TALES OF ADVENTURE

Auckland Star, Volume LVII, Issue 37, 13 February 1926, Page 27

TALES OF ADVENTURE

CASSHEL'S ESCAPE.

<By SERGT. MAJOR C. N. C. HAYTER.)

succeed i,. i«° rth "? r ?! , . t Mounted set out to "get" a man they usually fa * S . ot hlm they generally contrive to keep him. Here is the story of one of the very*ew criminals who ever succeeded in escaping from their clutches—and his spell of freedom was brief.

One of the very few men who ever escaped from the custody of the Royal North-West Mounted Police—for the time being—was Ernest Casshel, a young American who emigrated to Canada, and, after many vicissitudes, was befriended by a wealthy old rancher living -near Calgary, Alberta, who gave him a wellpaid job on the ranch and m many ways treated him almost as a son. Unfortunately, however, Casshel concealed, under a pleasing personality, a mean and treacherous nature. He "soon began to repay his benefactor's kindness by dishonesty, purloining any odd sarins of money on which he could" manage to lay his hands. When his thefts were finally discovered the old rancher, disillusioned and angry, gave him short shrift. "Take yourself off, you ungrateful hound!" he ordered, "and think yourself lucky that I don't prosecute you." So Casshel departed, but far from appreciating his erstwhile master's forbearance, he thirsted for revenge. That very night he broke into the house, where the rancher slept alone, crept up to the poor old man as he lay in bed, and battered his head with an axe, finally decamping with two hundred dollars in cash. He spent the remainder of the night at a local hotel, and next morning the landlord actually complained to a constable on duty that Casshel was drunk. On the officer approaching him, however, the young man proved sober enough to mount his horse and get clear away. It was not until the constable" reached the station that he discovered Casshel was "wanted" for the murder of the rancher. Later on, as a matter of fact, he was arrested by the city police on a charge of drunkenness, but was identified by

■ the most irksome jobs of a mounted policeman's life. One usually got a good dose of* it during one's early days in the Force, before one could hope to be on detachment duty. A fact that made it still more irksome was that when we were short-handed—as Calgary was at this time—it was no unusual thing for an escare to do duty all day, be relieved an hour before guard-mounting at G. 30 p.m., and then, after some supper and a clean-up, find itself mounted as guard for the night — twenty-four hours' straight duty! Even then one was quite possibly not yet "out of the soup," for sometimes one would be allowed to turn in at 6.30 a.m. and sleep until noon, and then be sent to do another twenty-four hour speli. But one learnt to endure little things like that with equanimity in the Royal North-West "Mounted Police! The first trooper to report for escort got the job of "inside duty"—quite pleasant on a cold day! This meant that he was allowed to take his revolver off, leave it in the ante-room, and patrol inside the corridor, superintending the prisoner's meals and the exercise of those awaiting trial. When there was a condemned man in the cells, three "death-watches," as they are called, paraded unarmed with th*» morning escorts for twenty-four hours' duty. One or other of them was always in the condemned cells, staying there two hours, with four hours off. They were not in the guard-room during the day, but at night formed part of the night guard—one, of course, being still in the cell with the condemned man, the others in the ante-room. This rather long digression will help to make what follows more und; 'standable.

us as the man wanted for the killing of the unfortunate rancher. He confessed to the crime, was tried, and in due course sentenced to be hanged at the RJN'.W.ILP. headquarters in Calgary. And now comes the amazing part of the affair. To understand more clearly how Casshel stage-managed a "getaway" which was as well thought out as it was unexpected it would be well to have some idea of the . guard-room in which he was confined while -awaiting execution,' and the manner of its administration. These guard-rooms were only wooden buildings, and that at Calgary had accommodation for fifty prisoners; the places served as common prisons, and anyone sentenced up to a year's imprisonment was interned there. They were situated at the headquarters of each division of the Force, Calgary being Division "E." Their permanent personnel consisted of a non-commissioned officer, generally a sergeant, known as the provost-sergeant, assisted by a senior constable,- who was called the assistant-provost. At 6.30 every morning as many escorts as were required mounted for duty, fully armed, and at 6.30 in the evening their place was taken by a non-commissioned officer and two constables, none of whocj were" allowed to sleep during tour of. duty. This "prisonpunching/' as we called it, is one of;

' Two days before the date arranged for the execution. Casshel's brother came to visit him and bid him a last farewell. The murderer had been allowed to correspond with his brother, and the latter with him, but the authorities" had not "tumbled" to the fact that, under the guise of the most harinless-looking epistles the two had actually been writing to one another in "code." As a matter ot fact, Casshel was looking forward to his brother's' arrival with the liveliest interest, for he had been advised that tht latter would come armed, and had received a hint as to how the weapons might be transferred from his visitor to himself. The "code" used was a very simple one, though new,to us at the time, lt might well be called "Punctuation Cypher," for it simply consisted of placing a punctuation mark after every word which comprised part of the real message. I cannot give the actual wording of the letter which told Casshel what was being done outside on his behalf, but we may presume that it read something ike this: Dear Ernest—l shall be in Calgaryvisiting, and am bringing, the shirt with mc I heard from Jim the other day He is now in the Garrison Artillery; and seems to like it. Mother has put a new inside, lining in my overcoat.

