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Monday, February 15, 2016

Fremont Cobb aka "Mont" accused of Murder.

This book is a collection of over fifty different stories and remembrances of
 people and events at happened in and around Overton, Clark County Nevada.
The Thomas Hepworth family continues to surprise me with stories I find on Ancestry.com..  What is more fun is connecting with (in this case) a third cousin. This cousin lives in California and Fremont Cobb is his Great Grandfather.
Fremont was born in 1856 in Michigan; his older brother by three years Charles Isaac Cobb was born in 1852 in New York.  Fremont and Charles married sisters; 'Mont' (aka) married Emma Hepworth the sixth child of Thomas and Mary. Charles married Jane Elizabeth the eighth child of Thomas and Mary.  Emma and Jennie (aka) are my great aunts. 

Both couples were married in the same month and year only two days apart.  It is unclear the place of marriage for Mont and Emma.They were married on the 16 January 1883 possibly in Salt Lake City (I have yet to find the source other than on a family group sheet); Charles and 'Jennie' were married two days later on 18 January 1883 in Burley, Cassia, Idaho.  (Source of marriage record was found on Ancestry.com) 

Oh how I would love to know the story of how these two couples met.  

At one time both families lived in Albion, Idaho.  

This story about Mont happened in 1906 in Copper City, Nevada.  This is what was written by the grandson of Fremont Cobb: "In Copper City Nevada, a mining camp located below Lincoln mine about two miles northwest of Gold Butte, two men, Jack Ward and Fremont Cobb held claims there.  A conflict developed between them, ending when Cobb fatally shot Ward in 1906.  Cobb was held on a charge of murder but found he shot in self defense when it appeared that Ward tried to shoot Cobb while he was sleeping in his tent. 

This story is reported in the book I have posted above and at present is not available:  (Hookey beans and willows: True Short Stories of Yesteryear. by Oeville Perkins )


Without infringing on a copyright (if it still exists) this is what is reported about the incident in  my own way. 
A) Cooper City is highly remembered for the Shoot-out between Jack Ward and Mont Cobb. 

B) Cooper City was a tent city. 

C) The City ran out of supplies; little food and no drinks. 

D) Men would not leave for fear of losing what they had acquired from mining so waited for supplies to arrive but were very impatient. 

E) A shooting took place and Jack Ward died.  His body was taken to St. Thomas for burial.

F) Mont Cobb was taken into custody; a trial would be held in Overton, Nevada.

G) There was no jail in Overton so Cobb was locked up at night in the local deputy's (Andrew Jones) younger brother's bedroom.

H) Both slept in the same room but, Wallace protested sleeping in the same room with a murderer. 

I) Top legal minds were sent to prosecute Cobb.  Charles Lee Harsey, Prosecuting Attorney, and William E. Ore, Clerk of the Court of Lincoln County, Pioche.

J) Evidence pointed strongly to self-defense.

All the Cobb's ended up living in the Los Angeles, California area.  Even the Parents of Fremont and Charles; all are buried in California.  One thing I have come to realize in researching the surname COBB; it is quite a common name.  

I will post more stories and information on FamilySearch.org about this family.  



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