Full text of "History of Minnehaha Co." Chapter 13

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CHAPTER XIII.

THE MURDER OF MARY EGAN 
BURNING OF THE EGAN HOMESTEAD 
THE LACEY-BUNKER TRAGEDY 
THE MURDER OF ALFRED ERIKSON
THE JOHN MCDONALD HOMICIDE 
THE MESSIAH CRAZE AND TRIAL OF PLENTY HORSES FOR THE MURDER OF LIEUTENANT CASEY.

THE MURDER OF MARY EGAN.

	Thomas Egan, a native of Tipperary, Ireland, on Sunday, September 12, 
1880, at his home eighteen miles northwest of Sioux Falls, murdered his wife 
Mary Egan. The circumstances of the murder were peculiarly horrible and brutal. 
Egan was in the habit of beating his wife, and on this day he sent his two boys 
away from the sod-shanty in which they lived, and then attacked his wife. He 
threw a piece of rope around her neck, and proceeded to strangle her, and beat 
her about the head with a hard wood picket until she became unconscious, and her 
scalp was laid open to the skull. He then threw the body through the trap-door 
into the hole used as a cellar, where it remained until Tuesday, when it was 
discovered. A coroner's jury was summoned and Egan arrested and lodged in jail. 
After unavoidable delays the trial came off in November, 1881, and the prisoner 
was convicted of the murder of his wife. A motion for a new trial was overruled, 
and he was sentenced to be hung on Friday, January 13, 1882. The counsel for the 
defense was L. S. Swezey assisted by C. H. Winsor, while the prosecution was 
conducted by the district attorney, J. W. Carter, assisted by E. Parliman and A. 
M. Flagg.

	An appeal to the supreme court was perfected January 4, 1882, which stayed 
proceedings under the sentence, until May 13, when the supreme court affirmed 
the judgment of the district court, and on May 29, Egan was re-sentenced, the 
date of the execution being fixed for Thursday, July 13, 1882. Through no fault 
of the officials in charge, owing to the accidental breaking of the noose at the 
first drop, and the consequent excitement, it was not until the culprit had been 
dropped the third time that the execution was successfully accomplished, and 
while the scene was harrowing, it seemed but the just retribution for so 
horrible a crime. This was the first execution in Minnehaha county, and the 
second one in Dakota. Joseph Dickson was the sheriff.

	There are two incidents in connection with this deplorable tragedy that 
are worthy of record. One is the changing" of the date fixed upon for Egan's 
execution to accommodate the publisher of a newspaper, and as E. W. Caldwell was 
the publisher, we will give the details in his own language:

	"I went to Judge Kidder and asked him if there was anything in the law 
which required that a man should be hung on Friday, and he said there was not. I 
then told him that I ran a weekly paper, which I issued on Thursday, and if Egan 
was hung on Friday, I would either have to postpone the issue of my paper, or 
hold the account of the hanging a week later, neither of which I wanted to do. 
He asked me if I had seen Judge Carter, the prosecuting attorney, and I said I 
had not, but I would; so I went to Judge Carter, told him the circumstances, and 
asked him if it would make any difference to him. He said it would not; he 
didn't care when the man was hung, if he was only hung. I then went back to 
Judge Kidder, who finally said that he had intended to appoint Friday, July 7, 
for the hanging, but as that was so soon after the Fourth, it might put a damper 
upon the celebration, and if it would be any accommodation to me, he would fix 
it for Thursday, July 13. I told him that would just suit me, and so he did. 
Afterwards I was telling Mr. McLoney of it, and he took me to task for depriving 
the poor man of one day of life. I replied that I did not deprive him of a day, 
on the contrary I was the means of prolonging his life six days."

	The other event was the burning of the Egan homestead. The fact of the 
burning was not so important as the fact that it resulted in the discovery of a 
poetess in Minnehaha county, who had hitherto been unknown to fame. It was 
printed at the time in one of the Sioux Falls newspapers and read as follows:

BURNING OF THE EGAN HOMESTEAD.

POEM BY MRS. CYNTHIA WARREN.

It was a fair and pleasant night, April the third or fourth, 
When at a distance we saw a light of a fire in the north.

The lurid flames ran to the east, not minding things of worth 
Burning beautiful trees, and leaving bare the earth.

The breeze sprang up, the bright flames leaped toward the shining stars, 
With a rushing sound resembling them of a train of cars.

