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Show Recent Deaths of Two Men, One in the West and One in the East, Recall Days Wheni'Gunfighlers Wrote Their Names in Blood in the' .Wild West' By ELMO SCOTT WATSON Beleaeed tit Wratern Newspaper Union. HMIE Old West lived again I recently and, paradoxically, paradoxi-cally, it lived again because of the deaths of two men within the span of two weeks. One of them died in the West 1T.T, ; j . v ..v - . i Snow flakes: 1 King George at Greece l Irked with his public relation expert. They kept him staying In hli London hotel room during the Atheni rness Instead of okaying His Highness' usual routine of making the London late place surrounded by bevy of beauts. . . . Cuba's Batiita will settle in Brazil. The Federal Trade commission I Is checking up on endorsers of prod- ucts In ads. Wants to And out if the I celebs who endorse (hem actually use them. . . . The reason for the New York butcher strike is this: The Gov't clamped down hard on black marketing. The butchers learned the fine was too high to make any profit, even at b.m. fees. They decided it was cheaper to get out of business than make wholesalers whole-salers rich and themselves poor. Add rackets: Phones In Florida are bringing as high as $300 each from people who lost theirs to the armed forces a year ago. . . . The mobs are set to run the book making mak-ing in Mexico and Havana. They had been figuring on the tracks suffering suf-fering disaster for more than a ' year. . . . Sidney Klngsley dashed off a five page scenario In SO minutes, min-utes, for which Zanuck paid him $50,000. More than a 1,000 smackers per minute.1 Episcopal Church in Tombstone Built by Dr. Peabody. I and the other in the Last, but j both hnd once been closely ; associated with events in what was once known as the "Wild ' West" the West of roaring cow towns and rowdy mining camps, of quick-shooting peace officers and equally hair-trigger-fingered outlaws, of lusty, action-filled life and Boot Hill burials, j When death claimed the Rev. En-i En-i dicott Peabody at the age of 87 in Groton, Mass., newspaper dispatches dis-patches chronicled the fact that he had been the founder of the Groton school and Its headmaster for many yeurs, during which time he had molded the minds and characters of many an eastern notable, including President Franklin Delano Roose-; Roose-; vclt. But few, if any, of these dispatches dis-patches mentioned the fact that this same Rev. Endlcott Peabody had I once lived and labored in one of the wildest towns In the history of the American frontier Tombstone, Arizona. I pute with the Selmans -Young John, i a city policeman, and Old John, a constable who had a record as a killer himself. The result was that on the night of August 19, 1895, Hardin Har-din went down before the blazing six-shooters of Old John Selman shot from behind, so his friends said, as he stood drinking at the bar of the Acme saloon. Selman, when tried for the killing, denied that he had shot Hardin in the back. He Insisted that Hardin was looking him straight in the eye and apparently about to draw his gun when the constable fired. A young attorney, named Fall, who the room followed his example. Peabody was dumbfounded for an instant, and then told them that it was a much larper contribution than he had expected, but It was for a good cause and he knew they would never regret it. "Peabody was a fine athlete, and was named the official referee In all baseball games and other outdoor sports that were carried on by the young men of Tombstone. His decisions were never questioned, as he was known as being absolutely square and he had no favorites. He loved a good horse-race, and frequently fre-quently attended the gymnasium Into such an environment In the summer of 1881 came a young Episcopal Epis-copal minister, recently ordained in Boston, and what happened thereafter there-after is best told in the words of a man who knew him then and there. That man was William M. Breaken-ridge, Breaken-ridge, who was one of Sheriff John--ny Behan's deputies ln Tombstone at the time. In his book, "Helldo- where he kept himself In fine ptiys-ical ptiys-ical condition by exercise; he never refused an invitation to put on the gloves with anyone and never was bested." Bad Man "Backs Down." Perhaps that fact had something to do with the "back-down" of one of the bad men who infested Arizona Ari-zona in those days when he tried to bluff the "fearless preacher." Breakenridge tells the story thus: "In the summer of 1881 the Reverend Rev-erend Mr. Peabody was invited down to Charleston to deliver a sermon. ser-mon. His subject was the evil of the cattle-steeling rustlers and the drinking and carousing cowboys. Billy Claybourn, the would-be bad man who had Hilled one or two in saloon fights ,in Charleston and who was afterwards killed by Frank Leslie, Les-lie, in Tombstone, heard of the sermon ser-mon and, sent