While the excitement over the tragedy was at its height, and the inquests
and the funeral services over the dead were in progress, the escaped
robbers were not forgotten.
They had left Northfield by what is known as the Dundas Road, leading to
the town of that name, three miles to the south. Their original plan had
been to go westward, over the route by which they had come, and to stop at
the telegraph office on their way, and destroy the instruments, in order
that the news of the raid might not be spread till they were out of reach
in the great forest tract lying in that direction. But, as they afterwards
said, finding it “too hot” for them in that part of the town, they were
glad to escape by any route they could find; while the telegraph was
publishing their deeds and their descriptions in every direction. Dundas
being the nearest place at which they could cross the Cannon River, they
made all possible speed toward it, six men on five horses. They rode
abreast, like a squad of cavalry, taking the whole road, and compelling
everyone they met to take the ditch. Meeting a farmer with a good span of
horses, they stopped him and helped themselves to one of the horses, for
the use of Bob Younger, who had been riding behind his brother Cole. A
little farther on they “borrowed” a saddle for him of another farmer,
representing themselves to be officers of the law in pursuit of horse
thieves,—a pretense which they made much use of during their flight. As
soon as possible they got back into their former route, where they were
once more on somewhat familiar ground. The death of Miller had deprived
them of the guide upon whose knowledge of the country they had depended.
The loss of their trained and high-bred saddle-horses was perhaps a still
more serious calamity,—a loss which they were not able to make good with
any of the farm-horses stolen one after another. Their rush at full speed
through Dundas caused a sensation; but, owing to the absence of the
telegraph operator, the news of the raid had not been received, and they
were not molested. Millersburg, where some of them had spent the previous
night, was reached about half-past four. They were recognized by the
landlord who had entertained them, but they were still in advance of the
news of their crime and far in advance of their pursuers. They rode hard,
sparing neither themselves nor their beasts, although Bob Younger’s arm
was causing him much suffering. His horse fell under him, breaking the
saddle-girth, and was abandoned in disgust, Younger again mounting behind
one of his companions. Another horse was seized in a similar manner,
regardless of the protests of his owner; but the animal balked so
obstinately that he too had to be abandoned. Thus began a dreary two-weeks
flight, which grew more and more dismal day by day, as the fugitives
skulked from place to place, now riding, now walking, now hiding, in a
region where, as they too well knew, every man’s hand was against them.
Nature and Providence seemed to be against them, too. A cold, drizzling
rain set in the day after the raid, and continued almost incessantly for
two weeks. The way of the transgressor was hard, and it grew harder at
every step.
The pursuers were after them. Before the robber-cavalcade was out of sight
of the scene of their raid, almost before the smoke of the battle had
passed away, men were running for their guns and horses, to join in the
chase. The first movements were made under intense excitement, and were
necessarily irresponsible and futile. But more deliberate measures were
soon taken. Mr. J. T. Ames called for volunteers for a systematic pursuit,
and telegraphed to the state capital for aid. Sheriffs, detectives, chiefs
of police and scores of private citizens promptly responded. As soon as
practicable a small army of pursuers was organized, and systematic plans
for their transportation and sustenance were perfected.
Three times on Thursday afternoon advanced detachments of this force
encountered the fugitives. First a couple of volunteer scouts, mounted, by
a singular coincidence, on the horses of the dead robbers, came within
sight of the band a they were seizing the farmer’s horse on the Dundas
Road. But as the robbers were six to the scouts’ two, the latter did not
venture an attack, but contented themselves with trailing their game until
reinforcements should arrive. Again, at Shieldsville, fifteen miles west
of Northfield, a squad of Faribault men had arrived in advance of the
pursued by taking a shorter road. But not knowing how close at hand the
bandits were, they had gone within doors, leaving their guns outside, when
the raiders suddenly appeared before the door, from which they did not
permit their unarmed pursuer to issue, but coolly watered their horses at
an adjacent pump, shot a defiant volley of bullets into it, and went on
their way. The out-witted scouts quickly regained their guns, and being
reinforced by a dozen or more local recruits, hastened after the robbers.
The band was overtaken in a ravine about four miles west of Shieldsville,
where the two forces exchanged some long-range shots, without effect on
either side; and the robbers escaped into the thick woods beyond.
While these preliminary contests were taking place, the more systematic
campaign was arranged and inaugurated. Before Thursday night two hundred
men were in the field, and on Friday five hundred. Other hundreds still
joined the chase later on, swelling the number at one time to at least a
thousand. It is impossible to give a list of those engaged, or to do
justice to the zeal, the determination and the endurance that they showed.
Among those who were prominently engaged, either in organizing the forces
or in conducting operations in the field, may be mentioned Mayor Solomon
P. Stewart of Northfield, Sheriff Ara Barton and Geo. N. Baxter, Esq., of
Faribault, chiefs of police King of St. Paul and Munger of Minneapolis,
Detectives Hoy and Brissette, and many others. Of the men under them,
several were experienced officers, and not a few were veteran soldiers.
