CHAPTER XLIX.

Closing the Record 542

PREFACE.

The governing idea in the mind of the author, while preparing this volume for the press, has been to give details connected with the MOLLIE MAGUIRES, and follow strictly the truth concerning the adventures of the detectives during three years passed in their midst. He is aware that, in many places, the relation reads much like fiction, and that it will be accepted as romance by very many who are totally unacquainted with the country and the people attempted to be described. It has been the constant endeavor to adhere closely to facts, and if the incidents are, in a great degree, novel and absorbing, it is due to these facts, and they were worked out, through arduous labors, in sleepless nights and undivided attention to the ends to be gained.

The coal regions of Pennsylvania are inhabited by a mixture of races, the ingredients perhaps more widely differing, in character and origin, than those of any other portion of the globe. Living within a stone’s throw of each other will be found the German, Swede, Norwegian, Pole, Irish, Scotch, English, Bohemian, and Russian. And in moving across the country, from one colliery to another, representatives of nearly all of these widely separated nations may be encountered, with here and there an American and Pennsylvania German. All endeavor to express themselves in Anglo-Saxon, but their foreign idioms and native eccentricities will, spite of themselves, occasionally crop out. Hence the life of a person, who is sensitively alive to diversified phases of human nature and having a keen sense of the humorous, in the mining districts, cannot well be devoid of enjoyment. Some extraordinary habits and peculiarities are found in the coal fields not discovered elsewhere.

To the boundless extent and value of the coal fields, as a portion of the economy of the whole country, full reference has been made in this volume.

The only difficulty of importance experienced by the writer of the work has been to condense within the compass of these pages the very extended and almost overwhelming mass of matter placed before him—all of which, he doubts not, would, if given, prove of general interest—and to exercise due discretion in the rejection of portions not deemed absolutely necessary to be incorporated.

It has been the constant intent to produce a fair picture of the MOLLIE MAGUIRE in his native or adopted home, with only such delineations of the scenery and surroundings as the course of the narrative may seem naturally to bring in. These, it is to be hoped, will be found apt and in accordance with nature.

For the sanguinary character of many of the chapters and accompanying illustrations no excuse is needed. It is the work of the MOLLIE MAGUIRES, and not of the author or designer. Where scenes of general interest are depicted the assistance of the photographer and his camera has been liberally invoked. In the letter-press the relater has merely traced the journeyings of the detectives with a faithful pen, and sought to reproduce their words, acts, and results achieved, as well as the language of the persons, criminals or citizens, with whom they have come in contact. All of the characters lived, or once have lived, in the anthracite coal regions. If fault there may be in their description, it will be found in lack of color, as the brush has not, in any case, been dipped in too florid hues.

With the ends accomplished in this three years’ warfare with the MOLLIE MAGUIRES, the public is already well instructed, the great newspapers of the country having vied with each other in friendly rivalry to first give the results.

The author has reason to be proud of the work done. The modes in which the labors were performed, and the routes taken by himself and others to gain desirable points have found record for the first time, in the following pages. No attempt has ever before been made to give them. No task of the kind could succeed without the private papers and documents on file in my Agency, to which, of course, no person, excepting myself, would be permitted to have access.

With the purely legal and court portions of the murder cases, the arguments of the distinguished counsel for both sides, and the testimony, simply as testimony, I have dealt very sparingly. The masterly effort of F. B. Gowen, Esq., I have printed almost entire. It is so to the point, so truthful, and such a vivid and telling exposition of the theory of the Commonwealth, that any attempt in the way of curtailment would be damaging. Without the speech I should consider my book incomplete.

The talent of the entire State of Pennsylvania was hunted over to find attorneys capable of freeing the unfortunate men brought to trial in Schuylkill, Columbia, and Carbon counties. But the law was against them. The defendants had incurred the penalty, by committal of crimes, and justice has been at least partly vindicated.

ALLAN PINKERTON.

CHICAGO, ILL., _June, 1877_.

THE MOLLIE MAGUIRES

AND THE

DETECTIVES.