Submitted by Sue B. Moore, sbmoore@swbell.net
Among the incidents in the early history of the Mississippi
Territory was the violent death of the notorious robber Mason. This
fearless bandit had become the terror of the routes from New Orleans
and Natchez through the Indian nations. After the organization of
the territorial government, and the opening of roads through the
wilderness to Tennessee, the return of traders, supercargoes, and
boatmen to the northern settlements, with the proceeds of their
voyage, was on foot and on horseback, in parties for mutual
protection, through the Indian nations; and often rich treasures of
specie were packed on mules and horses over (page 595) these long
and toilsome journeys. Nor was it a matter of surprise, in a dreary
wilderness, that
bandits should infest such a route.
It
was in the year 1802, when all travel and intercourse from New
Orleans and the Mississippi Territory was necessarily by way of this
solitary trace, or by the slow-ascending barge and keel, that Mason
made his appearance in the Mississippi Territory. Long accustomed to
robbery and murder upon the Lower Ohio, during the Spanish
dominion on the Mississippi, and pressed by the rapid approach of
the American population, he deserted the “Cave in the Rock,” on the
Ohio, and began to infest the great Natchez Trace, where the rich
proceeds of the river
trade were the tempting prize, and where
he soon become the terror of every peaceful traveler through the
wilderness.
Associated with him were his two sons and a few
other desperate miscreants; and the name of Mason and his band was
known and dreaded from the morasses of the southern frontier to the
silent shades of the Tennessee River. The outrages of Mason became
more frequent and sanguinary.
One day found him marauding on
the banks of the Pearl, against the life and fortune of the trader;
and before pursuit was organized, the hunter, attracted by the
descending sweep of the solitary vulture, learned the story of
another robbery and murder on the remote shores of the
Mississippi. Their depredations became at last so frequent and
daring, that the people of the territory were driven to adopt
measures for their apprehension. But such was the knowledge of the
wilderness possessed by the wily bandit, and such his untiring
vigilance and activity, that for a time he baffled every attempt for
his capture.
Treachery at last, however, effected what
stratagem, enterprise and courage had in vain attempted. A citizen
of great respectability, passing with his sons through the
wilderness, was plundered by the bandits. Their lives were, however,
spared, and they returned to the settlement.
Public feeling was
now excited, and the Governor of the territory found it necessary to
act. Governor Claiborne accordingly offered a liberal reward for the
robber Mason, dead or alive!
The proclamation was widely
distributed, and a copy of it reached Mason himself, who indulged in
much merriment on the occasion. Two of his band, however, tempted by
the large reward, concerted a plan by which they might obtain it. An
opportunity soon occurred; and while Mason, in company with the two
conspirators, was counting out some ill-gotten plunder, a tomahawk
was buried in his brain. His head was severed from his body and
borne in triumph to Washington, then the seat of the territorial
government.
The head of Mason was recognized by many, and
identified by all who read the proclamation, as the head entirely
corresponded with the description given of certain scars and
peculiar marks. Some delay, however, occurred in pitying over the
reward, owing to the slender
state of the treasury. Meantime, a
great assemblage from all the adjacent country had taken place, to
view the grim and ghastly head of the robber chief. They were not
less inspired with curiosity to see and converse with the individual
whose prowess had delivered the country of so great a scourge. Among
those spectators were the two young men, who, unfortunately for
these traitors, recognized them as companions of Mason in the
robbery of their father.
It is unnecessary to say that
treachery met its just reward, and that justice was also satisfied.
The reward was not only withheld, but the robbers were imprisoned,
and, on the full evidence of their guilt, condemned and executed at
Greenville, Jefferson County.
The band of Mason, being thus
deprived of their leader and two of his most efficient men,
dispersed and fled the country. Thus terminated the terrors which
had infested the route through the Indian nations, known to
travelers as the “Natchez and Nashville Trace.” (page 596)
The most notorious of the desperadoes who infested the settlements
(My note: the Green River country of Kentucky) were two brother
named Harpe, of whom Judge Hall, in his Western Sketches, has given
this narrative:
In the fall of 1801 or 1802, a company
consisting of two men and three women arrived in Lincoln county,
Ky., and encamped about a mile from the present town of Stanford.
