Story of a dark plot [electronic resource] : or, Tyranny on the frontier, The

Preface

For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept ; line upon line, line upon line ; here a little and there a little. — ■ (Isa. xxviii. io.)

This is a divinely appointed rule to which we will do well if we take heed, as it will save from many disappointments and discourageme n ts .

The writer of “ The Story of a Dark Plot” has no hope by this work of revolutionizing society or even working any very marked reforms. Books and essays on temperance topics are numerous, and this is but one among many. However, it is hoped that this may prove one of the lines and precepts that are of some service to the cause. There is always need for those wrho are on the right side of any important question to unfurl their banners and show their colors bravely, but just now, in connection with the temperance movement in our Dominion, there is a very special call for action presented by the Plebiscite.

We sometimes read on the pages of fiction exciting and blood-curdling tales of deep laid plots for murder and other

PREFACE.

crimes, but just when our feelings are being aroused to the highest pitch, we pause and comfort ourselves with the thought that after all this is only imaginary.

Or perchance, we may read the truthful details of a more or less successful attempt to end the life of a fellow being, but if we are unacquainted with the persons concerned in the affair and the circumstances which led to it, and especially if it happened some distance from us, we feel but little interest in it.

Again we find in the records of the past that thousands have suffered and many died in a really good cause, — the victims of depraved and brutish persecutors who hated what was good. We cannot doubt the truth of the statements nor the innocence of the sufferers, but we may be tempted to complacently remark “ the martyr age is past.” But if we look about us with unprejudiced eyes, we must see that the sufferers for conscience sake are still not a few.

The details of the dark plot as given in these pages are all matters of fact, and perhaps if all the particulars could be known, it might seem blacker even than now. Moreover, it happened in an old and progressive county of Eastern Canada, just across the border from New England, and Mr. Smith had incurred the anger of his persecutors only by trying to enforce law and order and working for the protection and uplifting of his fellow-men.

In view of such facts, let the voters of our Dominion pause

PREFACE.

ere they give their sanction to a system which throws around the makers and venders of alcoholic liquors the protection of the strong arm of the law.

That this volume, by showing the liquor party in its true light, and thus warning our countrymen of their position and danger, may be the means of arousing some who, though temperance people at heart, are sleeping on guard, and of adding a few to the ranks of active workers for the cause of right, is the earnest prayer of

The Author.

Introduction

The publication of this book has been with the approval of some of the best thinkers on the temperance question, and we doubt not that its careful perusal by all who read it will prove a stimulus in connection with the cause of temperance, and if they are timid or hesitating will cause them to become decisive in the noble work for humanity. It is a well-known fact that the grand old County of Brome is one of the banner counties in every thing which is helpful to the cause of morality, and we hereby offer a fraternal hand to all our co-workers in the Dominion, and pray God’s blessing may rest on every effort put forth that, whatever may be the private opinion they may entertain respecting the course pursued by the government, in order to ascertain the minds of the people on the prohibition ques-

INTRODUCTION .

tion, they may not only pray right, but when the time presents itself may vote right. Notwithstanding the fact that a majority of the inhabitants of our county are true to prohibition principles, yet a minority would not hesitate, if possible, to repeal the Scott Act, as was evidenced in the dark plot which was enacted in our midst, but which could not be carried out until a rough from another country was hired to commit the murderous assault, which was made on Mr. W. W. Smith, one of the most earnest temperance workers in the Province of Quebec, President of the Brome County Alliance for five terms in succession, and who is actively engaged in sustaining the Scott Act in our county, and saving from the sad consequences of the traffic the tempted and the fallen.

Sutton.

THE

STORY OF A DARK PLOT;

OR,

Tyranny on the Frontier.

Chapter I. Previous Events Which Led To The Assault

There are few communities, however small, that have not been aroused and stirred into action, by some uncommon event, or where opposing parties have never rejoiced, and mourned over a triumph of one at the other’s expense, and often have men and women, unappreciated by the many, bravely suffered for their fidelity to a good and beloved cause. Thus the little County of Brome has been stirred to the depths of its soul by the actions of contending parties, and especially by a deliberate attempt to hinder the work and destroy the life of a law-abiding io the story of a dark plot.

