his eye,
“if they do that, ye’ll hev to build a fire under ’em as we do below a
balky mule, an’ here’s plenty of matches for your use!”
Kehoe handed the operative a box of lucifers and held the light until
the three men were well off the platform in front of his house, when he
wished them plenty of “good luck” and shut the door, leaving them in
darkness.
Kehoe having found out that the men carried a little money with them,
and fearing they might be robbed, even if lucky enough to escape death
by freezing, should they linger by the roadside, was glad to have
McKenna travel in their company.
The path was dimly marked and the obscurity almost impenetrable, as the
young man, with a drunken miner clinging to either arm, attempted to
seek the way over the hills to Shenandoah. First McAndrew stumbled and
fell, and McKenna was forced to relax his hold of Maguire and help his
superior officer to his feet. While this was being accomplished,
Maguire, left unpropped, and unable or unwilling to stand alone,
suddenly slipped and went down headlong through the darkness into a deep
bank of snow, in which he floundered and sputtered like a struggling
novice at a swimming-school. McKenna, at first, tried hard to restrain
his temper, and finally succeeded in starting both of his protégés once
more _en route_ for home. But his patience gave way after three or four
repetitions of the same act, varied only by McAndrew rolling down a
steep declivity, and coming very near going off a ledge of rock to the
bottom, a distance of thirty feet.
“I’ll be shivered!” exclaimed McAndrew, when once more in the road, “if
I walk another step! What’ser use gettin’ all tired out, when its so
warrum and nice slapin’ here? I’m jist goin’ to bed!”
So saying, the Bodymaster threw himself flat in the snowbank, stretched
out his limbs, and prepared to stay where he was during the remainder of
the night.
“Tha’so!” repeated Maguire. “Move ’long, Frank, an’ don’t take up all
the bed!”
And he quickly followed McAndrew’s example. Both continued recumbent,
despite the detective’s exertions to keep them in the observance of a
perpendicular; and before many minutes elapsed, were snoring away in
concert, as though safely under blankets at their respective homes.
“What the divil am I to do now?” soliloquized McKenna. “It’ll never do
to follow Kehoe’s advice, beside the matches are as wet as a dog after a
bath, wid the snow in me pocket! Here’s a raal quandary!” He did not
forget his brogue even when talking to himself.
Presently the agent observed a faint light in the distance, and resolved
to make one more effort. He shouted in McAndrew’s ear:
“Get up now! Faith an’ I see the light in Mike Carey’s shebeen! Sure
they’re awake yet, an’ ye know the sort o’ liquor they sells? Get up,
an’ we’ll rouse that drunken Maguire—not that you’re touched at all
yourself—an’ go on a few steps, an’ I’ll stan’ trate when Mike Casey
puts out the stamin’ whisky-punch!”
“What-yer say about ‘whis-sy-punch?’” drowsily inquired McAndrew,
turning over on his side and filling his mouth with snow, “Was-is—it
bout ‘whissy-punch?’”
“I say old Mike Casey’s place is jist beyant, an’ that I’ll trate!”
“Enough said! Give me a lif’,” begged McAndrew, and he strove to rise.
“I—I—belave I really am gettin’ uncommon thirsty! ’Swonderful how atin’
snow’ll make one take to the drink!”
The drunken fellow blew the snow away from his eyes, nostrils, and
mouth, and truly stood alone, while the sober man turned his attention
to Maguire. That besotted individual at first flatly refused to get up,
but finally made out to rise to his feet, and McKenna, once more taking
an arm of each, marched away in the direction of the light.
The shebeen-shop of Mike Casey and his wife—an elderly couple, living on
the mountain by themselves—was reached after much difficulty, and the
detective, puffing like a porpoise, from over-exertion, released his
protégés and knocked at the unpainted door. When left to themselves
McAndrew and Maguire fell in a limp and confused heap, like so many damp
rags, upon the ground.
Soon there were heard footsteps within and Casey opened the door,
saying:
“Who the divil comes here at this time o’ night?”
“Oh, it’s McKenna an’ two belated travelers,” answered the operative.
“Well, whatever have brought _you_ here? But niver mind! Step in, an’ in
a jiffy the old woman will be out to help you!”