The frightened birds fly here and there, the frogs in the low pond croak, 
While suffocating is the air, filled with ashes, heat and smoke.

Then o'er the hill the fire comes sweeping toward the south, 
It has lit in Egan's forsaken home and burned the old sod house.

The roof and posts are burned, and all the boards around, 
The sodding is all fallen in and lies smouldering on the ground.

We never will forget the day when first the tale was told, 
That Mrs. Egan in the cellar lay a sail sight to behold.

By her husband she was killed, to get away she hoped, 
And her life-blood there he spilled, and choked her with a rope.

Now nothing marks the place, save a pile of sod burned mellow 
And they lay by the place where she was found in the cellar.

Good people, far and near, all had one desire, 
That a place so drear should be swept away by fire.

THE LACEY-BUNKER TRAGEDY.

	Probably the most awful tragedy in the state, occurred about five o'clock 
in the afternoon of Sunday, October 22, 1893, just outside of the eastern limits 
of the City of Sioux Falls.

	arry Lacey, a man known to all the residents of the city, shot his mother-
in-law Mrs. Lydia Bunker, his wife Clara, and himself, all three dying within a 
few minutes, and before any of the neighbors arrived at the place where the 
terrible deeds had been committed.

	Harry Lacey came to the City of Sioux Falls in 1882, and commenced the 
practice of law. He was quiet and unassuming, but it was soon known that he was 
a man of considerable ability. He obtained a good standing in the community, and 
although he soon abandoned his profession, he was always occupied in some 
business enterprise. His mother-in-law, in 1889, sold her farm east of the city 
(except a few acres where the tragedy took place) for quite a large sum of 
money, and invested fifteen thousand dollars of this sum in a phonograph 
enterprise, and lost it all. Mrs. Bunker charged Lacey with this loss and Lacey 
denied his responsibility in the matter. Soon after the sale of the farm, Mrs. 
Bunker came to the city and resided with the Laceys. It was known among their 
neighbors that family matters were not running smoothly, but not until the early 
part of December, 1891, was there an open outbreak. At this time there was a 
serious disturbance in the family, and all three of them bore marks of a 
personal combat. Mrs. Lacey had Mr. Lacey arrested for assault and battery, and 
immediately brought a bill for divorce. After a few months she told the writer, 
that she could not live without her husband, and soon after, the divorce 
proceedings were abandoned, and they commenced living together again. It did not 
prove a happy re-union, and they lived apart and together, as they could agree, 
until the spring of 1893, when Mr. Lacey secured rooms a short distance from 
Mrs. Bunker's place. During the summer there were frequent quarrels, and Mr. 
Lacey grew more and more dissatisfied and unhappy, and one thing more than 
anything else that seemed to trouble him was the fact that his little children 
were under the influence of Mrs. Bunker.

	On Sunday, the day the tragedy occurred, he was in Sioux Falls and went 
home late in the afternoon. Shortly after he walked over to the Bunker house. In 
less than thirty minutes after he had been seen going to Mrs. Bunker's, his two 
little children, aged four and seven years, who had witnessed the terrible deed 
of their father, came to a neighbor by the name of Jones, the eldest boy saying:
" Papa Jones come over; they are all dead. Papa has shot grandma and ma, and 
went out in the yard and shot himself." Mr. Jones went immediately to the house, 
and found them all dead. Mrs. Bunker and Mrs. Lacey were both shot in the back 
part of the head, near the base of the brain, and were lying but a little 
distance from each other in the kitchen. Lacey was lying in the yard, a few feet 
from the house, where he evidently fell and died without a struggle, after 
firing a bullet into his own head. Mr. Lacey was an expert marksman, and knew 
where the vital spark could be most quickly extinguished, and whether with the 
coolness of a wicked, desperate hate, or the frenzy of a man who thinks that 
nothing but blood can atone his wrong's, he brought his skill and knowledge into 
action, and committed the fearful tragedy with wonderful precision and fatality 
will never be known. He completed his work, and left nothing to be done but to 
bury the dead.

	The foregoing is sufficient to outline the incidents connected with one of 
the most horrible tragedies that ever occurred in a civilized community, and one 
which undoubtedly will never be paralleled in Minnehaha county.

THE MURDER OF ALFRED ERIKSON.