citizen. Mr. William W. Smith, the hero of this dark plot, was a native of the county which had always been his home, and had been during about fifteen years the Agent of the Canadian Pacific Railway Company at Sutton Junction. During those years, he had been a man of the world, fond of pleasure, and not objecting to a social glass, and it is not surprising that, amid all the temptations of railroad life, he had already felt the awful power of an appetite for strong drink. But he was led to see his danger and to flee from it, largely through the influence of his beloved companion, a faithful Christian, who rests from her labor, and her works do follow her. Breaking his bonds by the power of God, he became not only a temperance man, but a Christian, and in his great joy and gratitude for his own salvation was filled with a desire to warn and rescue others, whose feet were treading the same slippery paths. He then began holding Gospel Temperance Meetings, as he had opportunity in many places mostly within the County of Brome. This county has long held an honored position as being one of the leading temperance counties in the Dominion of Canada, because during many years no license to sell intoxicating liquor as a beverage has been granted within its borders, and a temperance law known as the

E VENTS WHICH LED TO ASSAULT. II

Scott Act had been in force for eight years previous to 1893, when the second attempt was made by the liquor party to obtain its repeal. Like the serpent in the Garden of Eden, the liquor sellers of the present day are remarkable for their subtility, and many are the innocent victims entangled in the meshes of the net woven by their deceptive tongues ; therefore, it need not seem strange that they should display great power and influence, even in a so-called temperance community. In the spring of 1893, the liquor party in Brome, having decided that they had been troubled by an anti-license act quite long enough, sent out their agents to various parts of the county with innocent looking papers to which they wished to obtain signatures. They called upon all the known supporters of their party, and also upon that doubtful class of persons which sometimes proves to be among their best helpers, although counted as temperance people. To this doubtful class they carefully explained that the petition they bore did not ask for the repeal of the Scott Act, but only requested that an election be held for the purpose of bringing the matter before the people, and determining their minds upon the subject. Therefore, they were told the signing of this petition was in no way equivalent to voting against the Scott Act,

THE STORY OF A DARK PLOT.

nor would they be bound to vote against that Act if an election was brought about. Many names were appended to the petition, the desired election took place, and very hard did the liquor men work to obtain a result that should favor their cause.

However, not all the faithful work was on their side. A few temperance speakers came from distant places, and held many interesting meetings in different parts of the county, but perhaps the most efficient work was done by people living in the county, who in many cases seemed to possess greater influence than strangers could exert. Mr. J. W. Alexander, at that time Principal of the Sutton Model School, added more recruits to the ranks of earnest workers by organizing a number of his pupils with a few other young people into a band which, under the name of the “Young People’s Temperance Crusaders,” did good work during the ensuing weeks. Older workers were admitted into the society as honorary members, and the officers were chosen from among these. One of the honorary members was Mr. W. W. Smith, who was also one of the Committee appointed to accompany the younger members and aid them in their meetings, and no one worked harder to retain the Scott Act than he. He took an active part in

EVENTS WHICH LED TO ASSAULT.

nearly every Crusade meeting, and on evenings, when the Crusaders were not thus employed, held other temperance meetings, thus occupying nearly every night during three or four weeks in the heat of the campaign. Not content with this, he worked and argued by day as well, and, associating his work with prayer, did not cease from his efforts until, on June 16th, 1893, the polls were closed and the victory for God and the temperance cause was won. The hotel-keepers and their confederates had gained that for which their petition has asked, but plainly they were far from satisfied with the result of the contest, and many were the curses pronounced upon Mr. Smith as one of the most active opposers of their cherished plans. Now the vote against them was greater than ever before, yet they were not content to abide by the voice of the people which they had seemed so anxious to obtain, but practiced the illegal sale of alcholic drinks until nearly, if not quite, every hotel-keeper in the County of Brome was known to be boldly and frequently breaking the law. A great cry of the liquor men while attempting to repeal this law had been “ The Scott Act is all right if you would only enforce it ; we don’t want a law which is not carried out,” and it was now the wish of those who had sustained the Act to prevent any fur-

THE STORY OF A DARK PLOT.

ther complaints like this. Therefore, on the eve^ ning of Feb. 26th, 1894, a public meeting was held in Sutton to discuss the circumstances and form plans for work, and at the close a society was organized to secure the enforcement of the Scott Act in the township of Sutton. Mr. Smith, who had been instrumental in bringing about this conference, was a member of the Executive Committee of the Society.

One of the leading temperance organizations of Canada is that known as the Dominion Alliance, which is divided and sub-divided into provincial and county branches. When, on April 25, 1894, the Brome County Branch of the Alliance held its annual meeting for the election of officers, Mr. Smith was chosen its President for the ensuing year. Here was field for increased usefulness, and he took up his work with a zeal that soon won the disapproval both of the liquor party and a certain class of so-called temperance people whose principal work for the cause usually lies in criticism of the work of others.

