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CITY OF DUBOIS Page 123
Paddy Burns. One day Jack Foster walking down the railroad, found
Paddy sitting on the end of a culvert, his hands between his knees,
and his head bent down looking very sad. Jack said, "Hey, Paddy,
what's the matter?" Paddy looked up and said, "Jack, this bloody
town ish no good. Yuse ushed to go over town, get three or four
dhrinks, have four or foive foights and go home feeling like a man.
Now if yuse go over town and say foight, the bloody police put you
in the bloody lock-up. I tell you, Jack, them was the halcorn days."
Paddy knew of what he spoke. In one issue of "The Reynoldsville
Herald and DuBois City Star," under the DuBois items, it was stated,
it had been very quiet on a certain day in DuBois as there had been
only two fights on the streets during that day."
The first homicide was committed on the tipple of the
Centennial Mine. The Jones brothers had leased the coal on some
property claimed by A. F. Baum. It seems that Baum concluded the
best way to oust these parties was by a force. A very large man by
the name of Montgomery was brought in, and one day on the tipple
Peter Jones was attacked. Jones being a small man, Montgomery soon
got him down, and Montgomery's partisans were calling to him to kill
Jones. Jones, having a gun in his possession, pulled it and shot
Montgomery. Of course there was a great deal of excitement. Paddy
Burns went to Luthersburg and made an information before George C.
Kirk, Esq., the nearest Justice of the Peace, charging Peter Jones
and three others with murder, riot and riotous assembly. Mr. Kirk
came to DuBois with Constable Jimeson, and summoned a coroner's
jury, the foreman of which was John DuBois. The mob was threatening
to do violence to Jones. Jones sent word in that he was ready to
surrender if he could be protected. The Constable, with a number of
men, was sent out to protect Jones and he came in and surrendered.
The coroner's inquest showed that Jones had shot in
self-defense and he might have been discharged, but the information
was made in such a way that the participants had to be held for a
riot.
In 1879 Sandy Township was organized and two
Justices of the Peace, viz: W. N. Prothero and J. P. Taylor, both of
whom resided within the limits of the town, were elected. A
constable was also elected.
"Squire" Prothero related an incident that occurred
shortly after his election as Justice of the Peace. A man by the
name of Jones came to town who assumed the office of private
detective. His first move was to arrest every hotel keeper in the
town for violation of the liquor law. At the hearing the hotel men
were represented by counsel. Jones stood alone and the Squire
promptly made a ruling that no lawyer should be heard. At the close
of the hearing all of the defendants were held for court, at which
they became very angry. Jones remained a few minutes to fix up his
costs and the landlords started over town. When Jones got to the
corner of Long Avenue and Brady Street, he found an organized mob
waiting for him. The
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