	Sometime during the early evening of December 7, 1897, Alfred Erikson, a 
young man about twenty-two years of age, was most brutally murdered. The crime 
was committed in a small one-story house located near the Mulhall block on Main 
avenue in the City of Sioux Falls. He was an eccentric character, and known to 
be a little below par in point of intelligence, but strong and robust. The house 
in which he was killed, was occupied by James Garrington, a small man about 
sixty-six years of age, who was at that time in feeble health. Erikson had the 
day before returned to Sioux Falls, from whence he had fled on the 28th day of 
August, preceding, to escape arrest upon a complaint charging him with having 
committed a serious offense upon the person of a girl about eleven years of age, 
the daughter of William West of Sioux Falls. The girl during Erikson's absence 
had been sent to the Reform school at Plankinton, and was burned to death at the 
time the Reform school buildings were destroyed by fire. Erikson arrived in town 
December 6, and stopped over night with his aunt, Mrs. Langbien. During the 
forenoon of the day following, Erikson went to Garrington's place, took dinner 
with him, and was out and in during the day. He was at Dunning's drug store at 
4:45 P. M., where he was last seen alive. A little past midnight that night, he 
was found dead in Garrington's building. As stated above, he had been brutally 
murdered, there being no less than thirty-three wounds upon his person. 
Garrington was immediately arrested, and he then charged Wm. West with having 
committed the murder. Two hours later West was arrested. During the evening of 
that day, representatives of the Sioux Falls Dally Press interviewed Garrington 
and represented to him that West could prove an alibi, and that the only hope he 
had was to confess that he did it, and to claim that he did it in self-defense. 
Before they left they succeeded in getting Garrington to sign such a statement. 
Within an hour thereafter State's Attorney Bates, with two or three others, also 
visited the prisoner, when he made in substance the same statement to them. The 
next day West was discharged, and Garrington remained in prison charged with the 
murder of Erikson. On the 13th day of December he plead not guilty and Monday 
the 3d day of January, 1898, was fixed for his trial. Before this time arrived, 
on motion of the defendant, the time of trial was changed to Monday, January 31. 
A special venire was issued for seventy-five jurymen in addition to the regular 
panel, and the trial commenced at the time appointed. State's Attorney C. P. 
Bates, assisted by ex-State's Attorney P. J. Rogde, appeared for the 
prosecution, and D. R. Bailey, assisted by A. F. Orr, appeared for the 
defendant. The trial lasted until February 9. The jury retired at 11:05 A. M., 
and at 4:10 p. M. returned a verdict of guilty, fixing the death penalty. On the 
14th day of February, Judge Jones sentenced Garrington to be hanged on the 14th 
day of April, 1898. D. R. Bailey, attorney for Garrington, made a motion for a 
new trial, based upon alleged errors occurring at the trial, and upon newly 
discovered evidence, which motion was on the 4th day of April denied by Judge 
Jones. Mr. Bailey, on the 8th day of April, secured a writ of error from the 
supreme court, which operated as a stay of the execution of Garrington, and all 
further proceedings in the case were transferred to the supreme court. On the 
14th day of June, the case was argued by C. P. Bates and D. R. Bailey, and the 
court took the case under advisement.

	The last of August, 1898, the supreme court granted a new trial, and at 
the next term of the circuit court the case was called on Tuesday, the 3d day of 
January, 1899, and the trial commenced. The same attorneys appeared for the 
prosecution as at the former trial, and D. R. Bailey, assisted by D. J. Conway 
and C. C. Gliem, conducted the defense. On the 12th day of January, at four 
o'clock in the afternoon, the case was submitted to the jury. At nine o'clock 
the next morning the jury found Garrington guilty, and fixed his punishment 
imprisonment for life.

	The writer having been the leading attorney in the defense, will refrain 
from any comment, except to assert that a large percentage of the people in the 
county feel confident that if the whole facts were known other parties would be 
implicated in this brutal murder.

THE JOHN McDONALD HOMICIDE.

	During the evening of December 24, 1897, an affray occurred between John 
McDonald, a printer, and Gilbert Gilman, a saloon keeper, both of Sioux Falls, 
which resulted in the death of McDonald.

