Triple Tragedy in Dallas County

On the morning of August 15, 1898, a man called at the farm of German immigrant Charles Duffner living about five miles north of Fair Grove, Missouri, in southern Dallas County and bought some wine from Duffner and his wife. As the customer was leaving, he said he'd probably be back for more wine that evening. About dusk, two strangers showed up, and Mrs. Duffner, who was standing in the yard with her husband, remarked that their morning customer must have returned. Instead of asking for wine, however, one of the men, who was wearing a false beard, demanded Duffner's money.
Duffner at first thought it was a joke and started laughing, and Mrs. Duffner walked up to the man and pulled off his fake beard. He immediately pulled out a revolver and shot at the woman, barely grazing her. Duffner raced to his wife's aid and grabbed hold of the assailant. Duffner was able to pull out a knife and cut the villain across the throat, and the would-be thief fell to the ground mortally wounded. Meanwhile, Otto Duffner, the couple's grown son, arrived on the scene and helped his mother hold the other culprit. The elder Duffner started toward the second man and slashed at him with the knife, but a third robber suddenly appeared from his hiding spot and started shooting. When one of the shots struck and killed Charles Duffner, Otto turned loose of the man he was holding, and the two remaining crooks made their escape on horses stolen from the Duffner barnyard.
A hastily formed posse trailed the robbers north and found the two Duffner horses shot to death about four miles north of the crime scene, but no trace of the bandits could be found after that.
Back at the Duffner place, a revolver was taken off the dead robber, and a satchel that one of the robbers had dropped in scaling the barnyard fence was also found. It contained three cups with the names of Silas Sprague's three children etched on them. This led authorities to believe the crime might have been the work of Sprague and his notorious brothers-in-law, the Jones boys. Sprague was a 29-year-old ex-schoolteacher who was married to Sarah Jones, daughter of Sam Jones, a farmer who lived about three miles south of Buffalo. About 1892 or 1893, Sprague and his brothers-in-law Tom and James Jones had been arrested on a charge of robbery. Sprague was convicted and sentenced to five years in state prison. Tom Jones took a change of venue to Webster County, escaped from jail at Marshfield, and had not been heard from since. James Jones had also somehow escaped or jumped bail, and he and Tom made their way to Texas, where James was charged with killing a lawmen who was attempting to arrest him. He and Tom stayed on the run, roaming into Montana and other western states, and they were reportedly joined by their younger brother, George, in their criminal pursuits about four years before the Duffner killing.
On September 20, five days after the murder of Charles Duffner, George Jones was arrested in Springfield on suspicion of participating in the crime. He was released for lack of evidence, and he later unsuccessfully sued a Springfield newspaper, claiming the paper had libeled him by suggesting that he was one of the culprits who had killed Duffner. Meanwhile, his brothers, who were still suspected of the Duffner killing, stayed on the run. Sprague was apparently cleared of involvement in the crime.
On October 22, 1898, just slightly over a month after Charles Duffner was killed, his 16-year-old daughter, Freida, was shot and killed with the same pistol that had been taken off the dead robber. Freida and a Duffner hired hand named Powell, were sitting at the dinner table in the Duffner home when young Powell picked up the weapon and it discharged. They were alone at the residence at the time, and Powell claimed Freida's death was an accident. He was nonetheless arrested on suspicion. It was thought by some that Powell might have been working in cahoots with the men who had killed Charles Duffner and that he had killed Frieda because she was a potential witness against them, but Powell was later released for lack of evidence.
In early August of 1900, James Jones was killed in western Kansas after he and another man had held up a train in eastern Colorado a few days earlier. The pair were trailed into Kansas to a farmhouse, where they holed up. James was killed in a shootout with the posse, and the house was set on fire. The charred body of the second man was found inside the house after it had burned. It was thought at the time that he was Jim's brother Tom, but this is not certain, because a later report said Tom was arrested in Missouri after being on the run for almost ten years.
A third tragedy in less than three years occurred at the Duffner farm when Leo Herzog, a brother-in-law of another Duffner daughter, was accidentally killed on June 11, 1901, when lightning spooked the team of horses he was working. His leg became caught in the cultivator the runaway horses were pulling, and he was dragged a considerable distance, mangling his entire left side and crushing his skull. Young Herzog had come from Germany to visit his brother and had been in the United States less than a month. He was buried at the nearby Union Grove Cemetery, just across the Polk County line.
On a personal note, I'd like to thank Fair Grove native David Beckerdite for putting me on the trail of this story.