The appearance of the individuals composing this party was wild and
rude in the extreme. The one who seemed to be the leader of the
band, was above the ordinary stature of men. His frame was bony and
muscular, his breast broad, his limbs gigantic. His clothing was
uncouth and shabby, his exterior, weather-beaten and dirty,
indicating continual exposure to the elements, and designating him
as one who dwelt far from the habitations of men, and mingled not in
the courtesies of civilized life. His countenance was bold and
ferocious and exceedingly impulsive, from its strongly marked
expression of villainy. His face which was larger than ordinary,
exhibited the lines of ungovernable passion, and the complexion
announced that the ordinary feelings of the human breast were in him
extinguished.
Instead of the healthy hue which indicates the
social emotions, there was a livid unnatural redness, resembling
that of a dried and lifeless skin. His eye was fearless and steady,
but it was also artful and audacious, glaring upon the beholder with
an unpleasant fixedness and brilliancy, like that of a ravenous
animal gloating on its prey. He wore no covering on his head, and
the natural protection of thick coarse hair, of a fiery redness,
uncombed and matted, gave evidence of long exposure to the rudest
visitations of the sunbeam and the tempest. He was armed with a
rifle, and a broad leather belt, drawn closely around his waist,
supported a knife and a tomahawk. He seemed, in short, all outlaw,
destitute of all the nobler sympathies of human nature, and prepared
at all points for assault or defense. The other man was smaller in
size than him who led the party, but similarly armed, having the
same suspicious exterior, and a countenance equally fierce and
sinister. The females were coarse, and wretchedly attired.
The men stated in answer to the inquiry of the inhabitants, that
their names were Harpe, and that they were emigrants from North
Carolina. They remained at their encampment the greater part of two
days and a night, spending the time in rioting, drunkenness and
debauchery.
When they left, they took the road leading to Green
River.
The day succeeding their departure, a report reached
the neighborhood that a young gentleman of wealth from Virginia,
named Lankford, had been robbed and murdered on what was (page 74)
then called, and is still known as the "Wilderness Road," which runs
through the Rockcastle
hills. Suspicion immediately fixed upon
the Harpes as the perpetrators, and Captain Ballenger, at the head
of a few bold and resolute men, started in pursuit. They experienced
great difficulty in following their trail, owing to a heavy fall of'
snow, which had obliterated most of their tracks, but finally came
upon them while encamped in a bottom on Green River, near the spot
where the town of Liberty now stands. At first they made a show of
resistance, but upon being informed that if they did not immediately
surrender, they would be shot down, they yielded themselves
prisoners.
They were brought back to Stanford, and there
examined. Among their effects were found some fine linen shirts,
marked with the initials of Lankford. One had been pierced by a
bullet and was stained with blood. They had also a considerable sum
of money, in gold. It was afterward
ascertained that this was
the kind of money Lankford had with him. The evidence against them
being thus conclusive, they were confined in the Stanford jail, but
were afterward sent for trial to Danville, where the district court
was in session. Here they broke jail, and succeeded in making their
escape.
They were next heard of in Adair county, near
Columbia. In passing through that country, they met a small boy, the
son of Colonel Trabue, with a pillow-case of meal or flour, an
article they probably needed. This boy, it is supposed, they robbed
and then murdered, as he was never afterward heard of. Many years
afterward, human bones, answering the size of Colonel Trabue's son
at the time of his disappearance, were found in a sink hole near the
place where
he was said to have been murdered.
The
Harpes still shaped their course toward the mouth of Green River,
marking their path by murders and robberies of the most horrible and
brutal character. The district of country through which they passed
was at that time very thinly settled, and from this reason their
outrages went unpunished They seemed inspired with the deadliest
hatred against the whole human race, and such was their implacable
misanthropy, that they were known to kill where there was no
temptation to rob. One of their victims was a little girl, found at
some distance from her home, whose tender age and helplessness would
have been protection against any but incarnate fiends.
