Otto A. Rothert

“ A century ago and more, its rock-ribbed walls echoed the drunken hilarity of villains and witnessed the death struggles of many a vanished man. Today this former haunt of criminals is as quiet as a tomb. Nothing is left in the Cave to indicate the outrages that were committed there in the olden days.
One state historian of our own times—Parrish, of Illinois—thus describes it: “The gruesome spot, which in those old border days witnessed many a scene of revelry and bloodshed, is today no more than a curiosity, its past victims, white and black, forgotten. ”

“ The scenery above and below the Cave attracted the attention of the earliest western travelers. Much deforestation has taken place during the past century, but the landscapes along the banks of that section of the Ohio stand today, as they did in the olden days, unsurpassed by any other along the river’s course. The mouth of the Cave is in a high bluff overlooking the Ohio, which is the central link in a chain of majestic landscapes. It seems almost a paradox that a spot so beautified by nature should have been made the headquarters of outlaws, and the scene of much that was hideous in crime. ”

“ Every passing boat must reveal itself to those in the Cave who had a long, clear view up and down the river. A lookout could detect boats long before boatmen could perceive the Cave. The bold beauty of the bluff made it pleasant for the boats to run in near the sharply shelving shore, and many travelers were thus simply and easily delivered into the hands of the banditti. ”

“ Mason fell and fell fast, and became not only an outcast, but a notorious outlaw. The only argument that can be presented in his defense is that he was, to some extent, a peculiar product of his times—only more “highly developed” than contemporaneous outlaws who were products of the same influences and environment. It should be added in justice to Mason that, unlike the Harpes, he was out for booty and that he personally never shed blood unless it became absolutely necessary for his own safety. ”

“ Among the early counterfeiters who made the Cave their headquarters for a time was Philip Alston, who looms large in the romance and gossip of the latter part of the eighteenth and early part of the nineteenth centuries. He was a gentleman by birth, education, and early association. He comes down to us handsome in figure and grand in manner, wearing broad-cloth, ruffles, and lace. He had an air of chivalry to women and of aloofness, superiority, and mystery to men. ”

“ Fiction is undoubtedly more truthful in the presentation of the manners and social life of the period portrayed than is formal history. The history of Cave-in-Rock and the careers of the outlaws identified with the place is not only stranger than fiction, but is besprinkled with many tragic and melodramatic scenes which, although almost unimaginable, are actually true. For more than a century fiction writers have used the Cave as a background for stories. ”

“ In the pioneer history of the Ohio and Mississippi valley, Samuel Mason stands as one of the shrewdest and most resourceful of outlaws. The Harpes were more widely known and were more terrible characters; their notoriety was due to their great brutality. Mason robbed along the roads and rivers solely for the purpose of getting money; the Harpes killed men, women, and children simply to gratify a lust for cruelty. ”

“ Not far from Cave-in-Rock is Ford’s Ferry, which gets its name from a man who was one of the noted criminals of pioneer history. He lived on the Kentucky side about two miles above Cave-in-Rock and was ostensibly a farmer, owning a large tract of land. He also kept a hotel. Ford was always surrounded by a gang of desperate men, highwaymen and murderers, and, while nothing was ever proved on him, he was looked upon as equal to his companions in guilt. He was a robber of flatboats and of emigrants. ”

“ These pioneers were thus honored, not to show that “the evil men do lives after them,” but to reward two men whose names were “linked with one virtue” at least—that of being responsible for the capture and death of Big Harpe.
17 Whether or not the Harpes were brothers and Big Harpe’s two “wives” were sisters is a question that can never be decided definitely by history, but it is one over which psychologists may long argue. If the two men actually were brothers and the two women actually were sisters, it is an anomaly in nature. The Harpes were not ordinary criminals. ”

“ A flatboat had come down the river and its passengers, not realizing they were near the famous rendezvous of outlaws, landed about a quarter of a mile above the Cave at the foot of a small bluff, later known as Cedar Point. Among the travelers on board were a young man and his sweetheart who, while their companions were making some repairs to the boat, strolled to the top of the cliff and there sat down upon a rock. ”

