The Molly Maguires and the detectives

The governing idea in the mind of the author, while preparing this volume for the press, has been to give details connected with the MOLLIE MAGUIRES, and follow strictly the tru...

Early in the month of October, 1873, I was in Philadelphia, and one day received a note from Mr. F. B. Gowen, President of the Philadelphia and Reading Railway Company and the P...

By the time I had reached headquarters, in Chicago, I imagined that I might need a man for the Mollie Maguire operation, who, among other acquirements and qualifications, was al...

After several days very profitably spent among the coal, canal, and dock hands, in the vicinity of Philadelphia, acquiring some knowledge of their habits and occupations, and at...

They were not long in suspense, as Mrs. Timmins, after closing the interview with her husband, gathered resolution to grasp the seemingly inanimate body by the arm, and to drag...

The succeeding day McKenna returned to the switch-tender’s hut, and, after obtaining permission to retain the Boston _Pilot_, their suddenly suspended conversation was resumed....

The detective, after making a casual inspection of the place, during the following day, was in many respects well suited with it. Usually carrying on considerable trade, he foun...

For the purpose of properly carrying out the _rôle_ of a truthful historian of actual occurrences, we will change the scene, for a short season, and, leaving McKenna to seek adv...

The Sheridan House, Patrick Dormer, proprietor, situated in Centre Street, Pottsville, was somewhat celebrated in annals of the town, and its reputation among the inhabitants by...

Kelly soon returned to the saloon, reporting his principal in the late encounter as well as, under the circumstances, he could expect to be, and hinting that, as far as he was c...

The night before the one on which McKenna had determined to take his departure from Pottsville, while in Dormer’s saloon, some words passed and a quarrel arose between the detec...

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...

Before him was the long, low, dark dining-room, only a small portion of which, at one extremity, was illuminated by a single tallow candle, trussed to the wall with an old, rust...

The day following the one on which he arrived in Shenandoah was the Sabbath, and, believing Lawler would be unemployed, McKenna put in an early appearance at that gentleman’s ho...

The operations of the detective as a laborer in the coal mines were destined to be of brief duration. Commencing nigh the middle of February, 1874, working a few days loading co...

The detective was now competent to encounter modern as well as old-time Mollie Maguires. He apprehended no more trouble from the questions of Dormer, Lawler, or even Jack Kehoe...

A few days after McKenna’s initiation into the Mollie Maguires, he was surprised, upon entering Lawler’s bar-room, to find his friend with one limb bandaged, sitting by the fire...

Flynn obeyed. He could do nothing less, finding himself completely in the power of the enemy and that menacing revolver. It was far from his intention to lose his life, when, by...

The true cause of the disturbance was not at once disclosed, but its progress and bearings were easily determined by the eye and ear of the spectator. Such a reign of confusion...

The festivities were continued until nearly break of day, when the detective, learning that his partner had no male attendant, politely volunteered to accompany her home, which...

Time passed, however, and the murder of Gomer James was not accomplished. In truth, it was little spoken of. Political excitements and the occurrence of other absorbing events a...

Not long after the wake, it was made evident to some of the members of Shenandoah Division that Frank McAndrew was not fitted by nature or education for the important office of...

The strike was yet in progress, in November, 1874, and the consequent want of work produced the very result anticipated—the Mollies were as active as a community of hornets whos...

Shenandoah is a handsome little inland town, the center of a productive coal country and the place of residence of many excellent people. This volume, however, will not have muc...

It was maintained by some that the Mollies of the coal regions were not supported or recognized by the Ancient Order of Hibernians throughout the United States, but there is abu...

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 af...

Mr. Franklin was, the same evening, duly instructed where the detective intended to be the next night and informed of the probability that he would succeed in frustrating the de...

In casting about me for a chief assistant of Mr. Franklin and co-worker with McParlan, in the coal country, I was quick in deciding that the very man, of all others among my lar...

McKenna’s fears were not without foundation, as was shown from the action taken by members of his division the very day succeeding the one on which McAndrew, the Bodymaster, sho...

Other events crowding upon their attention seemed for a time to guard the threatened Gomer James from the bullets of his sworn assassins. The Welshman still lived and pursued hi...

For a few days after the return of the unsuccessful delegation engaged in the work of killing Wm. M. Thomas, in accordance with the order of the Mahanoy City Convention, quiet r...

“I see by a report of Mr. Pinkerton’s agent in Shenandoah—and we also have it from other good authority—that the strikers, including the Mollie Maguires and the members of the M...

Captain Linden made a flying visit to Shoemaker’s Patch, when once informed of the attempt upon the life of Wm. M. Thomas, where he met the injured man, frescoed and ornamented...

The Legislature of Pennsylvania, listening to the repeated demands of the dissatisfied and the call of the Anti-Monopoly Convention, heretofore alluded to, in 1875 appointed a c...

In the interim, while many of the collieries were beginning to work, making up for lost time, and others putting machinery in order, preparing to do so, the Mollies kept themsel...

The wounding of Thomas, and subsequent murder of Yost, were enough to assure me that more work of the same character would speedily follow, unless earnest endeavors were put for...

After breakfast, the detective accompanied the landlord to the bar and swallowed a powerful decoction of spirits, lemon, and sugar, commonly termed whisky-punch, which had the e...

The following Tuesday, Carroll having accepted employment at the new depot of the Philadelphia and Reading Company, McKenna would be unable to see him until after the day’s work...

At the close of the month McKenna met Yellow Jack Donahue, who gave out that he had nearly given up the Major job, for the present, and feared his vengeance might fail of accomp...

Early in August, 1875, symptoms of smouldering disorder in the coal regions began to increase in severity and numbers. Seeing and appreciating this, Superintendent Franklin arra...

Now the Mollies having Gomer James dead and buried and out of their way, it was believed by some bloodshed would cease. But the attentive reader will have arrived at the conclus...

Leaving my agent in Tamaqua, a victim of three-fold suspense, I must now attempt to describe a double murder, perpetrated by the Mollie Maguires at Raven Run, near Ashland, Wedn...

Quite a fraternal feeling had existed between the two men murdered on the first of September at Raven Run, Wm. Uren having been a native of the parish of Germoe, Cornwall, Engla...

It should have been mentioned that, on the sixteenth of August, James Riles, of Shenandoah, was attacked by a crowd of Mollies, headed by Charles McAllister, Ned Monaghan, and T...

Some weeks before the occurrence of part of the events narrated in the last chapter, McKenna had suffered from a severe illness, and for several weeks was under the constant car...

In February, McAndrew found himself the victim of a panic regarding the society. He believed that Kerrigan was only the Alpha and that Omega was not far away, and therefore requ...

From what occurred later McParlan believed his friend Sweeney had been waiting for his coming, when he found that person on the street, near the lamp-post. But he said nothing,...

When the detective, in accordance with his promise, appeared that afternoon at Mahanoy Plane, he encountered Dennis Dowling and Tom Donahue still hanging about Callaghan’s saloo...

Kerrigan, Doyle, and Kelly were already convicted of the murder of John P. Jones, and on the fourth of February, 1876, Alex. Campbell, the originator of the plan and the man for...

After this came the arrest of the murderers—or those interested in the murder—of Gomer James. Thomas Hurley, having for the time made his escape—though it is reasonable to suppo...