Page:Memoirs of the United States Secret Service.djvu/155

138 process was being executed, (which would return them to United States' jurisdiction,) Felker opposed this movement against the robbers, with great earnestness, for reasons that none could then understand. The case was then in the hands of Allan Pinkerton, the well-known head of the "Western Detective Agency," whose success in his peculiar line, is well appreciated in this country and the Canadas—where he has "driven to cover" first and last, a host of thieves, burglar's, forgers, and other offenders.

The crime of the Reno boys was of such a startlingly bold character, that the people in the West were aroused and became exceedingly indignant at the course he adopted on that occasion. The thieves were nabbed, and were subsequently very justly hung by the populace. But it soon became evident these villains were at work with accomplices—who moved in a respectable sphere of society.

Just prior to the Adams Express robbery by this gang, somebody was observed hanging about the office, watching, as it has since been determined, for the Company's valuable packages then about to be shipped; and this party, from the description given by competent witnesses, corresponded very accurately with the person of Felker. His sudden turning up to the rescue of these robbers, his having received at that time several of the bonds actually stolen on that occasion—and his promising to assist the thieves out of their dilemma, through his official influence—point very decidedly in the same direction; and leave no doubt of his actual complicity in that "heavy transaction" with the Reno boys, before and after the fact.

He was arrested on suspicion of being concerned in the noted robbery of the Farmer's Insurance Company in '65, and placed in irons, charged with this offense. He escaped punishment at that time, after expending a heavy sum of