Wyoming History: Beloved Sheriff Shot By…

The Union Pacific train traveling half a mile west of Wilcox, Wyoming was stopped by a lantern in the dark at 2:15 a.m. on Friday, June 2, 1899.

The engineer named WR Jones stopped the locomotive thinking the front bridge needed to be removed. Instead, two men wearing white masks jumped into the cab and ordered the train to pull forward towards the bridge.

“One of the robbers informed him that there was enough dynamite down there to blow him into hell,” reported the Carbon County Journal on June 3, 1899. A masked man jumped down, lit the dynamite’s fuse, jumped back on board and ordered. the train ahead.

Thus begins one of Wyoming’s most notorious train robberies involving members of the Hole in the Wall Gang. It would lead to the death of one of the state’s most beloved sheriffs and spark a manhunt that would see Wyoming’s governor talk to the president about getting federal help to bring criminals to justice.

A prominent newspaper of the time even called the train robbery, which was done by blowing up a safe – and the car it was in – “the most audacious crime of its kind in the West.”

For Converse County Sheriff Josiah Hazen, his third year in office had already been busy.

The Natrona County Pioneer reported the arrest of a con man in Glenrock for the Natrona County Sheriff. The Daily Deadwood Pioneer-Times of Deadwood, South Dakota reported on June 8, 1899 that Hazen had been in town that winter to arrest a man wanted for forgery.

When Hazen learned of the June 2nd train robbery, he joined the hunt by taking a train to Casper with Union Pacific detectives on June 3rd.

It turned out to be a quest for justice that would lead to the shooting of the sheriff by a member of the notorious outlaw gang.

What law enforcement did know was that six masked men had robbed the first section of the United Pacific train after forcing it over the bridge. Then they blew up the bridge – a robber hit the engineer, who he thought was taking the train too slowly.

After the train passed over the bridge, they separated the mail and express car and punched a hole in it. They put dynamite on top of the safe and blew a hole in it.

Unsigned currency

Later reports indicated that among the loot was $3,400 in unsigned currency for the First National Bank of Portland and $34,000 in cash and $7,000 in valuables.

The bandits mounted their horses and headed north.

“Sheriff McDonald was dispatched and began a scene,” the Carbon County Journal reported on June 3. “Sheriff McDonald remained in Rawlins and late in the afternoon organized another party to depart northward from this city. The group set out at 7 last night, headed for Brown’s Canyon.

“Possessions have also been started from Laramie, Dana, Casper, and Lander, and desperadoes can be surrounded and enveloped so that escape is impossible.”

Hazen and the men on the train conferred with Natrona County Sheriff Oscar Hiestand Saturday afternoon. While some of the lawmen took the train out of town, Hazen stayed in Casper.

On Sunday morning, a cowboy looking for his stray horses drove into town and reported that two men had pulled guns on him in an abandoned house.

Both sheriffs thought they probably had their suspects. Since there were only a few good horses in town, Hiestand went to the CY Ranch to find men and horses for a group.

Hazen apparently found a horse and took six men with him who also had good horses, including Dr. JF Leeper.

The group regrouped outside the city, pursued the outlaws, and engaged in a brief skirmish. During that battle, Hiestand lost his horse. But Hazen and his men remained in pursuit.

On Monday, near Teapot Creek, Hazen and his party found the outlaws’ horses and their boot tracks.

“There they are, guys, right here. Here are their tracks,” Hazen told a Converse County weekly newspaper, Bill Barlow’s Budget. Shots were fired and “the brave sheriff fell, got up and ran a short distance and fell again.”

Bullet through the stomach

He was shot through the stomach and out the back near the spine. The men in the group secured the area and a few went to try to find a wagon for Hazen. After a few hours, Bill Barlow’s budget reported that he found one and used it to transport the sheriff to Casper.

Hazen wanted to be taken to Douglas. The railroad ordered a special car and engine to take him there. He died in his home the next day.

“It seldom falls to a newspaper to report the death of a man so esteemed and beloved by the people among whom he lived,” reported Bill Barlow’s budget on June 7, 1899. “Possessing a sunny disposition, they led Him to look on the bright side of life, Joe’s kind words and generous laugh lifted the veils of care and sadness from the minds of many of us during his residence among us.”

Wyoming Governor DeForest Richards attended his funeral, which filled the city streets. The services were conducted by Freemasons and members of regional lodges arrived on special trains, in addition to many members of the region’s farming community.

As for the robbers, their horses worthless from exhaustion, they managed to slip away on foot, steal horses from a nearby camp, and make their way to the Hole in the Wall.

The manhunt intensified. Richards contacted President William McKinley about federal marshal assistance and ordered the Wyoming militia out of Buffalo to assist in the hunt.

Attempts to pass the unsigned and torn notes put the Union Pacific agency and Pinkerton on the trail of the Curry brothers. They allegedly operated a sedan business in Harlem, Montana. Then he ran away.

A killer curry

In March 1900, a Pinkerton agent went to Dodson, Missouri with law enforcement to arrest a gang member named Lonny Logan, aka Louis Curry, aka Louis Logan. He was killed in the attempted arrest. And Bob Lee, aka Bob Curry, was arrested while handing out books in Cripple Creek, Colorado, the Omaha World-Herald reported.

“Louis Curry has been a ‘bad man’ of repute in Montana for several years,” reported The Omaha World-Herald on March 4, 1900. “Bob Lee is also a gambler, fortune teller, and thief and has been arrested for numerous crimes in Missouri, New Mexico, Wyoming, Texas and Colorado.”

Lee was tried in Cheyenne, Wyoming, for the robbery, but not for Hazen’s murder. He was convicted of robbing the train but not endangering the lives of the postal officials. He received 10 years in prison.

No one was ever convicted of Hazen’s murder, although some suspected that the shooter was Harvey Logan, also known as Kid Curry and George Curry. George Curry was allegedly killed in 1900 while rustling cattle in Utah. But his death was never officially confirmed.

Kid Curry allegedly committed suicide in 1904 after being shot by a mob following a train robbery.

Current Converse County Sheriff Clint Becker said Hazen’s story and other feats of past Converse County sheriffs are inspiring and historic, but not something he thinks about regularly. He said his department has embraced its Western roots by making the Cowboy Code of Ethics part of department policy.

One of the 10 principles is “be brave”.

A former cowboy, ranch hand, businessman and lawman, Hazen impressed those he met with this quality.

“He was a friend to whom none called in vain, ready to extend the right hand of fellowship to a needy brother in distress,” declared Ashlar Masonic Lodge No. 10 in a newspaper resolution in Bill Barlow’s Budget of June 21, 1899. . “A man of high principles and unquestionable bravery.”

Dale Killingbeck can be contacted at [email protected].