Soon a public meeting of the Alliance was announced by the new President to be held at Sutton, and a large number of people gathered in the hall on the evening appointed. Many speakers addressed

EVENTS WHICH LED TO ASSAULT.

the audience, and told in no uncertain words that the law must be enforced and offenders must be punished. It had not been deemed best to prosecute the liquor sellers without first giving them a fair and public warning, and therefore this meeting had been called ; but now that they were notified of the intentions of the temperance people, if detected in dealing out the liquid poison, they had only themselves to blame. True to these announcements, Mr. Smith and others proceeded at once to obtain satisfactory evidence of the traffic in strong drink which was known to be taking place in the various hotels. This was by no means a slight task, for though the liquor sellers were not willing to keep the law, they were entirely willing to preserve the appearance of so doing, and very loath to sell liquor in the presence of a stranger, while the testimony of their regular customers could not be relied on. However, the task was done, and the evidence gathered was sufficient to condemn nearly every hotel-keeper in the county to imprisonment or a fine. On June 6th, these cases were considered in the District court, at Sweetsburg, Quebec, and punishment was meted out to the offenders. In some instances where the offences merited imprisonment a fine was allowed instead, and this was accepted by the Alliance President, who believed

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THE STORY OF A DARK PLOT.

that justice should be tempered with mercy. This bit of leniency, however, was not taken into account by the liquor sellers in considering his treatment of them. They appeared to have altered their opinions as to the enforcement of the law, and their anger waxed hot, while many, often ranked with the temperance people, were in sympathy with them. Divisions occurred in temperance societies, because some of the members had friends who were made to suffer by the imposing of fines on the lawbreakers, and members of secret brotherhoods, who felt it their duty to uphold their brethren in good or evil, complained of the injustice of thus depriving the hotel-keepers of the property they had earned ; some even declaring such transactions to be on a par with the meanest theft. Meanwhile the liquor sellers and their allies, who had already by the recent trials been shown to be a company of lawbreakers, seemed to be forming plans of their own. Many dark whispers floated through the county to the effect that W. W. Smith had better look out for his personal safety, and some declared with an air of wisdom that they would not like to be in his position, while a suspicious looking stranger, said to be a horse buyer, was noticed by some to be frequenting the hotels at Sutton and Abercorn, and attending the horse races in

EVENTS WHICH LED TO ASSAULT. \J

the vicinity. However, Mr. Smith had not the spirit of fear, and believing, as he said, that “the Lord will take care of his own,” he continued as usual to go from place to place on errands of temperance, or any other work which he felt claimed his attention.

Chapter II. The Midnight Assault

Thus matters went on until the night of July 7th, 1894, when Mr. Smith drove out from his home and returned somewhat late. After caring for his team he went into the station. It was afterwards told that some young men had noticed a stranger at the depot that night, who had appeared to be waiting for a train but had not gone away on any. After the crowd at the station had dispersed, and the inmates of the building had retired, as there was little night work to be done, Mr. Smith went into his home in the station, where his brother’s family were then living with him, and having obtained a pillow for his head went back to the waiting-room, where he lay down upon a settee and dropped asleep.

An article published in the Montreal Daily Witness soon after this so well describes some of the circumstances which cluster round the events of that night at Sutton Junction that we give some parts of it here. It says:

“The liquor selling ruffians will descend to any warfare however dastardly and mean when forced by law to a standstill. There is something in the sad business that degrades every one in it. This time it is liquor sellers in Brome County that are indicted. Mr. W. W, Smith, President of the Brome County Branch of the Dominion Alliance, is also the station agent at Sutton Junction for the Canadian Pacific Railway Company. As president of the Alliance he represents the temperance element of course, and that is the element determined to carry out the law against liquor selling. Mr. Smith represents them in this. In doing so he is certain to make enemies. He has been assiduous in his duty, and has been threatened several times. These threats did not keep him from actively participating in efforts to secure the conviction recently of several lawbreaking liquor sellers in Brome, some of whom were convicted, and have had sentence suspended over them pending their good behavior. On Saturday night, Mr. Smith took the night operator’s place, arranging that the latter should take his place on Sunday. After securing everything for the night, Mr. Smith lay down on the sofa, never dreaming that any evil was to come to him.”

Instead of copying the account of the assault which follows the above, we will describe the facts as nearly as possible as they have been related by the victim himself.