There were also, of course, in so large and hastily-mustered a force, very
many who had no fitness for the service, either in personal qualities or
in equipment, and no conception of the requirements of such a campaign.
They came armed with small pistols and old fowling-pieces of various
degrees of uselessness, and utterly without either judgment or courage.
Their presence was a source of weakness to the force. Their foolish
indiscretions embarrassed and defeated the best-laid plans; and their
failure at critical moments and places to do what they had been depended
upon to do made them worse than useless,—worse than enemies. Many went
into the service from mercenary motives. Large rewards for the capture of
the robbers dead or alive were offered by the Northfield bank, the
Governor of the state and the railway companies; and this inducement drew
into the ranks of the pursuers much poor material. These statements need
to be made, not so much by way of censure upon the inefficient as in
justice to the better members of the force, and as an explanation of some
of the vexatious delays and failures of the campaign. For, while it
constantly suffered from the presence of these mercenaries and blunderers,
it did not lack, from its first day to its last, a nucleus of brave,
keen-witted, cool-headed, determined men, whom nothing could daunt or
discourage. And the best of them were not too capable for the work. Two
objects were to be accomplished,—the retreat of the fugitives was to be
cut off, and they were to be hunted down and captured. To secure the
first, picket-lines were thrown out in advance of them, covering every
route which they could possibly take, and especially guarding roads,
bridges and fords. To secure the second, scouting parties were put upon
their trail, to follow them from place to place, and to explore the
country far and near in search of them. It was no holiday excursion. They
were in a vast forest tract known as the Big Woods, broken here and there
by clearings and by settlements great and small, but embracing also wide
area of uncut timber, full of dense thickets and ravines, and abounding in
lakes, streams and swamps. The weather made difficult trailing, as tracks
and other signs were soon obliterated; and the nature and extent of the
ground to be covered rendered it impossible to keep the picket-line strong
at all points. The rain and the mud, the dripping forests, the swollen
streams, the softened fields, multiplied the hardships of the pursuers.
Their very numbers caused confusion. They were for the most part unable to
recognize with any certainty either the robbers or one another or to tell
whether some squad of horsemen in the distance were friends or foe. The
bandits were shrewd enough to take advantage of this doubt. It was their
favorite trick to pass themselves off as a sheriff’s posse in pursuit of
the bank-robbers. Under this subterfuge they inquired their way of
unsuspecting people, obtained provisions, secured information about the
position and movements of their pursuers, and repeatedly supplied
themselves with fresh horses. But this is in advance of our story.
We left the robbers in their Thursday night’s hiding-place in the woods
beyond Shieldsville. Thence on Friday they moved first westward and then
southwestward, in the direction of Waterville. Coming to a ford of the
Little Cannon River, guarded by three men poorly armed, they were fired
upon and turned back into the woods. Finding shortly afterward that the
guard had withdrawn, they returned to the ford, crossed over, and
disappeared in the forest beyond. Thus the picket line which had been so
laboriously posted was broken at its weakest point.
The news of the escape was immediately carried to those in command, a new
picket-line was thrown out in advance of the robbers, and the pursuer
pressed the more eagerly after them. The whole region was now aroused. The
telegraph was kept constantly busy, flashing items of fact, and a good
many items of fiction, to and from the field of operations. The railways
did good service in transporting men to accessible points; but the flight
and the pursuit were chiefly out of the range of towns, telegraphs or
railways, in the heart of the forest.
Pushing on into the township of Elysian, the robbers found themselves in a
labyrinth of lakes and swamps, where it seemed easy to prevent their
escape. At an isolated farm they exchanged two of their exhausted horses
for fresh ones, against the owner’s protest. In the evening they made a
similar exchange in an out-of-the-way pasture without consulting the
owner. Late Friday night they went into camp between Elysian and Gentian
Lake. The stolen horses were now turned loose, and all returned to their
masters. The remaining horses were tied to trees; a sort of tent was made
by spreading blankets over some bushes; and under this the fugitives spent
the rainy night.
On Saturday morning they abandoned their horses altogether, tied their
blankets about their bodies with the bridles, and, though already lame and
disabled, continued their journey on foot. The horses were found three
days later, one of them still tied to the tree, the other two having
gnawed off their halters and escaped. The robbers now proceeded more
circumspectly. The dash and daring of their previous course were exchanged
for the stealth and caution more befitting their condition. They went no
farther on Saturday than to find a hiding-place on an island in the middle
of the swamp, where they encamped for the day. After dark they took up
their journey, marched slowly all night, and at daylight on Sunday morning
again halted, near the village of Marysburg, whose church-bell they could
hear from their camp in the woods. Passing around Marysburg, they next
encamped four miles south of that village, so slow was their progress and
so short their marches. Nine miles west of this camp, and within two or
three miles of Mankato, they found a deserted farm-house in the woods,
where they spent Monday night, Tuesday and Tuesday night, having advanced
less than fifty miles in five days.