From this, using the "code," one gets: "Visiting Bringing Artillery Inside Overcoat."

By some such letter as this Ernest Casshel -was apprised of what he might expect, and the next step was the arrival of the brother himself. His' visit, either by chance or design, coincided with the relief of the "death-watch," which to -a certain extent distracted attention from himself and his movements. He was not, of course, allowed to talk to his brother inside the cell, but the front of this was open to view, with long iron bars, having considerable space between them, reaching from floor to ceiling. There came a moment during the relief when no "death-watch" was actually in the cell. Instantly the condemned man's brother leant forward against the bars, as if to attempt a last embrace, his overcoat — with two revolvers sewn loosely into the lining—flapping open as he did so. Pressing in his turn close to the bars, it was the work of a second for Casshel to withdraw the weapons and thrust them into concealment beneath his own clothing. Then, with every manifestation of grief—part of which may not have been assumed—the visitor departed, leaving a desperate and heavilyarmed man in the custody of his unsuspecting jailors. The hours went, by, with Casshel doubtless meditating upon the method of his intended escape, and then, half an hour before the mounting of the nightguard, the provost-sergeant unlocked the cell door to carry out the nightly procedure of searching the prisoner. Let us note the disposition of the personnel just before the attempt. In the ante-room of the guard-room was the provost-sergeant, down the corridor the "inside man," in the condemned cell the "death-watch"—all three of them unaware that the criminal under their supervision was armed. On the other hand, neither the provostsergeant nor the "death-watch" carried weapons, it being the rule not to carry a revolver when going near a condemned man lest he might contrive to snatch it. The remainder of the guard was in the dining-room of the barracks, five hundred yards away, getting some before mounting for another tour j of duty. I At about six o'clock, therefore, the ] provost-sergeant left the ante-room and, | going to the end of corridor Xo. 1, called to the constable on "inside" duty to take his place there as he was about to search Casshel. In the ordinary way he should have waited until the constable was actually in the ante-room and had buckled on his revolver, but long usage tends to make the best of I us careless, and the provost-sergeant did jnot wait to see this done before proceeding to the cell. Seeing the constable start up at his hail, he assumed all would be well and went straight on to make his search. As luck would have it, the constable did not go to the ante-room immediately, but lingered on his way to shut a j window which he observed to be open. On his way to the cell, the provostsergeant had to pass through a gateway in a light iron lattice. He unlocked this and left it to be re-fastened by the con- ! stable—whose duty as a matter of fact I it was—doubtless imagining the man to be close behind him. Then he opened the j door of the murderer's cell and entered. j "Xow, Casshel, - ' he exclaimed, "just j let mc run my hands over you," ! What followed happened in a flash. The prisoner, who had been awaiting this moment with every nerve tensed, made j no reply, but with a sudden lightning spring brought down the butt end of one of his concealed weapons on the hapless officer's head. The sergeant reeled from the blow, and sank half-unconscious to the ground. Then. covering the astounded "death-watch" with his revolver, the condemned man leapt outside the cell. While he was actually in the process of shutting the door, the sergeant, having partially recovered, ; rose and made a rush at him. I Casshel levelled his revolver at him. ; "Keep back sergeant!" he warned. | "You've . been very decent to mc and I j should hate to shoot you, but I tell you I mean business. Then the door clanged to and the sergeant and the "death-watch" were j prisoners in their turn. I Xot an instant did Casshel waste. j Turning, he sped down the corridor, and i at the lattice door came face to face with the "inside" constable who—still unarmed—had crossed the ante-room to shnt it. He would not have stood a dog's chance in a tussle with the desperado, though the latter afterwards said that he would not have fired for fear of alarming the men in barracks. The constable—a youngster and new te the Force—decided that dis"crcfticnii •waa the belie? part of valour, ami in a trice Casshel had tied him up securely and sirnt him in the ante-room. There was wnnr only one door between hum. a-q3 freedom—that leading out into the ojen air- It was a wooden affair, sasly negotiated, and Casshel made •slrrri wort of it. In a moment or two he gjnt clean away to where his brother •seas awaiting him -with a buggy and hsarses. Ten miniitps after his departure the new guard marched in, and fhz escape was discovered! Wfiuh the beJp of his brother and others the fugitive got safely across the "border intra the United States. Though the chase was very hot. he might quite possibly have outwitted us and got clean away had he not been guilty of the almost incomprehensible foolishness of j returning to Calgary. It was, it transpired, the charms of a grrl with whom he had become infatuated that lured him to his

