Page:History of Iowa From the Earliest Times to the Beginning of the Twentieth Century Volume 1.djvu/492



Edward Bonney, a fearless officer, determined to ferret out the perpetrators of the crime. Disguising himself, and knowing some members of the banditti, he passed himself off to their confederates as a member of the gang. In that guise he soon learned that Fox, Birch, John Long and Richard Baxter were the murderers. One by one he ran them down, arresting one at a time until he had all of them in jail. Aaron Long and Granville Young were arrested as accessories. Birch turned State’s evidence, escaped from jail and was recaptured. Baxter was convicted and died in the penitentiary, while Granville Young, John and Aaron Long were executed after making a confession. For a time the banditti sought other parts of the country for their depredations.

During the next ten years fifteen murders were committed in Jackson and Clinton counties, and in all but one case the murderers escaped punishment. Lawyers found a way to secure the acquittal of their clients or they escaped from jail and it seemed impossible to punish crime through the courts.

A particularly atrocious murder was committed in March, 1857, where a citizen, John Ingle, was murdered by Alexander Gifford for parties who paid Gifford to do the deed. He was arrested and lodged in jail at Andrew to await his trial. The impression prevailed that his attorney would secure his acquittal and the citizens, exasperated by the continued escape of the guilty, secretly organized a “Vigilance Committee.” One afternoon, about three weeks after the murder, a hundred men marched into Andrew, battered down the door of the jail with sledges, took Gifford from his cell, placed a rope around his neck, threw the other end over the limb of a tree, and called upon the prisoner to confess. The trembling wretch, hoping to receive lighter punishment by a full confession, told the story of the crime. He said that he had been hired by Henry Jarret and David McDonald to put Ingle out of the way and had received $150 for doing