HISTORY OF CLAY COUNTY	235

prisoners were brought in, a jury impanelled, and the trial lasted three
days and nights, but they were acquitted, because Baber did not have his
mark recorded.
	“About this time a party of desperadoes was organized over in the
borders of Owen county, and barns, cribs, and houses were broken open
and their contents taken. When any of this gang, composed of the Longs,
Phipps, and others, were arrested and brought to court, their confeder-
ates would swear them out. Bowling Green, Spencer, Bloomfield and
other neighboring towns were overrun with bad men, dangerous to our
society and civil institutions. The law-abiding portion of the community
despaired of breaking up this dangerous element. A Mr. Lindley, of
Bloomfield. came over to confer with the best of our citizens, insisting on
the necessity for regulators who would take the law into their own hands.
This gang had a man traveling over the country selling their stolen goods
and wares. Well, the regulators were organized, and lynched several of
these men. Shack Phipps was tied up to a beech tree and whipped just
below us here, where Van White now lives. While I and many others
did not approve of this way of meting out justice, yet it seemed to be the
only effectual way of redressing the wrongs they were inflicting upon
our society. Old Mother Betty Long was the leading and guiding spirit
of this gang of outlaws—she was the president and dictator. The regu-
lators found goods of all descriptions concealed in logs, hollow trees, caves
and holes, identified by merchants from all the surrounding towns.
Nearly two years after these desperadoes had been practically broken up.
a hunter found a bolt of fine cloth in a hollow tree, which had been stolen
from the old man Chance at Bowling Green, and was estimated worth
$200, though worthless when found. Lindley was a natural detective, a
complete physiognomist, and was known as the United States sheriff.
Nicholas G. Cromwell, grandfather of the Cromwells of this township,
who lived above Bowling Greeh, had a very fine horse, which he called
Jackson. This horse was stolen and Lindley was sent for, who tracked
the thief to Lake Michigan, where he was caught and the horse recovered.
The prisoner soon afterward broke out of the county jail and escaped.
Eighteen months afterward the same horse was stolen and by the same
man. Lindley was again sent for, who followed the thief to the western
border of Missouri and pressed him so hard that he jumped from the
horse and escaped across a stream. Lindley returned with the horse.
	“Such things as these your forefathers had to endure in opening up
and planting the seeds of civilization in this part of the country, and you
are today enjoying the fruits of their labors and tribulations. You expe-
rience none of their hardships and privations, nor can you fully appreciate
the debt of gratitude you owe to the pioneer fathers and mothers who
laid out the way in the midst of which you walk in security, peace and
plenty. I want to impress upon you that it requires courage, nerve,
determination and Christian fortitude to stand up under all these things.
But there is one thing just as essential today as these to enable you boys
and girls to perform your part as members of society—honesty in all your
dealings and honor in all your relations. Without these qualities you
can never aspire to true manhood and womanhood. Your word must be
good—as good as your bond. Not boastingly, hut by way of illustration.
let me recite to you an instance in my own experience. At one time sev-
eral of our citizens here were arrested by the sheriff of Owen county, on
charge of having aided in the lynching of one of the characters I have told