doom. With the fickleness of her sex, however, the maiden, during Casshel's enforced absence, had fallen in love with a policeman in the Force—one of the very men who were searching for her erstwhile lover! It was not long before she betrayed to her new fancy the whereabouts of Casshel, who had taken refuge at the homestead of a man of doubtful reputation named Brown. A patrol consisting of a sergeant and ten men was at once sent out to capture the outlaw. In the meantime, quite by chance, another patrol of six men, under Detec-tive-Sergeant Biggs, also on the look out for the elusive Casshel, had called at the same house. Just as Biggs entered the door he caught sight of a man disappearing into the cellar through a flap in the floor, and his suspicions were aroused. "Who is that?" he demanded sternly; "and what's he doing scuttling out of sight?" Brown was inclined to prevaricate at first, but it was obvious that he was pretty badly scared, and finally he blurted out the truth. "Guess I'd better tell you, sergeant," he admitted. "That's Casshel, the man you're after." '"The devil it is!" cried the seageant; and at once began to take steps for the apprehension of the fugitive. There was one easy and infallible way of getting him, and that was to smoke him out but while posting hLi men round the house in order to block every avenue of escape, Biggs observed the approach of the other patrol, and realised that if he was to reap the sole honour and glory of capturing Casshel, he had no time to lose. He accordingly approached the flap and opened it. "Come out, Casshel," he called. "The game's up." "If you want mc, come and get mc!" And that is precisely what Biggs did. He knew that the chances of Casshel being armed were about a hundred to one; he knew, moreover, that the murderer would not hesitate to fire at anyone who attempted to enter the cellar. But Biggs was determined that he. and he alone, should capture the outlaw. He drew back a few steps from the cellar entrance and raised his voice as if calling to his men. "Bring wood at once," he shouted. "We'll smoke him out !" Then, turning on his tracks, he sprang -traight down into the cellar ! Taken by surprise though he was, the desperado managed to fire one shot before Biggs grappled with him, and, although he missed —Casshel declared later that lie had fired wide on "purpose —the weapon was so close to the plucky policeman that his eyes were badly injured and he was afterwards invalided out of the Force. At the time, however, the brave fellow made light of his injuries, and down there in the darkness a desperate struggle ensued for the mastery. Little by little, both of their swaying backwards and forwards in the gloom of the cellar, he overcame the criminal. His men, missing him, rushed to his aid, and before long Casshel was secured. The patrol which had been dispatched from Ca'gary upon the information of the half-breed girl, arrived to find their quarry already a prisoner. Casshel was taken back to Calgary after some three months of freedom, and this time we saw to it that he did not escape again. Visitors were carefully searched before entering the precincts, and no one was allowed within ten yards of the bars of his cell. He was duly hanged at Calgary barracks, and died game, walking' unfalteringly to the scaffold. Casshel's escape had very serious consequences for the provost-sergeant and the two constables who were on duty with him at the time. All three were dismissed .from the Force and sentenced to imprisonment for neglect of sergeant for twelve months and the constables for six. There was a considerable " outcry about the severity of the sentences, but speaking without prejudice, one must admit grave lapses of duty on their part. The discipline of the Mounted Police is adamant. Even good work receives no commendation it is taken for granted. You are selected for a certain job, and you are supposed to go and do it. If you bring it off, well and good; you have merely done your duty. Failure, however, means disaster. Xo extenuating circumstances are allowed to palliate it. It sounds harsh and ruthless perhaps, but it brings results, and its justification is that it has made the Force what it is—perhaps the finest body of disciplined men in the world. Before I conclude I must mention one little spice of comedy that enlivened the affair towards the end. While the hue-and-cry was being raised far and wide' for the escaped murderer, a certain zealous young corporal v as sent into British Columbia to conduct the search there. Forthwith he began to telegraph all kinds of wonderful "clues" to headquarters. Finally, two days after Casshel had been safely lodged under lock and key again, the following telegram arrived from the corporal:— "Positive information Casshel left for Australia on steamship Harrilda a week ago. Suggest following on next boat. Wire more funds." Instead of more "funds," there arrived a sergeant and escort, who brought the imaginative corporal back to Calgary and there confronted him with a real "clue" in the person of Casshel himself. Beyond a "choke-off," however, nothing was done to the too-enthusiastic X.C.O. But "Wire more funds" became from that moment a standard joke in the Force.