	There were some words between the parties in a saloon on Phil-lips avenue 
in reference to a bill Gilman claimed McDonald owed him. Gilman left the saloon, 
McDonald followed him and continued to talk to him about the matter. Just as 
they turned the corner of Tenth street, going east, Gilman turned around and 
struck McDonald a slight blow upon his face, telling him to stop his talking, 
and then walked away. Shortly after, McDonald was found lying on the sidewalk in 
a dying condition, and was carried back into the saloon, where he in a few 
minutes expired. Considerable excitement prevailed in the community in reference 
to the affair. Gilman was arrested and bound over to the circuit court, which 
was then in session. State's Attorney Bates filed an information against Gilman 
charging him with manslaughter. There is a statute which declares that homicide 
"when perpetrated without a design to effect death by a person while engaged in 
the commission of a misdemeanor" is guilty of manslaughter in the first degree. 
The trial commenced on Thursday, January 6, State's Attorney Bates appearing for 
the prosecution, and H. H. Keith for the defense. After the regular panel had 
been exhausted, a special venire was issued for additional jurors. At 3:30 P. 
M., the following jurors were accepted: Charles Foss, Frank Edgington, E. T. 
Haves, Fred Witte, P. F. Sherman, Sam Herbert, Chas. Arndt, W. H. Holt, and 
Henry Dalton, all of Sioux Falls, W. J. Page of Dell Rapids, H. A. Foster of 
Wayne, and I. N. Griffith of Brandon. The testimony of Doctors Morgan and Oiney, 
who conducted the post-mortem examination upon the body of McDonald, developed 
the fact that he came to his death from the obstruction in the air passage to 
the lungs by quite a large quantity of fine cut tobacco and mucus, which they 
found in the trachea and bronchial tubes.

	The case was vigorously tried by the attorneys. Mr. Bates claimed that 
Gilman while in the act of striking McDonald was committing a misdemeanor, and 
that the blow McDonald received caused him to swallow the tobacco which resulted 
in his death, and hence the jury should find him guilty of manslaughter as 
charged in the information. Mr. Keith, on the other hand, claimed that the 
prosecution had not established the fact beyond a reasonable doubt that the 
swallowing of the tobacco by McDonald was the result of the blow struck by 
Gilman. The jury retired to consider their verdict at 2:10 P. M. Saturday, the 
8th of January, and after being out about three hours, returned a verdict of not 
guilty. On the first ballot the jury stood three for conviction and nine for 
acquittal.

	The jury were all of the opinion that Gilman did not contemplate doing 
McDonald any serious harm, and it is greatly to his credit that since his 
acquittal he has materially assisted in maintaining McDonald's family.

THE MESSIAH CRAZE, AND THE TRIAL OF PLENTY HORSES, ALIAS TSUNKA WAKA OTTA, FOR 
THE MURDER OF LIEUTENANT E. W. CASEY.

	Plenty Horses was indicted on the 13th day of March, 1891, at a term of 
the United States District Court at Deadwood, S. D., charged with the murder of 
Lieut. E. W. Casey on the 7th day of January preceding.

	During the latter part of the summer of 1890, it first became known that a 
remarkable hallucination had taken possession of some of the tribes of Indians 
belonging to the Sioux nation. It was known as the "Messiah Craze." At first it 
attracted attention outside of the Indian country by reason of its strange 
features, both in reference to the character of the delusion and the peculiar 
demonstrations resulting therefrom. Just how it originated is not well verified, 
but that it was madly contagious and rapidly spread among the Indians, 
completely demoralizing whole tribes, was soon well known. It was at first 
thought to he harmless, and it did not seem possible to a sane person that such 
a craze could last for any length of time, and the authorities in charge of the 
Indians delayed taking any active, aggressive measure for its suppression, 
believing that it would destroy itself by its own intensity. The Indians 
professed to believe that the Messiah was at that time to be found west of Salt 
Lake, and that they were to leave the Union Pacific railroad and go into the 
mountains, about four day's travel, where they would find him; that he would 
talk to those who went to see him in their own language, and the next spring, or 
at some stated time, he would come and visit them. That the purpose of his 
coming was to punish the white people for crucifying him and for the wrongs they 
had committed against the Indians, and that they would be restored to their 
former mode of living. That another earth would come from the west and cover up 
the white people, and that the Indians would mount this new earth. Dances were 
organized among them, and were so unnatural and weird that they were called 
ghost-dances.