THE STORY OF A DARK PLOT.

It was between one and two o’clock on Sunday morning, July 8th, when Mr. Smith was attacked by the cowardly miscreant who has thus made himself notorious. We say “cowardly,” because when a large, strong man who carries arms and is a professional fighter, as he appears to have been, attacks a man who is weaponless and not more than two-thirds his size by giving him a stunning blow upon the head while he is asleep, there is clearly no evidence of heroism on the part of the man who makes the assault. Yet this was what Mr. Smith’s brave assailant did !

After receiving the first blow, Mr. Smith felt a strange sensation as though he were taking a long, happy journey, and he thinks he was aroused by his assailant attempting to drag him from the settee. As a train was going by before daylight, it is the opinion of many that his intention may have been to leave his victim stunned upon the railway track, that the locomotive might complete the frightful work which he had begnn. At least, he doubtless intended by some means to guard himself from suspicion and leave Mr. Smith entirely unable ever to identify him. When he saw that the object of his brutal attack was arousing he struck him a second time, but this blow not having the effect of the former one, Mr. Smith,

STATION AT SUTTON JUNCTION, PLACE OF THE MIDNIGHT ASSAULT.

THE MIDNIGHT ASSAULT.

who was now fully conscious, although he could not see clearly, grappled desperately with his foe. He saw a long weapon of some sort waving fiercely above his head, and now and then received a blow from it, while his assailant was constantly dragging him nearer the door, and he struggling to remain in the room fearing the villain might have associates outside. Mr. Smith was all the time shouting “ murder,” as loudly as possible, but, his mouth being filled with blood, he was unable to make himself clearly heard, and his calls brought no assistance. At length, being somewhat weakened by the blows he had received, he was dragged outside in spite of his efforts to remain within, but still no one came to the help of either himself or his antagonist. The two men, still struggling desperately, passed on from the upper to the lower platform without the station, and thence to the railway track below, and finally back to the lower platform. Then Mr. Smith got possession of the weapon which his assailant had been wielding, and the last hope of his enemy seemed to vanish with the loss of that, for, freeing himself from the grasp of the man whom he had thought a few minutes before was entirely in his power, he disappeared in the darkness, and fled up the track in such haste that he did not even stop for his hat, which was

THE STORY OF A DARK PLOT.

found by some one upon the platform next morning. The weapon which he left in Mr. Smith’s possession proved to be a large piece of lead pipe well battered and bruised, near one end of which was attached a short piece of rope, apparently intended to be slipped around the wrist of the user so that the weapon might be concealed up his sleeve.

Mr. Smith, having seen his enemy retreat, hastened to the part of the house where his brother’s family were sleeping, and thence to the other part where a Mr. Ames and family lived, and aroused the inmates of both apartments, who were very much surprised and alarmed at thought of the frightful scene which had been enacted so close to the apartments where they were calmly sleeping. However, there was one brave man, a train hand, who was sleeping above the scene of the assault, who declared that he had heard the blows when given, but did not go down to learn the cause as he “did not want to mix up in it,” and was afraid he might get hurt. There are far too many people who display the same disposition when others within their reach are in danger or in need of assistance. When the people of the house were awakened it seemed already too late to capture the retreating criminal, but Mr. Smith’s injuries were attended to, and a message sent at once by telephone

THE MIDNIGHT ASSAULT.

to Sutton for a physician. The bruises proved to be very severe, and it seems to be a modern miracle that life itself was spared.

The article from the Witness, part of which we quoted above, after describing the assault, says :

“A good deal of indignation is felt by the law-abiding people not only of Sutton Flats, but of the county, and it is hoped that every effort will be made to discover the perpetrator. The woollen cap and slung-shot should give a clever detective a good clue to work upon. Some time ago, at the public meeting called to discuss the liquor question, Mr. Dyer, M. P. for the county, said that the authorities had been twitted by the liquor men for not enforcing the Scott Act. That reproach might have been justified in a measure at least, as there was some doubt as to the opinion of the people in its favor. But in 1893 the liquor men had appealed — and perhaps it was well they did so — to the county, to decide whether that law should be enforced or not. The county had declared against the liquor men. Now the time had come when this majority should stand at the back of the officials, and all should endeavor to enforce the law. Mr. Dyer’s remarks at the time were taken to represent the desire of the law-abiding people of Brome County. In carrying out this idea, Mr. Smith, they contend, was simply doing his duty, and it is expected that in doing it he had the majority of the people of the county with him,”

THE STORY OF A DARK PLOT.

