Show PEOPLE AND THINGS By Dy FR FRED D BAGBY Speck is de dead d. d P And thus ends another mother chapter inthe inthe in iii the history of Browns Brown's Hole better belle known as the the in that tha notorious robbers robbers' roost tucked away In the midst of almost In inaccessible peaks on the northeastern border o of Utah and southern Wyoming where whereIn 1 In th the days of the untamed west I it H served as a safe ate haven for as wile wild and woolly wooly a gang of cattle rustlers train holdups and rObbers as ever evOr infested in in- the frontier In the days when Butch Cassidy was king of or the Robbers' Robbers Roost Old Speck is 5 credited credit credit- ed with having been cabin tender anc and bandy handy man for the notorious outlaw although it Is Js said he never never was was' wasa a member of the gang and never was involved in any of their breaking law escapades r w Born orn a Slave kOld Old Speck born as Albert Williams Wil Wll liams IIams a colored slave in Charlottesville Charlottes yule ville Va Vau about 1854 died of infirm ties incident to age ageth W t tin th in Vernal a few f d days s 's ago accord accord- according V ing to information re received c e I v e d by Charles Kelly of ot Salt Lake But few people In U Uta Utah t a h Lt ever saw or heard m a of t Old Speck g l who whose s e cognomen r f w was wa derived from the fact that his 1 brown skin was was' covered with coal coal- coal 1 h black freckles yet he was one of the v f notable characters of the state stale His hIs history is t ory st stretches etches Old fOld Speck from a beginning on a southern plantation plantation plantation plan plan- tation in pre Civil war days to a n close dose not far from the portal of the mountain fastness that served as sanctuary sanc sane luary for years for some of Americas America's most noted desperadoes and where he 50 years in a hermits hermit's cabin Old Speck vas was discovered in 1932 by Dic E. E S. S Frazier of Bingham who with four men from Vernal made a trip down the Green river The rhe party made camp on the river ank supposedly miles from human During the evening Old Speck peck came down to lo fish and around he hc campfire Dr Frazier learned of his hs story The old negro recalled soldiers marching to and tram Tom the Civil war He reckoned he vas tas about 10 years old then He had arned money caring caring horses onne on he ne plantation and later became came carlage car car- lage dage driver for the ladies and gen gen- lemen of the old south who spent heir summers at White Sulphur Springs Later he drove mules in a aVirginia Virginia IrgInIa mine Then he went to Luc Lucas Iowa with a trainload of 1 gro strikebreakers in 1883 The were on the war path there aid nd he joined a company compan o of colored which later was sent into the country countr where they had exciting encounters with the redskins redskins- rhen he went t to the coal mines in int t elyn Wash f li Never Would Tell Just how Old Speck happened happened happened hap hap- f to drift Into Browns Brown's Hole he never would tell teU but it is known that he appeared there thereabout about the time that Butch Cassidy's Cas- Cas sidy's tidy's gang gan of outlaws was using this place as a hideout from the law aw He took up his abode in a cabin near th the entrance to lo the Hole and worked as cook and horse wrangler for the few feY ranchers ranch ranch- ers who ventured near the border of this hells half acre of out out- laws In the SOs BOs this place was headquarters for the western bad pien men en who were rustling cattle robbing trains and banks bank In Utah Wyoming Colorado Colora o and Montana It was a perfect fortress fort fort- r ress ss into which officers of the law didn't dare dinc venture Cassidy was the recognized leader of the gang which included Harry Tracy Bob Lay Tom and Bill McCarly McCarty MeC Mc- Mc C Carly Carty Lant Larit Longabaugh and the Curry brothers The gang operated on a big scale Hid and with the various outside agents i ind nd on hangers-on n numbered m red at one onee lime ene e about men it is said After Alter i big train or bank robbery the gang would retreat to their mountain sane sane- ury and whoop er up until their to was gone Old Speck red ed witnessing many fights some of hick bleh resulted in killings |