	This condition of affairs at last became intolerable; but it was found 
impossible to control them by peaceful measures, and the regular army was called 
upon for aid. General Miles was in command. The Indians believed that the white 
man's bullet could not injure them, and they were defiant. A battle was fought 
at Wounded Knee on the 29th day of December, 1890, in which one hundred and 
forty-nine Indians, and forty-nine soldiers were killed. Another battle took 
place the next day on White Clay creek.

	General Miles, at the time of the killing of Lieutenant Casey, had the 
Indians surrounded and was endeavoring to force them to surrender. Lieutenant 
Casey, at the head of the Cheyenne scouts, was with General Brooke, northwest of 
Pine Ridge, and on the morning of his death, left General Brooke's camp, taking 
one of his scouts with him, for the purpose of obtaining information in regard 
to the location of the camp of the hostile Indians. He proceeded without 
molestation until he reached the picket line of the hostiles, when he was told 
that he was in great danger and had better turn back. He paid no attention to 
this, however, but proceeded in the direction of the camp, when he was again 
warned by some friendly Indians that he was in danger and ought not to go any 
further. He hesitated, but at the same time expressed a desire to go a little 
further where he could see the hostile camp. While conversing with a messenger 
who had been sent out from the Indian camp by Red Cloud (who had learned that 
Lieutenant Casey was approaching the camp) to intercept and warn him of the 
danger he was in. Plenty Horses, after changing his position so as to get behind 
Lieutenant Casey, deliberately shot him and rode away. Lieutenant Casey died 
instantly.

	General Miles immediately after the death of Lieutenant Casey demanded the 
surrender of Plenty Horses, which demand was complied with. After the Indictment 
was found, the court ordered the trial to take place at Sioux Falls, and on the 
24th day of April, 1891, the trial of Plenty Horses commenced in the United 
States court room in the Masonic Temple at that place.  Judges Shiras and 
Edgerton were upon the bench. U. S. District Attorney Sterling", with his 
Assistant Howard and Lieutenant J. G. Ballance, appeared for the prosecution, 
and George P. Nock and D. E. Powers of Sioux Falls, appeared for Plenty Horses.  
The indictment of Plenty Horses for murder aroused considerable interest 
throughout the country. The New York World sent one of its most competent men to 
report the trial, and the account of the proceedings in that paper was most 
minutely and graphically given.  The trial lasted six days, and the attorneys 
for the defense endeavored to secure the acquittal of their client upon the 
theory that actual war existed at the time of the killing of Lieutenant Casey, 
and that Plenty Horses was one of the hostiles; that his act was not murder but 
excusable as an act of war. They had, however, but short time for preparation, 
and did not succeed in establishing the fact beyond question that there was 
actual war, and the Court not feeling justified in directing a verdict, the case 
was submitted to the jury and resulted in a disagreement.

	The Court immediately fixed upon the 25th day of May following, for a 
second trial. At that time the same judges and attorneys were in charge, and 
assembled at the place of the former trial to determine the position the Indian 
holds in the time of so called war. At this trial the real character of the acts 
of war occurring during the Indian outbreak was clearly shown by the defense, 
and when the testimony was all in, Judge Shiras directed the jury to return a 
verdict of not guilty; holding that at the time of the killing of Lieutenant 
Casey there existed in and about Pine Ridge Agency an actual state of warfare 
between the army of the United States and the Indian camp; and that Lieutenant 
Casey was killed by Plenty Horses while reconnoitering the camp of the hostile 
Indians; and, while condemning the manner in which the act was committed, still, 
it was a legitimate act of war. Judge Edgerton did not concur in the opinion of 
Judge Shiras.

	Plenty Horses was educated at the Indian school at Carlisle, Pa., going 
there the 24th day of November, 1883, and remaining until July 8, 1888, when he 
returned to the Rosebud Agency where his father, Living Bear, was the recognized 
leader of the Brule tribe of Indians. He was a dull scholar, although considered 
quite intelligent, but upon the return to his old home he again adopted the 
habits and customs of the Indians.

	In the fall of 1890 when the Indians were banding together and threatening 
to make trouble, he sympathized with them, and after the destruction of Big 
Foot's band he joined the hostile Indians and became a participator in their 
warlike demonstrations and undoubtedly felt justified in killing Lieutenant 
Casey.

	It only remains to mention that the trials were of a more sensational and 
dramatic character than any ever had in South Dakota, attracting the attention 
of the whole country; and were conducted by the attorneys on both sides with 
great energy and ability.