“ Mason’s domestic life in the wilderness of the lower Ohio evidently was, in the beginning, up to the standard of the average early settler. But in the wild woods, far away from companionship and influence of law-abiding citizens, the best of men were subject to deterioration. Men of education, illiterates, and all other pioneers were alike exposed to this strong influence of frontier life. Many men who, by their inborn nature or by their own choice disregarded law and order, necessarily became, by one route or another, outcasts. ”

“ Although the penmanship is far from good, every word, with few exceptions, can be deciphered. It is filled with interesting facts and equally interesting perjury. From the beginning of legislation down through the pioneer days humanity has ever been the same, and facts and fabrications have been paraded together before officials who are to pass judgment on the evidence presented. The Mason trial is no exception to this old practice in courts, but is rather an exaggerated instance of the tendency, as common in the “good old days” as in our own times. ”

“ It is probable a number of his victims did not survive to tell the tale, for the wide-awake outlaw realized that along the trails and on the river, as at Cave-in-Rock, his greatest safety lay in the fact that “dead men tell no tales.” Those who were permitted to survive had been treated in such a manner that they would be more likely to describe Mason as a shrewd robber than a cruel murderer, and, it seems, most survivors were careful not to condemn him too severely lest one of his “agents” silence their tongues with a dagger. ”

“ Most of the travelers who appeared after Ashe’s day and examined the Cave detected in his sketch a combination of facts and fiction that helped spread the name and history of this interesting and picturesque rendezvous of outlaws. Many a visitor still goes to the place expecting to explore the “upper cave” but soon discovers that its size has been wildly exaggerated by Ashe. His account of the Cave is one of the longest ever written and will always be of curious interest no matter from what standpoint it may be read, other than history. ”

“ Then began the chase after the Harpes—a chase made so cold and dramatic by its results, that for more than a century every minute detail of it has been sought by historians and by all who are curious about those full moments when life and death look each other in the eye with the event hanging on the balance of an instant.115 Various have been the accounts printed, nearly all agreeing in the main features but differing in those small details, the rendering of which seems to excite as it satisfies the curiosity of the mind. ”

“ Evidences of its former grandeur are nowhere so well retained as in the neighborhood of Cave-in-Rock. The last of the giants of the forests standing on the bluffs and in the bottoms along the river will some day disappear, but Cave-in-Rock will defy time and its changes, and ever stand as a reminder of the days when wilderness was king.
Cave-in-Rock is in Hardin County, Illinois, about twenty miles below Shawneetown and twenty miles above Golconda, or about eighty-five miles below Evansville, Indiana, and fifty miles above Paducah, Kentucky. ”

“ The log house occupied by Billy Potts is still standing. Many years ago it was converted into a barn. On its floor and walls there can still be seen a number of large dark spots. Tradition has it that they are stains made by human blood. Some of the old citizens living in the neighborhood insist that they are as distinct today as they were more than half a century ago, notwithstanding the ravages of time.
There are many traditions of mysterious murders attributed to the Ford’s Ferry highwaymen. Every one is a fearsome tale and has evidently undergone many changes since it was first told. ”

“ Any history of these outlaws would doubtless be looked upon as wild fiction unless the statements were carefully verified by court records and contemporary newspaper notices, and the records of early writers who gathered the facts regarding them when these facts were told by men and women who lived at the time the atrocities were committed. The adage that “truth is stranger than fiction” is exemplified fully in their careers.
The lives and exploits of these men constitute an important phase in pioneer life because their deeds greatly affected the settlement of the new country. ”

“ It is not clear when Cave-in-Rock first became the headquarters of the criminals who flourished on the Ohio, and preyed upon primitive commerce and travel between Pittsburgh and the Lower Mississippi. Shortly after the Revolution was under way, renegades from eastern communities, corrupt stragglers from the American army, and villains who had had their brutal training in western wilds, began to seek in the Ohio valley refuge from the more orderly and well settled communities. Samuel Mason, who had been an officer in the Continental army, converted the cavern into an inn as early as 1797. ”

