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Show j STAGE COACH . TALES Z?y E. C. TAYLOR j The Bandit's Nemesis TAMES CURRY was the most noted -'of all the stage coach drivers on the old Baraboo-Kilbourn line when Wisconsin was little more than a wilderness wil-derness and the roads were quagmires and rough, rocky trails through the forests. Tall and fearless, Curry's word was law along the stage line, and his fearlessness fear-lessness and the respect in which the new inhabitants of the country held him proved the undoing of one of the most desperate bandits and gunmen in the old Northwest. Curry's stretch of the road was miles of sandy trail north of Baraboo. lie drove coaches over this route from 1800 until the Chicago & North Western West-ern railroad extended its line from Kilbourn to Baraboo in 1871. During the last nine years of this period he owned the stage coach line, but continued con-tinued to drive through the "bad" section. sec-tion. In the late 60's the entire countryside country-side lived in fear of Pat Wildrick, one of the most noted bandits in the history his-tory of the American frontier. Pat was leader of a band of lawless men who stooped to any crime to do his .. bidding. Baraboo was already a thriving community, com-munity, and the railroad line ran to Kilbourn. Curry's stage coach line made its chief revenue by carrying money from the railhead at Kilbourn to towns along the route, but principally princi-pally to the bank at Baraboo. The people trusted Curry so greatly that they never thought of having their packages of money insured, and many a farmer or housewife would turn money over to him after stopping his coach along the road, and have him pay their bills, or buy things for them at Kilbourn or Baraboo. Curry received 50 cents for each $1,000 cash he transported across the country. One night he was handed $12,000 to be carried to the Terrell Thomas bank at Baraboo. Just as he was leaving two strangers crawled into in-to the stage coach, sat in the rear seats and conversed in whispers. As the stage crossed the river and entered a section thick with pine woods, the two strangers continued to talk in low tones. Curry recalled that Pat Wildrick vand his gang some time before had attacked at-tacked S. S. Gates and his wife near the same spot, and while the authorities authori-ties were hunting Pat, a pal of the bandit chief had murdered Gates at this same spot on the road. Curry whipped up his horses, fully convinced that besides the $12,000 in cash he was carrying two of Pat's bandit gang. He expected to be attacked at-tacked at any moment. s Arriving at Baraboo, Curry breathed a sigh of relief. There he learned that the two strangers were law-abiding persons, who talked low as a matter mat-ter of habit. The entire countryside was uneasy when Pat was at large, and Curry was constantly on the lookout for the bandit. Pat once escaped from the Baraboo jail, and posses searched the woods for miles around for him. As Curry drove his stage coach peacefully along the road near Oschner park, he spied the bandit leader hiding in the woods. He drove along for a short distance as though nothing unusual happened, until he mei some of the posse. He called to them, and led them back to Pat's hiding place. The bandit was speedily recaptured. As Pat was hurried hur-ried back to the Baraboo jail, he shouted to Curry : "Young man, I'll see you later." The Irish bandit had a habit of keeping his word, and Curry and all of Baraboo knew what he meant by saying he would "see him later." Curry was wary thereafter, but the Irish bandit must have realized that It would be dangerous for him to attack at-tack the stage coach driver, as Curry was well guarded constantly from the day of the threat by friends who liked the driver. At any rate, Curry was the one man in the whole countryside whom Pat did not dare raise a hand against Pat's career ended soon after that, at the end of a rope in the hands of a mob at Portage, Wis. ((c). 1031. Western Newsnaper Union. |