The
last dreadful act of barbarity, which led to their punishment and
expulsion from the country, exceeded in atrocity all the others.
Assuming the guise of Methodist preachers, they obtained lodgings
one night at a solitary house on the road. Mr. Stagall, the master
of the house, was absent, but they found his wife and children, and
a stranger, who, like themselves, had stopped for the night. Here
they conversed, and made inquiries about the two noted Harpes, who
were represented as prowling about the country. When they retired to
rest, they contrived to secure an
ax, which they carried with
them to their chamber. In the dead of night, they crept softly down
stairs, and assassinated the whole family, together with the
stranger, in their sleep and then setting fire to the house, made
their escape.
When Stagall returned, he found no wife to
welcome him; no home to receive him. Distracted with grief and rage,
he turned his horse's head from the smoldering ruins, and repaired
to the house of Captain John Leeper. Leeper was one of the most
powerful men of his day, and
fearless as powerful. Collecting
four or five other men well armed, they mounted and started in
pursuit of vengeance. It was agreed that Leeper should attack "Big
Harpe," leaving "Little Harpe" to be disposed of by Stagall. The
others were to hold themselves in readiness to assist
Leeper and
Stagall, as circumstance might require.
This party found the
women belonging to the Harpes attending to their little camp by
(page 75) the roadside; the men having gone aside into the woods to
shoot an unfortunate traveler, of the name of Smith, who had fallen
into their hands, and whom the women had begged might not be
dispatched before their eyes. It was this halt that enabled the
pursuers to overtake them. The women immediately gave the alarm, and
the miscreants, mounting their horses, which were large, fleet and
powerful, fled in separate directions. Leeper singled out the Big
Harpe, and being better mounted than his companions, soon left them
far behind. Little Harpe succeeded in escaping from Stagall, and he,
with the rest of his companions, turned and followed the track of
Leeper and Big Harpe. After a chase of about nine miles, Leeper came
within gun shot of the latter and fired. The ball entering his
thigh, passed through it and penetrated his horse, and both fell.
Harpe's gun escaped from his hand and rolled some eight or ten feet
down the bank. Reloading his rifle Leeper ran to where the wounded
outlaw lay weltering in his blood, and found himwith one thigh
broken and the other crushed beneath his horse. Leeper rolled the
horse a-way, and set Harpe in an easier position. The robber begged
that he might not be killed. Leeper told him that he had nothing to
fear from him, but that Stagall was coming up, and could not
probably be restrained. Harpe appeared very much frightened at
hearing this, and implored Leeper to protect him. In a few moments
Stagall appeared, and without uttering a word, raised his rifle and
shot Harpe through the head. They then severed the head from the
body, and stuck it upon a, pole where the road crosses the creek,
from which the place was then named and is yet called Harpe's Head.
Thus perished one of the boldest and most noted freebooters that has
ever appeared in America. Save courage, he was without one redeeming
quality, and his death freed the country from a terror which had
long paralyzed its boldest spirits.
The Little Harpe
afterward joined the band of Mason, and became one of his most
valuable assistants in the dreadful trade of robbery and murder. He
was one of the two bandits, that , tempted by the reward for their
leader's head, murdered him, and eventually themselves suffered the
penalty of the law as previously related. (page 76)
By
John Warner Barber, All the Western States and Territories, from the
Alleghenies to the Pacific, and from the Lakes to the Gulf,
Containing Their History from the Earliest Times, published in 1867,
Making of America, U of Michigan.
My note: From “The Outlaw Years by Robert M. Coates, pages
163-164:
“They (Wiley Harpe and his co-conspirator May) escaped
and were almost immediately recaptured in the town of Greenville,
some twenty miles north of Natchez, and there finally, they were
convicted and hanged. On February 8, 1804, they were taken from the
jail and out through
the town to the “Gallows-Field” to be
hanged….After the execution, their heads were cut off. The head of
Harpe was mounted on a pole along the Trace, a little north of the
town; the head of Mays was mounted on a pole and placed a little
south of the town, along the Trace.”