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Updated: May 14, 2025
The two towns literally fought each other to the death. "The murder of Sheriff Cross occurred in 1888. The militia were withdrawn within about thirty days thereafter. Both towns continued to break the law in short, agreed jointly to break the law. They drew up a stipulation, it is said, under which Colonel Wood was to have all the charges against the Hugoton men dismissed.
There was in camp there, making hay, an old man by the name of A. B. Haas, of Voorhees, and with him were his sons, C. and Keen Haas, as well as Dave Scott, a Hugoton partisan. When we met these people here, we concluded to stop for a while. Eaton and Wilcox got into the wagon-box and lay down. My horse got loose and I was a few minutes in repicketing him.
From Reed we learned that Robinson had gotten away from Short, who had started back, leaving word for Mr. Cross, should he arrive, to return home. A band of men from Hugoton, we learned later, had overtaken Short and his men and chased them for twenty-five miles, but the latter reached Springfield, Seward county, unharmed.
Corner lots were selling at Hugoton for $1,000 apiece, and people were flocking to that town. The new town was called Woodsdale, and Colonel Wood offered lots free to any who would come and build upon them. Settlers now streamed to Woodsdale. Tents, white-topped wagons and frail shanties sprung up as though by magic.
So far as I know, this is the only legal punishment ever inflicted upon any of the Hugoton or Woodsdale men, who outvied each other in a lawlessness for which anarchy would be a mild name." Biographies of Bad Men Desperadoes of the Deserts Billy the Kid, Jesse Evans, Joel Fowler, and Others Skilled in the Art of Gun Fighting.
The Kansas legislature, however, now met, and the political 'pull' of Hugoton was still strong enough to secure a special act legalizing the organization of Stevens county. It was now the legislature against the Supreme Court; for a little later the Supreme Court declared that the organization had been made through open fraud and by means of perjury.
Robinson told them to hitch up and follow the Hugoton party away. They did this, and after a while I was left lying there in the half-moonlight, with the dead bodies of my friends for company. "After the party had been gone about twenty minutes, I found I could get on my feet, although I was very weak. At first, I went and examined Wilcox, Cross, and Hubbard, and found they were quite dead.
Colonel Wood bought these effects in at public auction. "By this time, Stevens county had been organized and the Hugoton 'pull' was in the ascendency. A continuance had been taken at Garden City by the Hugoton prisoners, who were charged with kidnapping. The papers in this case were sent down from Finney county to the first session of the District Court of Stevens county. The result was foregone.
An election was called for September 9, and the town of Hugoton at first called Hugo was chosen. "There can be competition in the town-site business, however. At Mead Center, Kansas, there resided an old-time Kansas man, Colonel S. N. Wood, who also wanted a town site in the new county. Wood's partner, Captain I. C. Price, went down on July 3 to look over the situation.
There was talk that some beer bottles were emptied and left near the heads of their victims as markers, but whether this was deliberately done I cannot say. "Constable Cann later hid me in the middle of a cornfield. This, no doubt, saved my life, for the Hugoton scouts were soon down there the next morning, having discovered that one of the victims had come to life.
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