“ Mason, continued the witness, repeatedly asserted that he had never done any wrong on the Spanish side of the Mississippi River, and that if time were given him he could and would, in justice to himself, disclose many criminals. On one occasion Mason asked “if a man became informer, with proofs and evidence of crimes committed in the States, could he obtain pardon for those attributed to him?” McCoy casually answered him that if he could give such information it would, in all probability, clear up matters and greatly help him and his people. ”

“ Henry Scaggs, one of the party, suggested that the crowd go to his farm and, with the aid of his dogs, continue the chase. Scaggs was one of the “Long Hunters” who came to Kentucky in 1770 with Colonel James Knox and a pioneer who had ever since been looked upon as “a valiant man in battle and a great hunter.” Urged by him they resumed the pursuit and continued it until late that night, when most of the men, becoming discouraged, left the party because the trail of the Harpes led them through very thick and almost impenetrable cane. ”

“ It is about two and one-half miles below Ford’s Ferry and a half mile above the village of Cave-in-Rock.19 Its position commands a long view up and down the Ohio River. It has a large and dark tunnel-like opening extending into a gray limestone bluff which is partly hidden by shrubbery and small trees. Whether one sees it while passing in a boat or approaching it from the shore the view invariably stirs the beholder. It has the appearance of a large arched crypt, imbedded in solid rock. It is a “house” built by Nature, and is as solid as Gibraltar. ”

“ To what extent James Ford, the owner of Ford’s Ferry—a crossing place on the Ohio two and one-half miles above the Cave—was connected with this organization was not revealed in his day nor since, and it is not at all likely that it will ever be determined. He is more frequently discussed in tradition, and his life is the subject of a greater variety of opinions than that of any other man connected with the tragedies of the Cave-in-Rock country. ”

“ There never were more than three Harpe children and all of them were born in the Danville jail. We have seen how the child of Little Harpe’s wife was killed a few weeks before the women were arrested and taken to Henderson; it is later shown what became of Big Harpe’s children, both of whom were with their mothers in the Russellville jail. It is quite likely that when Big Harpe realized the pursuers were close at hand, he proposed that the children be killed and that then Little Harpe’s wife took the two infants and “determined to remain and die” with them. ”

“ The next day Francois Derousser, a citizen of New Madrid, came forward, stating that he had an important declaration to make concerning the prisoners. He explained that he was a native of Illinois and that in 1791, when he and his family were coming down the Ohio River and had reached a point near Red Banks, where they happened to make a landing, a man—the one he now recognized among the prisoners as Samuel Mason—stepped up to him and, pushing a gun against his stomach, threatened to shoot him if he did not follow. ”

“ Mason frequently sought interviews with Swaney, with whom he had many friendly chats. The outlaw often asked what was said about him by the public. He told Swaney that no mail-carrier need fear being molested by him and his men, for mail was of no value to them, and that he “did not desire to kill any man, for money was all he was after and if he could not get it without taking life, he certainly would shed no blood.”
“Among Mason’s first robberies,” continues the historian who interviewed the mail-carrier, “was that of a party of Kentucky boatmen returning home from Natchez. ”

“ A report of a robbery committed by him on the Natchez Trace, says Monette, was soon followed by an account of another perpetrated on the Mississippi many miles away, and vice versa. Men going down the Mississippi, as those going down the Ohio, encountered many troubles incidental to the running of boats. They were always exposed to river pirates of whom Mason was one. Among other hardships to which they were subjected was the unrestrained authority of the Spanish, who were then in possession of the land west of the Mississippi and who practically controlled the navigation of that river. ”

“ No matter how achieved, preserving peace and fighting danger was looked upon by good citizens as the imperative duty of all. Had the then slow-acting laws been relied upon, the sly and quick-traveling Harpes probably would not have been captured for years, and their victims might have been numbered by the hundreds. On the other hand, as suggested by Colonel Trabue, it is possible that had the men who were called upon by Scaggs done what was in those days considered a duty, Langford might have been the last victim of the Harpes and their career ended. ”