word to Mr. Peabodjr that if he ever, came to Charleston again and preached such a sermon, he, Claybourn, -would come to the church and make him dance. -Peabody tolct ther'mar) who delivered the message that he expected to return re-turn to Charleston ln about two weeks, and would preach a sermon ser-mon that nek thought appropriate, and if Mr. Claybourn would come to the church and listen to it, and then Though war . plant absenteeism was a contributing factor, the Washington Wash-ington grapevine is saying that the main reason for closing the tracks was this: congress was preparing to stick a 10 per cent tax on the mutuels, and the track owners (instead (in-stead of cooperating gladly in view of the fortunes they've garnered lately) made ready to fight It. . . . It was their attitude, more than anything any-thing else, which irritated the powers pow-ers that be. The first Broadway hit shew to 1 beat the jinx of the amusement page alphabetical listing is "A Bell for Adano." 7 , . Many shows that put an "A" in front of the title to inherit the top of the list flopped. "Angel Street" was the exception for a long time. . . . The commies in Indianapolis, Eri and Buffalo last week started their campaign to discredit G-man Hoover with' a na- tional smear attack. . ,s , They say N. Y. Times' critic,' "Brooks Atkinson Atkin-son (now in the hospital after a long session covering China's part In the JKar), doesn't want , to resume drarrrswinspecting. He prefers doing something important, auch as his recent re-cent assignment. His excellent reports re-ports are credited with actually Influencing In-fluencing V. S. policy in the Orient. Faces About Town: Libby Hol-man, Hol-man, the blues thrush-tobacco heir--ess, who Is quietly backing Broadway shows. Band chief John Kirby, $5,000 wealthier after winning a libel li-bel action from a Pittsburgh writer, who cast aspersions on 'his draft status. . . . Canary Bernlce Parks, had just come to El Paso, agreed to assist in Selman's defense. Years later, Ex-Senator Fall, recalling the case, told Eugene Cunningham, author au-thor of "Triggernomerty: A Gallery of Gunflghters": "I couldn't help being impressed by Selman's appearance when he assured me that he had been looking Hardin in the eye. I knew Selman well and I felt that he wouldn't lie to me and he had all the appearance of a man telling what he firmly believed. be-lieved. It puzzled me, so I went down to look over the scene Of the killing. I stopped at the Acme's door and looked inside, ' There was a man standing at the -ha r and he-lifted he-lifted his head. Then I had the explanation ex-planation of Selman's statement. For as that man stared into the mirror, mir-ror, I had the illusion for an instant of looking him straighten the eye." Apparently Fall's explanation, was convincing to the jury, for Selman was freed.' L'Ji , "Few of the gunmen of that era lived past the turn of the century," says an editorial on the passing ol Albert B. Fall) which appeared in the Chicago Daily News recent ly.An. exception to that statement iaTai Garrett, slayer pf Billy theitfal, the 21-year-old gunman . withr the 21 notches. That killing maHe Garrett a national figure. Three times he was elected sheriff of Donna Ana county in New Mexico In 19Q1 Presi&ent Theodore .Roosevelt ap pointed him collector of customs in El Paso, Texas. Then he retired from public life and took up ranch-jng ranch-jng In New Mexico. He had a dispute dis-pute over some trifling matter with a comparatively unknown young W ' thought he could make him dance, to try it, "Peabody was known to go into the saloons and gambling-houses and go up to the gambling-tables when they were ln operation, with a crowd around them, and say 'Gentlemen, 'Gen-tlemen, I am going to preach a sermon ser-mon on the evil of gambling Sunday Sun-day night, and I would like to have you all come to the church and listen lis-ten to it.' All who could get away went to hear him. He had large j audiences always." Less than two weeks after the death of Dr. Peabody, the wires car- i DR. END1COTT PEABODY rado: Bringing the Law to the Mes-quite," Mes-quite," published by the Houghton Mifflin company in 1928, "Billy" Breakenridge writes of "The Fearless Fear-less Preacher" thus: "His name was Endfcott Peabody. He was about twenty-four years of age, and full of vim and energy. He immediately got busy building up a membership for his congregation and getting funds together to build a church. He was a good mixer and soon got acquainted, not only with the very best element of society in ried thcyiews that Albert Bacon Fall had died at the age of 83 In El Paso, Texas. The news of his passing served to recall .briefly a great national na-tional scandal in the recent past-how past-how Senator "A. B. Fall of New Mexico Mex-ico was appointed secretary of, the interior in President Harding's cab', inet, how he was, ope of the chief figures in the Teapot Dome oil case, and how he became the first cabi., net officer in AmertcanJ history; to serve a prison sentence for a crime. Again few, if any, of the newspaper newspa-per accounts gave much space to his career as a young lawyer in the Southwest or told of his association associa-tion with some of the notables of currently at the St. Regis, who will decorate Life's 'pages as best-dressed best-dressed rat Shehas 16 fur coats. Her match book covers feature photos cber lelleh . . . Horace MacMahonTwreAof the stage's capa-bles.' capa-bles.' serving the ration by delivering deliver-ing war bond speeches while waiting" wait-ing" for producers to come to their senses. . . ."