About 8 a.m. on the morning of November 15, 1891, Charles Lambert, driver on the Eureka to Ukiah stage run, guided his team up a relatively steep grade 18 miles north of the Mendocino County seat. A man stepped from behind a rock, pointing a Ballard rifle at him. The tall rifleman, in a drab duster and wearing a blue calico mask, called out, “Halt.”
“You're joking,” Lambert replied, for he'd never encountered a highwayman afoot, but his hands trembled a bit at the reins nevertheless.
“No, I am not joking. I mean business,” the masked man said. “Stop and throw out the box.”
Lambert did as instructed as quickly as possible.
“Now, throw out the mail bags.”
“But they're down on the inside,” Lambert responded.
“Well, get down and get them out.”
Lambert did not want to fool with the open end of a Ballard rifle, so he clambered to the ground to reach for the mail sacks. The coach, resting on the steep incline, caused the horses to repeatedly back step. Lambert hollered, “You'll either have to block the wheels or let me drive to a level place.”
“All right,” the masked man acquiesced, “drive on a little ways.”
Lambert climbed up to his seat and hoo-rahed the horses to the crest of “Robber's Ridge,” two rods or so distant. Looking over his shoulder, Lambert realized the top of the coach protected his noggin from the bandit's rifle. With a bend and a downgrade in front of him, the stage driver plied the whip to his restless leaders. The horses bolted, but the highwayman neither hollered for a halt nor fired a round.
Arriving in Ukiah a bit delayed, yet safe, Charlie Lambert sought out Sheriff Doc Standley and recounted the incident near “Robber's Ridge,” adding to the description of the outlaw the fact that he wore heavy shoes. Lambert called them, “Dagoes.”
Doc Standley rode to the scene of the spoiled crime, where he found shoe prints that appeared to match those of the robber, but for the most part the ground was hard and dry. The tracks dwindled as day turned to dusk, so the county sheriff headed on to Willits.
The following day the box Lambert had thrown down from the stage was located at some distance from the scene of the crime. It had been chopped open.
In Willits, Standley discovered that three strangers had been noticed in the vicinity recently. Two were older men seeking gainful employment. The third, a younger fellow, did not inquire about work, and those who spoke to the sheriff said the young man acted as if this particular stranger seemed not to care one whit whether he earned a job or not. He had appeared athletic enough, possessed a spring in his stride, was clean shaven with semi-blond hair.
Sheriff Standley also gleaned that two days before the stage robbery, a farm house had been broken into about a mile north of town. Stolen from the home were a Ballard rifle, a duster, a butcher knife and a blue calico dress.
Standley rode south, arriving at the county seat around three in the morning. From there he rode on to Hopland where he found that a man called Joe McKay, fitting the description of the suspect had worked for three weeks as a wood cutter before leaving four days before the stage holdup at “Robber's Ridge.”
The Sheriff traveled to the camp where McKay had labored. Among his discoveries there was a crumpled envelope addressed to Joseph McKay, Hopland, Cal. Inside it, a letter signed, “Your Brother, George B. Miller.”
The return address read, “The Hermitage, Oakland Heights.” This clue drove Standley on to Cloverdale where he caught the train southward, then the ferry to San Francisco. The next day another ferry ride took him to Oakland where George B. Miller attended school. The following morning Mendocino County's sheriff intercepted young George Miller on his way to class.
The college student admitted that a brother of his had, indeed, been working near Hopland. On the spot, Doc Standley made up a tale about being a neighboring rancher outside Hopland and that much wood had been cut illegally on his property under the orders of Joe McKay's boss and that young McKay would be needed as a witness to this.
George Miller told Standley that he hadn't heard from his brother in a couple of weeks and that if he was not in the vicinity of Hopland he could help no further as to his whereabouts. The sheriff left Miller to his schooling and went on to notify postal authorities to be on the lookout for letters addressed to him.
Standley searched the countryside between Petaluma and Cloverdale, but ended up back at Hopland on the Saturday following the stage robbery to find that McKay had visited the post office there just before closing on Thursday. Doc found heavy boot prints alongside the railroad, resembling those from the scene of the stage hold-up. He followed them down the line, nearly to Cloverdale where they left the tracks and headed southwest toward Guerneville.
Several days later, on Friday, November 27, Standley received word of a man answering McKay's description traveling from Guerneville toward Santa Rosa. The lawman rode on to Santa Rosa and to the neighborhood of the rail station. Stepping into the nearby Burns Hotel he spotted his suspect, sitting in a chair, reading a newspaper.
Doc Standley arrested Joseph McKay without incident, but the story hardly ends there. Return next week for more twists and turns.
(Twisting tales told thoughtfully at malcolmmacdonaldoutlawford.com.)
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