“Its very well to say ‘come in!’ an’ _I_ can do it, but these two
spalpeens here, are too drunk to do anything! Just get on some clothes,
plaze, an’ come help me to house the rascals!”
In a few moments, by dint of hard pulling and much tugging at hands and
feet, McAndrew and Maguire were at last hauled inside the cabin, where
they reposed on the floor, a couple of as wet and uncomfortable bodies
as can well be imagined.
Casey’s shanty consisted of a single room, and a half loft overhead, to
which latter place access was had by a wooden ladder. In the lower
apartment slept the man and wife, on a bed in one corner. In the same
room they also ate, drank, did their washing, cooking, and sold whisky
and tobacco. Only one window, the door, and a big chimney gave light and
ventilation to the shop. It was a rough retreat, but far better and
warmer than out-of-doors, and quite acceptable under the circumstances.
Old Mrs. Casey—blind of one eye, not exactly handsome-looking, and only
partly dressed—was by this time ready to wait on her unexpected but not
unwelcome customers. By again shouting “whisky-punch” in McAndrew’s ear,
the detective managed to put his friend upright, and, after imbibing
more drink, assisted him to ascend the steep ladder, to the only spare
bedroom in the building. Maguire had to be shaken for half an hour, some
matches set off under his nose, and one slightly touched to his cheek,
before he could be sufficiently awakened to drag himself to the same
portion of the cabin. Covering the men with the hay forming their couch,
and all the clothes he could find, McKenna left the drowsy worthies. The
loft would only contain two.
“Now phat are we to do wid you?” inquired old man Casey.
“Oh, I kin sit up! Its not long ’til mornin’!”
“An’ ye shall do no such thing!” said Mrs. Casey. “I knows a trick worth
two o’ that!”
She then went hunting about the room until she found an old shawl and
some bags, the latter suitable for holding corn. These she spread on the
floor before the hearth stone, beyond which was a rosy, red bed of
anthracite, resting upon a novel grate, made of railroad iron and
smaller bars, and which was sending a genial warmth throughout the
apartment.
“Auld man! Get ye to bed!” said Mrs. Casey. He obeyed the command, and
his wife piled upon the recumbent McKenna—who had placed himself,
dressed as he was, on the improvised mattress, in accordance with an
imperious gesture of Mrs. Casey—her husband’s lately vacated coat, and
other garments. Then she said:
[Illustration: “_Now shut your eyes!_”]
“Now, lad, shut your eyes!”
McKenna did so, and presently heard a rustling, as of changing garments,
and felt his coverings greatly augmented in weight. Mrs. Casey retired
to the scant and only bed the place afforded.
“I hope ye’ll slape comfortably!” said Mike, laughing.
The operative knew that the kind-hearted old lady had heaped her own
woolen garments upon him in default of other comforts.
The wind came up so furiously through the crevices in the floor, and the
snow sifted down so plentifully from the roof, that the tired man could
not rest. Excepting on one occasion, however, when he thought he heard
Casey get up, and turned to see that it was not his step but that of his
helpmate, he pretended to slumber, out of regard for and not to hurt the
feelings of the kindly pair who had taken them in.
In the morning, early, McAndrew and Maguire clambered down the ladder
and awakened the rest with demands for beer. They were very thirsty.
McKenna arose, gave the old lady her clothes, and she was soon ready to
wait upon them. The detective noticed that she took her half gallon
measure from beneath the foot of her bed, threw something that it
contained out at the door, and then filled it half full of beer from the
keg. But he said nothing of this to his companions.
“I belave I’ll take a sip o’ gin,” said the Secretary, as the Bodymaster
and Maguire, in turn, drank deeply of the malt liquor. “I always try and
get gin for my morning dram!”
This liquor was in a small bottle and clear and genuine. The beer he
could not relish, considering the use to which the tin vessel in which
it stood had been put during the night.
It was not until they had reached Shenandoah that McKenna informed his
comrades of the sickening circumstance. Their stomachs were in such a
peculiarly sensitive condition at the time, that a few explanatory words
caused them to revolt. As a consequence both men were very sick.
“Sea-sickness was no name for it,” they said.