This brutal assault, made upon a law-abiding citizen by one whom he had never injured in any way is a fair sample of the fruits of intemperance wherever found. There are those who have seemed loath to believe that Mr. Smith’s strong temperance convictions and his activity in carrying them out were the real causes which led to the bitter hatred that inspired this fiendish act. They seem to think it impossible that “respectable (?)” citizens of a temperance county should attempt in such a reckless, lawless way to prevent opposition to their traffic in strong drink. But what is there incredible in this? When we consider that traffic in strong drink means a trade in the souls of men, women and children, and in innocence, virtue and hope ; when we remember that the bartender daily takes from his customers the price of food, clothes, health, respectability and all that he has of real value in the world, and gives him in return nothing but liquid ruin ; when we know that the rumseller’s business is a sort of wholesale murder continually, inasmuch as by it millions of lost souls are sent into eternity annually ; in view of all these facts, why should we be surprised when the liquor sellers of a community plan together to rid themselves of one who has vigorously opposed their dangerous work? It is only another form of the same business.

The disclosures following the assault upon Mr. Smith convinced many people of the evils of the liquor traffic, and some who had favored and pitied the hotel keepers when they had been fined for lawbreaking now turned against them, feeling that they could no longer uphold their deeds. Meantime, some of the hotel keepers of the vicinity gave evidence of their guilt by disappearing from the locality very soon after the assault took place.

The investigation of the affair was placed in the hands of S. H. Carpenter, Superintendent of the Canadian Secret Service, and detectives were at once set at work upon the case. Either Mr. Carpenter or one of the men under his direction was constantly in the vicinity, seeking to obtain clues by which to determine the guilty party. One man, who lived near the mountain pass between Sutton and Glen Sutton, declared that, early on the morning of July 8th, he had seen two men pass his house driving very rapidly and going in the direction of the latter village, one of the men having no hat, but wearing a cloth around his head. Of course this story had an air of significance inasmuch as the assailant of the previous night had left his hat at Sutton Junction, but it did not prove to be of much importance. It was soon settled in the minds of many that the

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stranger whom we have mentioned as having been frequenting the hotels at Sutton and Abercorn had been the wielder of the lead pipe on July 8th, but his name and whereabouts were not to be obtained, as he had been sailing under false colors during his stay in the country, and those who were initiated into the secrets of the case, of course, kept silence.

At length, Mr. Smith received a letter from a woman in Vermont, who had formerly been employed at one of the hotels in the vicinity of the assault, and soon after he met this same woman at Sutton, and her evidence was a great aid towards locating the assailant. She knew nothing about the pretended Boston horse-buyer, who had apparently forgotten the object of his northward journey and disappeared without having purchased any of the Canadian steeds, but she remembered an American having once stopped for a time at the hotel where she was then working, and from the description given it seemed that he might be the same man. The one whom she described she said came from Marlboro, Mass., and thither a man was soon despatched in search. It proved that the man to whom she had directed Mr. Smith was not the one in question, but in searching for him the real perpetrator of the crime was found, as he chanced to

THE MIDNIGHT ASSAULT.

2 7 be also a resident of Marlboro, Mass. Having located his man, the gentleman in search returned home, leaving in Marlboro a Canadian detective who should keep watch of the man until Mr. Carpenter went there. However, when Mr. Carpenter, who was accompanied by Mr. Smith, reached the place, the man whom they sought had already been lost track of by the detective, but after a few days Mr. Smith saw him in company with several others, and at once identified him as being the man whom he had seen in the vicinity of Sutton Junction previous to the assault, and also as having the form and gait which he had noticed his assailant to have when he had watched him fleeing from the scene of his cowardly attack. Soon this man was captured at Hudson, Mass., a place about five miles distant from Marlboro. He was arrested by Chief of Police Skully of Hudson and Policeman Hater of Worcester, and taken to Fitchburg. The name of this young man who had apparently come very near being a murderer was Walter W. Kelly, and he had been a bartender in Marlboro, which probably made him feel more sympathy for his Canadian brethren when their liberty to sell intoxicants was interfered with.

While at Fitchburg, Kelly was advised to yield himself up and go freely to Canada with Mr. Carpenter and Mr. Smith, because, he was told, they were determined to have him at any cost, and, if he made them the trouble and expense of extraditing him, he would only be obliged to lie in jail a much longer time before his trial could take place, whereas the sentence of punishment would doubtless be just as severe in the one case as in the other.