On Tuseday, May 10, 1870, seven men rode into the town of Ladore, Kansas, looking to raise hell. The Missouri, Kansas and Texas Railroad (aka the Katy) planned to make Ladore, located about six miles north of present-day Parsons, a junction point of the railroad, and the place pulsed with rowdy activity in anticipation of the expected boom. A railroad man named Bowes recalled many years later that Ladore was the toughest place he ever struck. Whiskey was sold in almost every house, and "vice and immorality flourished like a green bay tree." But even the citizens of a raucous town like Ladore drew a line, and when the seven rowdy strangers got liquored up and crossed it, only one of them rode out alive.
The seven "hard-looking characters" hit town about noon and commenced filling up on whiskey. About dusk they "began operations" by knocking people down and robbing them, and because they were heavily armed, they soon had entire possession of the town. About seven in the evening, they went to a boarding house kept by James N. Roach on the south outskirts of the town and asked to stay overnight. They were refused because of their intoxicated condition. but they didn't take the rejection well. Two of the desperadoes guarded a stairs leading to the second floor, where a number of railroad workers boarded, while the other five took over the lower part of the building. One of them hit Roach over the head with his revolver, knocking him to the floor unconscious. The men then proceeded to a bedroom where Roach's daughter and two other girls who worked for him, 13 and 14 years of age, slept. Roach's daughter managed to escape by slipping out of the room unnoticed, but the hellions took the two young girls, who were sisters, and dragged them to the edge of some nearby woods. There they took turn raping the girls throughout the night. At one point a quarrel erupted between the leader of the gang and one of his men over one of the girls, and the leader shot and killed his own man. Roach roused enough that he could hear the terrible cries of the girls, but he dared not stir for fear the men, who continued to keep an eye on the boarding house, would kill him.
Near daybreak, the outlaws went their separate ways, and an alarm was sounded. A posse of citizens and railroad workers found one of the hombres in the nearby woods still holding one of the girls captive. He was quickly strung up to hackberry tree not far from the Roach place. Two others were located in town, having fallen into a drunken stupor at a saloon, and they promptly joined their comrade on the same limb of the hackberry tree. The remaining three desperadoes were overtaken on the road to Osage Mission (now St. Paul) and brought back to Ladore. Two of them soon adorned the hackberry tree alongside their pals, while the third man was granted a reprieve, since one of the girls testified that he did not participate in the hellish deeds of the other gang members. By 11 a.m. on Wednesday morning, five men hung lifeless side by side on the same hackberry limb. All five were later cut down and buried in a common grave near the hackberry tree.
Ladore's anticipated boom never materialized, because the main line of the Katy Railroad ended up bypassing the town and choosing Parsons instead as its junction point. Ladore settled into a period of peace and quiet, or, in the words of Bowes, it became "a good, moral town." The place gradually declined, and by the turn of the 20th century, it had virtually disappeared. Today about the only thing that remains to suggest that a town called Ladore ever existed is the cemetery, located on an out-of-the-way road a few miles north of Parsons.
No comments:
Post a Comment