No. 649
Crime, Eccentricity, and the Sporting Life in 19th Century America.
September 06, 2022

A Miners' Racket.

Cold lead for cocktails.
September 6, 2022
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Tag: Little Murders

 Welcome to this week's Link Dump!The Strange Company HQ staffers wish you pleasant reading!A handy reminder that bees are weird.A look at medieval executioners.The world's oldest dated printed book.A stupid theory about the Salem Witch Trials that refuses to die.The 11th century abbot and the recycled sarcophagus.The duel between W.B. Yeats and Aleister Crowley.The man who made a living
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Strange Company - 10/23/2026
  [Editor’s note: Guest writer, Peter Dickson, lives in West Sussex, England and has been working with microfilm copies of The Duncan Campbell Papers from the State Library of NSW, Sydney, Australia. The following are some of his analyses of what he has discovered from reading these papers. Dickson has contributed many transcriptions to the Jamaica […]
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Early American Crime - 2/7/2019
"As his son I am proud of hisefforts to succeed in life"Jefferson Randolph Smith IIIArtifact #93-2Jeff Smith collection(Click image to enlarge) oapy's son hires a legal firm to stop the defamation of his father's name. At age 30, Jefferson Randolph Smith III, Soapy and Mary's oldest son, was protecting his father's legacy and his mother's reputation from "libel" and scandal. He was also
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Soapy Smith's Soap Box - 10/13/2025
This week, we feature a guest post by Don Everett Smith Jr., author of The Goffle Road Murders of Passaic County (History Press, 2011).   In a previous post on Murder by Gaslight, “Revisiting the Goffle Road Murders,” Don presented an excerpt from his book. This week’s post, “The Three Hangings, Lycoming County,” examines the 1880 murder of Andrew Miller in Lycoming County, Pennsylvania
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Murder By Gaslight - 10/24/2026
Youth With Executioner by Nuremberg native Albrecht Dürer … although it’s dated to 1493, which was during a period of several years when Dürer worked abroad. November 13 [1617]. Burnt alive here a miller of Manberna, who however was lately … Continue reading →
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Executed Today - 11/13/2020
Saloons and Houses of Ill-Fame. | Cowboys Lassoing the Ballet.

A Miners' Racket.

Cold-lead Pay-day at the mines in the vicinity of Robinson, Col., is always followed by a night of boisterous merriment. Last Saturday was no Exception to the rule, and a gang of the "boys," headed by Ed. Dolin, Jimmy Higgins, John Tye, Jerry Ryan and others got hold of a Jack mule or burro. Ed Dolan mounted the beast, and with his feet touching the ground, headed the procession. The others urged the animal along by pounding its buttocks with boards and cudgels. The gang made for a dance hall kept by two women named Jennie Stone and Nellie Williams alias "Buffalo Nell." Dolan rode astride the ass, made a charge on the bar, and presenting two cocked poppers, persuaded Buffalo Nell to set up San Juan cock tails for the crowd. About the time the gang were soaked, policeman Andy Purvin appeared on the scene, and a general stampede was made for the door. Boss Dolan and the ass went over a high side walk into a bank of snow, and it was only after a good deal of tumbling and much hard talk praying that they were placed on a solid footing again.


The National Police Gazette, December 3, 1881.