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| Samuel Perrins age abt. 12 Very near the age of when this story took place. Albion, Cassia , Idaho |
This is
my grandfather Samuel Perrins the father of my mother Verona. He had a friendly
outgoing personality and was known by everyone in the Albion Valley. After
Grandmother died; for years he would stay with one of his eight children going
from home to home spreading out his visits and telling his stories. When his only sister Flora Perrins Dumas’s
husband died he then he moved into the basement room of her house in Twin Falls,
Idaho. He was living with my parents at the time of his death just shy of turning ninety years old.
He was
living with his oldest son Melvin Samuel Perrins and daughter-in-law Ressa Lounsbury
Perrins in Deer Park, Washington when he retold this story and either Sam or Ressa
typed it in his own words. Keeping the story
in Grandfathers own words is the best.
I smile
when he refers to the outdoor privy as the restroom; and how he sets up the
story that helps with the ending. He has
a way of keeping your attention to what is going to happen next. Love you
Grandfather Sam Perrins.
This is a true story written by Samuel Perrins who
was an eyewitness to this tragedy from beginning to the finish.
One bright sunny day in the year of 1888, I was
walking down the Main Street of Albion, Idaho.
Albion at that time was the County Seat of Cassia County and I noticed
coming out of the Court House, Sheriff E. J. Stokes and his two deputies, Dan
Starks and William Holcome. With them
was a Deputy Sheriff from Salt Lake City, Mr. Butterfield. They were well armed and headed straight for
Joe Parks Saloon.
I stopped to see what it was all about. Everyone in town knew that Mr. Butterfield had
come for Perry Pleasents, who was wanted for stealing horses in Utah. Mr. Butterfield and Mr. Pleasents were
brothers-in-law and held a grudge against each other. Mr. Butterfield requested the honor to run
Mr. Pleasents down and fetch him back for trail. The Sheriff of Salt Lake City swore Mr.
Butterfield in as a Deputy, pinned a badge on him and sent him on his way. After several days of trailing, Mr.
Butterfield had located Mr. Pleasents in Albion.
Mr. Pleasents liked to play cards and gamble. The card tables were in the back part of the
saloon. Mr. Pleasents, when he sat at a
card game, always sat with his face towards the front door so he could see
whoever came in that way. He was playing
cards at the time when the officers entered the saloon through the front door. When the officers got inside the saloon, Mr.
Pleasants got up quickly and left the card game through the back door and the
officers followed him. I ran to the
corner of the block to watch and see where he went. He ran catty-corner across the street and
into the hotel and went through the hotel into the back yard and then into the
restroom, which was outside in the back yard.
It was made of lumber and was double, marked on one end ‘Women’ and the
other ‘Men’, he went n the Men’s side. Mr. Pleasents went through the hotel; he
stopped long enough in the kitchen to order him up a lunch. This hotel was a 16 or 20 bedroom, two-story,
frame building and the back yard was fenced in with a board fence seven feet
high. (Several years later this hotel
caught fire and burned down, and one man was trapped in the building. The man
that was trapped in the fire was Archey Howell.)
We used wood those days for heat and to do our
cooking with and someone had thrown a load of wood over the fence into the back
yard. It was in long lengths, and the
limbs stuck out in all directions. Well,
the officers surrounded the restroom where Mr. Pleasents was hiding.
I perches myself on top of this high board fence,
resting my feet on top of the two-by-four which was nailed about one foot from
the top of the fence, and right under me inside the yard and close up to this
wood pile was a man by the name of Lewis.
I think his name was Heber Lewis; anyway his was [a] brother of Hyrum S.
Lewis of Declo. Little did I think while
sitting on top of this fence what was going to happen, and I don’t think Mr.
Lewis did either. Well, Sheriff Stokes
ordered Mr. Pleasents to come out and with his hand and arms up above his head,
but he would not come out. Finally the
Sheriff added to his demand, ‘If you don’t come out, we will start
shooting!’ Still Mr. Pleasents would not
come out and then the fireworks started.
The Sheriff and his deputies started shooting through the higher part of
the restroom and every round they would drop down a little lower until they got
within 18 inches or two feet for the floor.
Mr. Pleasents yelled out ‘Don’t shoot any more, I am coming out.’ The Sheriff said ‘All right, come out with
your hands up in the air.’ So he
did. The Deputy Sheriff from Salt Lake City,
Mr. Butterfield, had a double-barrel, sawed off, shotgun, and when Mr.
Pleasents came out of the restroom the deputy fro Salt Lake pointed the shotgun
right at Mr. Pleasents breast and cocked both barrels of the shotgun, ready to
shoot, and held it on him all the time.
Mr. Butterfield never took his eyes off him. They stood about 8 or 10 feet apart. The next thing was to search Mr. Pleasents
for firearms which they did, but failed to search his boots where he carried
his gun. After they searched him for
firearms, Mr. Pleasents asked if he could roll a pill (meaning a
cigarette). They rolled their own those
days. The Sheriff said ‘yes.’ Now right behind Mr. Pleasants where he stood
rolling his pill was an old frame building, which was once a saloon. After he rolled his pill as he called it he
put it in his mouth and the next thing was to light it. Now, all the time this was going on, the
Deputy Sheriff from Salt Lake held the shotgun on him, pointing right at his
breast with both barrels cocked. He
reached in his pocket and got a match and struck it on his pants leg, but broke
the match, at the same time lifted his pants leg up a little where his gun was
in his boot. He repeated this operation,
but the third time he got his pants leg up high enough to get his gun. He shot the Deputy Sheriff from Salt Lake
City, hitting him in the breast about two inches from his heart and as Mr.
Butterfield was falling he automatically pulled the trigger of his shotgun and
the blast struck Mr. Pleasents in the head, just above the eyes, and the
contents of his head were smeared all over the side of this old building that
was just back of him and stayed there for quite some time, in fact stayed there
until the weather and rain washed it off.
The Sheriff from Salt Lake City did not live very long, in fact just
long enough for his wife to come from Salt Lake to see him breath his
last. Both bodies were taken to Utah for
burial.
I suppose you readers are wondering what happened to
me and Mr. Lewis? Well, I will tell you. I rolled off the top of that high fence
backwards and lit on my feet and took off.
Honestly, I believe I ran so fast that if anyone had taken a shot at me
with a .45 Colt, the bullet would never have caught up with me and Mr. Lewis in
his fright, whirled around to run and ran into the wood pile that was thrown
over the fence and rammed a stick of wood in his stomach and fell on the ground
flat on is back and shouted, “My God,
boys, I am shot, I am shot—.”
