AN AMERICAN DESPERADO.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXV, Issue 9244, 22 December 1888, Page 1 (Supplement)

AN AMERICAN DESPERADO.

BILL WHITLEY, THE TRAINROBBER. To look at, Bill Whitley was the very reverse of the preconceived notion of a robber. He was not big nor brawny. He had no sweeping moustache, no fierce black eye, no gleaming white teeth, no cruel lips, nor any other of the stage properties of the melodramatic villain. Ho was not even like "Buffalo Bill." About oft 10in high, he was slenderly though muscularly built, with a pleasant regular face, blue eyes, a slight tawny moustache, and a rather feminine expression. Yet his career was as lawless as his death was violent. He is said to have been raised in Texas only eight-and-twenty years back ; bab he has been "wanted" for five years. He has left his mark on Atascosa, De Witt, Williamson, and Lampasas Counties and elsewhere. His original occupation was stealing any stock that came handy, and shooting anyone who objected ; but when he fell in with Joe Baxter, he planned Sreater things. A few years ago he and is gang of some half a dozen startled the world by the great M'Neil robbery, which was effected on the International and Great Northern line, a few miles above Austin. His second successful raid was the Texas, Pacific, and Elatonia affair; after which ho turned his attention to banks. In high noon he held up the officials of the 'Cisco Bank and gob away with the swag. Then the pair showed up on the ranche of Deputy Marshal Stanfield, of Williamson County, whom they shot dead while he was in the cow-pen with his wife and children. And so on.

Nothing could scare Bill Whitley. All his gang considered him the "nerviest" man amongst them. Even Captain Dick, who was killed in Frio County, was not a patch on Bill. He could, and often did, look down the barrel of a six-shooter without winking. Yet a few years back he was considered a quiet, respectable young fellow.

For a long time they couldn't catch him. On Saturday night, the 22nd of September last, the East-bound Southern Pacific train was attacked near Harwood. The thing had been expected, and United States Marshal Rankin and nine deputies boarded the train in anticipation. At Harwood Station three men, unmasked, got on the engine, and a mile and a-half later it was stopped dead. Then the passengers wore told to look out for —11. The coloured brakesman gob out and went forward. He returned, nervously shaking, to say that the conductor's presence in front was earnestly solicited. He went, and, with a revolver at his head, was told to " uncouple that car"the mail car. Three of the deputies were in it; the other six were left in the express car when Bill ordered the engineer to pull the mail-car out. A couple of miles on came the übiquitous trestle, which always figured in Bill's artistic exploits on the line, and the engine was stopped again. Dan Tooney, the engineer, was ordered to break in a panel of the car door. This done, they pushed him into the aperture, and a deputy-marshal at once filled his face and chest with buckshot, supposing he had been one of the gang. Then the bullets flow fast and thick, till the robbers left, the deputies being afraid to follow lest they might fall into an ambush. This was Bill Whitley's last raid. On September 25 there were two surprised men in Texas. One was Mr. William Harrell, with whom Bill was lodging, whoso surprise still continues ; the other was Bill Whitley, whose surprise is over for good. United States Marshal Rankin and his deputies left San Antonio on the Aransas Pass passengers for Floresville, believing that Bill would be found in the neighbourhood. They reached Harrell's cottage in the town a little before dark, and found only a negro boy in possession. They ordered him to do as he was bid, which he was glad enough to do. The officers ensconced themselves in the kitchen while the negro put on a careless demeanour and sat in f?he back door. They waited for two hours. At half-past eight Harrell walked in followed by Whitley. Harrel lighted a lamp in the front room, and then Bill, throwing his Winchester on the bed, took a chair near it. He kept his pistol on, but with his hat tilted over his eyes he seemed absolutely unsuspicious. Rankin appeared with his shotgun levelled at Bill's head within four feet of him, and said : "Be quiet ! Throw up your hands !" Like a flash, Bill was on his feet/with his six-shooter out. • The reports were simultaneous. Bill's bullet flattened on the wall, just over the Marshal's head. Ho received the latter's buckshot in the face. He staggered to the bed, fell back on it, fired once more, and missed again. Rankin riddled his hat with a second fire, and all the officers were now working their shooting irons for all they were worth. When the smoke cleared away, Bill was dead, his feet to the foe and his cocked revolver above his shoulder, where ho had thrown it in a last effort to fire. All the officers had got in their work on him. Harrell was pale and speechless ; the negro boy practically demented ; and the bed and bedding ruined. Since then everyone has been to look at dead Bill as ho was laid out for the inquest, his hands folded, and his riddled sombrero on his breast. The Southern Pacific Railway are said to have spent several thousand dollars over his killing, for the sheriffs don't take much action out there under "big money." Bill put courage into the game, and what ho did he did effectively and artistically. He was as quick a pis-tol-shot as Ben Thompson, and like him had to be ambushed by a large party, surprised, and killed by a volley, before he could be taken. He died game, though taken at great disadvantage by overwhelming odds. He leaves a wife and two young children, who are at present living in Atascosa County. Bill was the most dangerous man in Texas in his own line. Barber, his lieutenant, is said to have been arrested at Kountze. With Bill Whitley and Captain Dick dead, the heart has been cut out of the gang ; and train-robbing is played out for the present.Vanity Fair.