It chanced well for McKenna that, on this very day, and before Maguire
and McAndrew recovered their appetites and their strength, he was
compelled to go to another part of the county and remain during several
nights. When he returned Maguire was away at his home and McAndrew had
forgiven him.
“Faith, an’ ye know well enough, it would have been both mane an’
uncivil for me to say anythin’ of it before the kind old couple!” was
all the excuse the operative could offer. Not one of the three men drank
ale at Mike Casey’s house after that.
There was little of interest occurring in the region from the dates last
mentioned, until early in the spring of 1875, when the Mollies
determined to destroy the bridges on the Catawissa Railway, then as now
run by the Philadelphia and Reading Company. The reason given by Pat
Brennan, one of the prime movers in the business, for the proposed
outrage, was that considerable coal passed to market over the Catawissa
line, and it would be necessary to stop shipments as well as production
in that portion of country. McAndrew of Shenandoah, and Pat Butler, of
Loss Creek, were expected to furnish the force of Mollies, and Brennan
was to secure an equal number of men from outside sources. The several
high and costly structures were to be set on fire simultaneously, after
all trains had passed over, so that life would not be endangered.
Brennan, found picking coal at Glover’s dirt bank, was not a Mollie, but
bad enough to be one. McKenna went to see him, pretending great anxiety
to have a hand in the matter, at the order of McAndrew. Brennan
implicated two brothers, named Welch, with many others, and said one
meeting had already been held on the subject, by his friends, in the
bush, but nothing had been permanently decided upon. Another gathering
was appointed for the ensuing Tuesday night, to be attended by Mollies
and outsiders, and the detective was invited to be present. He
consented. McHugh was opposed to the project. Gibbons was greatly in
favor of it. In a conversation held with the latter, the detective said:
“It is a big job, ye understand, an’ it will take a good many men to do
the thing. They must be as true as steel, at that.”
“I know it,” answered Gibbons. “An’ are not the Hibernians the men who
can be depended upon? They can do it, if anybody can.”
“I know we’re all right—but we’re not alone. We can’t possibly arrange
everything so as to act before next Wednesday night.”
“That’s the truth!” responded Gibbons.
This was urged in order to gain time in which to notify Mr. Franklin, so
that, if McKenna might not succeed in discouraging the Mollies and
preventing the destructive effort, a force could be sent to capture the
would-be incendiaries before the match had done its duty. It was finally
decided that a second meeting should be held the ensuing Tuesday night,
at nine o’clock, at Number Three Hill, when the details should be
attended to, and quickly following that should come the destruction of
the obnoxious bridges. The following evening—Wednesday—all were expected
to convene at Ringtown Mountain, near the Catholic cemetery, duly
equipped for work, and, after brief consultation, at once proceed to do
the task proposed. Axes and other tools were to be procured and brought
to the second meeting, with plenty of powder and fuses for exploding
some of the heavier abutments.
The detective afterward saw Pat Butler, and informed him of the proposed
affair. Butler was inclined to be cautious. He fully approved the
business, but feared the outsiders might harm the Mollies—in other
words, inform against them—and wanted every one specially sworn to
secrecy. He knew very well that there would be a large reward offered
for the capture of those interested in destroying the bridges, and
believed those not in the society would be the first to sell out. This
was in McAndrew’s presence. The Shenandoah Bodymaster thought it made
little difference whether the men were sworn or not, as they gave away
secrets held under oath about as freely as when not bound by an
obligation. A pledge would not stop them from informing, if they were so
disposed. John Thompson, of Number Three Hill, and John Dean, said they
agreed to the arrangement, would attend the meeting, and provide some
powder. There was no way for the detective except to go in with the
incendiaries. In no other manner could he learn the exact time when the
deed was to be committed; in no other way was the thing to be prevented
and the would-be bridge-burners apprehended. There was danger that he
might be captured with the rest, or killed; but the damage to the
company, in case the game was not frustrated, would be very great,
beside the loss of life to innocent passengers, who would, if the
bridges were destroyed at the time proposed, some of them, be hurled,
without a word of warning, into eternity. These were among the nigh
probabilities. The detective could but run the hazard. Certainly, he
must keep in with the conspirators, and see that his whole duty was
performed.
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