- Milton Berle, who at this' tardy time is feuding with Joe E. Lewis over the song, "Sam, You Made the Pants Too Long!" Apparently after reading the "Fight or Work'f edict. ' v trTT? .. ' StoVy-of the Week (By Dr. Elisha A.( King); Do - you remember the Indian Juggler described by William Hszlitt hi. one ohls famous essays? The Juggler was perfect in throwing and .catching brass balls' keeping four nlhe air fit once.iThat wsU his wlidle fctock in tadebyt it wat the best He had. Sefeinf a number of people 0 the Shrine of the Virgin Mother bowing; praying, etc., he . became interested and wanted to worship. ; Finally, he went in, .'squatted in front of the image and performed It was the best he had to offer and doubtless acceptable. '. i I mention this because of a report from Guadalcanal describing a Christmas evening service. Father Gehring celebrated midnight Mass, but no one could play Christmas music. A soldier had gotten a small organ from somewhere, but no one could play it However, one man j was found who knew only one tune, "Yiddisher ' Mama," so be played that. I With the heavens for a roof. Mass was said in Latin, a Jewish boy played the one piece be- knew ' and several hundred Protestants, Catho- , lies and Jews knelt and listened. . j Tombstone and there wepe some educated- people there but he undertook un-dertook to get acquainted with everybody, ev-erybody, with the mining magnates and managers, the federal, county and city officials, the professional and business managers, the miners and muckers, the ore-haulers or teamsters, and the saloonkeepers and gamblers.' He soon had a large congregation and had the money donated do-nated to butld his church, When it was completed, he had the money to pay for it, and the church has never been in debt since." .flow the Money Was Raised. An incident which Breakenridge relates sheds, light on the young preacher's t money - raising ability. One day a group of mining men, including E. B, Gage, general man ager of the Grand Centra! and Contention Con-tention mines, was sitting In a back room of the Prospector hotel enjoying enjoy-ing a stiff poker game In which frequently fre-quently as much as a thousand dollars dol-lars was in the pot. "Gage was an Episcopalian," writes Breakenridge.' "Mr. Peabody Pea-body came back where they were playing and introduced himself and asked them for a donation to help build a church. He explained that it" was something needed badly, and the only way it could be built was to get everybody he possibly could to subscribe toward building it. Gage counted but about a hundred and fifty dollars from his pile in front of him, and everyone elft in I ALBERT B. FALL , man nmed Wayne Brazel ""and1 6n-February 6n-February 2, 1908$ a sh6t frorrt Bra-" zel's six-shooter ended the career of the great! Pat Garrett. , , Brazel was tried for the killing and acquitted. His attorney was" Albert Al-bert Bacon Fall. "Few of the men who knew these gunmen or Who saw them alive remain alive today," continues con-tinues the.Daily News editorial. "Albert "Al-bert Fall knew a lot about many of them. It was popularly believed in the Southwest that he might, if he chose, shed light on mysterious circumstances cir-cumstances surrounding the sudden demise of a .number of them. But, if he could, . he didn't And, with his death, another colorful segment of frontier history grows fainter'; and recedes farther and .farther into the fabulous past" the frontier. Yet he was the attorney, attor-ney, for the defense whsj won '.freedom '.free-dom for the slayers of two famous gunflghters both of whom illustrate the truth of the age-old paying that "he who takes the sword perishes by the sword." . i ..:' One of these gunflghters was John Wesley Hardin of Texas, possibly the most notorious killer in the annals an-nals of the "Wild West" and popularly popu-larly credited with 40 notches on his six-gun-i-39 of them beore he was 21 years old! The 40th notch it was Deputy Sheriff Charles Webb of Brown county coun-ty put Hardin in the penitentiary for 15 years. He employed them usefully, studying law, and after his release in !8!4 he hung out his shingle shin-gle in various Texas towns, ending up in El P.: so the following year. There he became involved in a dis- |
