Henry Plummer & Internet Cowards

With rare exception (Bill Tilghman, Nellie Cashman, Sam Sixkiller), writing about outlaws is much more interesting to me than writing about the good guys. Perhaps it’s because finding a truly good guy to write about is a bit more difficult. At the beginning of his career in law enforcement, Sheriff Henry Plummer struck people as being a good guy, but he quickly dispelled that notion. In January 1864, a gang of holdup men and murderers known as ‘road agents,’ led by Sheriff Plummer, were preying on traveling miners who had found gold near Bannack and Virginia City, in eastern Idaho Territory. A Committee of Vigilance was quickly formed in haste and the gang was destroyed, as more than two dozen outlaws were hanged in accordance with ‘hemp justice.’ It seems to me that catching up with the true bad guy was much more simpler back then and dealing with them much more swift. Now of days the worst of the bad guys hide behind a computer screen. The internet has spawn so many cowards. I think about the cowards that posted threats on my website a few years back, leaving behind false names. A sophisticated tracking device led authorities to the coward, but the point is the threats were still made and left by a coward with a false name for all the world to see. They sit out there in the dark writing their vile emails and leave no way for the person they sent them to to respond. At least when Henry Plummer struck there was no mistake it was him. Toward the end of his career he admitted what he had done. Of course that confession came at the end of a rope, but he did confess. If the Old West teaches anything it’s that justice comes to outlaws, thugs, manipulators, cheats, and liars. It may take awhile, but justice does come. After doing an interview this morning for the Chronicle of the Old West radio program, I’ll go back to writing about a good guy who made sure criminals of all kinds were introduced to justice. Sam Sixkiller was a lawman who didn’t tolerate duplicity. How satisfying it must have been to see a coward get what was coming to him.