[THE SEVEN CAPTORS. (From Recent Photographs).]
THE SEVEN CAPTORS. (From Recent Photographs).
Even at this rate they had distanced their pursuers, who did not suspect
that they had abandoned their horses, and who, confident that no mounted
cavalcade had passed their lines, were still searching the swamps and
bottoms about Elysian. This delusion was painfully dispelled on Tuesday
morning by the discovery of the half-starved horses and the deserted camp.
The robbers had stolen away on foot, and had at least a three-days start.
This was regarded as evidence of the hopelessness of the chase. The
fugitives were no doubt far away, and in what direction no one could
conjecture. A large proportion of the pursuers, including many of the most
efficient leaders, therefore gave up the hunt and returned to their homes.
Even some authentic reports from persons who had caught glimpses of the
robbers near Mankato were scouted as absurdly incredible.
Soon, however, further news was received which could not be disputed, and
which at once aroused fresh interest in the chase. On Tuesday the robbers,
it seemed, had invited themselves to breakfast at the house of a German
farmer. On Wednesday morning they had captured another farmer’s hired man
in the woods, and after binding him, extorting information from him,
threatening to kill him, and finally swearing him to secrecy, had let him
go. Believing that a bad promise was better broken than kept, he had
immediately reported the incident to his employer, who hastened with the
news to Mankato, whence the telegraph sent it everywhere. Excitement was
at once renewed. The disbanded forces hurried back, and hundreds of fresh
recruits joined in the chase. A thousand men were soon on the ground, and
a new campaign was organized under the direction of Gen. Pope of Mankato.
Again patrols and searching parties were sent out, and every possible
avenue of escape was guarded night and day. But again the fugitives
escaped, not so much by virtue of their own cunning as through favorable
accidents and the inefficiency of the guards on duty. Part of them crossed
the railroad bridge over the Blue Earth River during Wednesday night. Two
others, mounted on a stolen horse, passed the picket-line near Lake
Crystal on Thursday night. These last were challenged, fired upon, and
probably wounded by a brave young fellow, named Richard Roberts, whose
sleeping companions had left him to hold the pass alone. The horse threw
his riders and ran away, and they escaped in the darkness to the adjacent
field, one of them leaving his hat behind him.
[THE FIRST NATIONAL BANK, NORTHFIELD, MINN. (1876).]
THE FIRST NATIONAL BANK, NORTHFIELD, MINN. (1876).
The band had now divided, Pitts and the three Youngers forming one
division, and the two Jameses the other. It is believed to have been the
James brothers whom Roberts fired upon. Continuing their flight, they
stole a fine span of grey, on which they mounted bareback. This capture
was a most fortunate one for them, and enabled them to make rapid progress
and to assume again the role of officers in pursuit of criminals. They had
no difficulty in getting food and information from unsuspecting people,
who found only too late how they had been imposed upon. The two men went
almost due west during the next forty-eight hours, travelling day and
night at the utmost practicable speed, and making eighty miles with
scarcely a halt. On Sunday, September 17th, they crossed the Minnesota
line into what is now South Dakota. That evening they took the liberty of
exchanging their over-driven greys for a span of blacks, one of which
proved to be blind in one eye and the other in both. Not finding these
satisfactory, they exchanged them in turn, in the small hours of Monday
morning, for another span of greys. They now turned southward; passed
through Sioux Falls; exchanged salutations with the driver of the Yankton
stage, and clothes with a Sioux City doctor; and quietly pursued their
flight by a route and to a destination best known to themselves.
They had not been permitted to make this escape without interference. No
sooner was it known that they had gone through the picket-line than scouts
were sent out in every direction, to overtake or intercept them. The best
men in the field took up the trail. The most comprehensive measures were
adopted for their capture. But owing perhaps to the unexpected celerity of
their movements, so different from the previous methods of the gang, and
to unforeseen slips and miscalculations, they succeeded in eluding their
pursuers, most of whom abandoned the chase at the Dakota line.
This episode had entirely diverted attention from the rest of the band, as
it was not then known that a division had taken place; and when the two
horsemen were finally lost track of, the general supposition was that the
whole band had escaped. Some persons, indeed, believed that the four
unaccounted for were still in the neighborhood in which they had last been
seen. The disreputable house near Mankato, already referred to as the
place where two of the robbers were known to have been on the night of
September 3d, was searched, and many suspicious characters in various
places were arrested and investigated. This vigilance resulted in securing
some criminals, including two notorious horse-thieves, but it discovered
no clue to the bank-robbers.
The mortification of the pursuers was intense; and the denunciations
heaped upon some of them and the ridicule upon all was a bitter reward for
their two weeks of hard service. The failure of their campaign could not
be denied. The only consolation they had was in reflecting that they had
done their best, and in joining in the general laugh at their own expense.
The robber hunt was the great joke of the season.