KNOXVILLE TASTES THE WILD WEST

6/27/1903 - Tired of the accommodations at the Knox County Jail in Knoxville, Tennessee, Hole-in-the-Wall outlaw, 36-year-old bandit, Harvey Alexander "Kid Curry" Logan pulls off an audacious escape that even public enemy John Dillinger would have had trouble recreating.

Logan And Girlfriend Annie Rogers

Seeking a respite from the heat authorities have placed on Logan territory in Montana after the outlaw robs the westbound Great Northern Overland Flyer #3 when it stops to take on water outside of the town of Wagner (the bandits, consisting of Logan, O.C. Hanks, Ben "The Tall Texan" Kilpatrick, and an unknown fourth gang member take between $40,000 and $80,000 off the train), and the revenge assassination of rancher James Winters for the murder of his younger brother, John, back in 1896, Harvey "Kid Curry" Logan moves his activities away from the west where he has been hunted like a dog, and sets up a new base of operations in Tennessee, in the city of Knoxville.  A safe haven at first, it doesn't take long for Logan, and his girlfriend, Annie Rogers, to screw things up ... Rogers is caught exchanging money from the Wagner robbery (guilty as sin, a jury will nonetheless find her not guilty at trial), and Logan comes to the attention of authorities after foolishly letting his temper boil over and participating in a brutal bar fight.

Robbery Postcard

Wanted Poster

Enjoying an evening of pool (the stakes are $20 a game) and drinking with friends in Ike Jones' Central Saloon at the junction of Commerce and Central Streets in Knoxville, on a cold December Friday in 1903, the festive mood of everyone in the bar comes apart over an argument involving the broken tip on a pool cue.  Angry words exchanged about the implement and its continued use, it at first appears that Logan has been mollified by calmer heads, but after downing a shot of whiskey, the bandit suddenly grabs Luther Brady, pulls the man over to an empty sugar barrel, and sticks his former friend in, strangling him the entire time.  Seeing his friend is about to run out of oxygen, another former pal, Jim Boley, rushes over to save Brady, but is prevented from striking Logan over the head with another pool stick by a bystander at the bar.  A ruckus going now, the noise of the fight drifts outside to the street, where it is heard by two of Knoxville's finest, Patrolmen William M. Dinwiddie and Robert T. Saylor, both recovering from injuries they suffered six months before arresting a robbery suspect.  Pushing through the crowd in the bar with their nightsticks, the two men order Logan to stop his assault on Brady ... a demand to which Logan responds to as he always does when confronted by officers of the law, by pulling a concealed pistol and firing (at this point in his career he is thought to have already killed at least nine peace officers and posse members).  As bullets fly about the saloon, Saylor is hit in the right side and in the left arm just below the shoulder, wounds that do not prevent the lawman from hitting Logan over the head with his billy club, an ouch that gets him a third hit of lead to his left side, and sends him to the floor. Meanwhile, Dinwiddie is also pummeling Logan with his billy club ... the last blow breaking the billy club over Logan's head as the outlaw is knocked down to his knees ... but showing why he is known as the "Tiger of the Wild Bunch," the bandit brushes off another head shot (Dinwiddie has now grabbed Saylor's dropped billy club), stands, and places a bullet in Dinwiddie's chest (the officer's shirt will later be found to be covered in powder burns). Opponents down, bar entrance blocked by the crowd watching the fight, Logan takes the only exit he has available, out the back of the bar, where he makes a 15 foot leap down to the creek behind the drinking establishment and then stumbles off into the darkness.
 
Saylor & Dinwiddie

Two officers shot and a violent suspect on the loose, the bar fight makes front page news in the area and sets posses off in every direction of the compass looking for Logan.  Blood on his clothes and bandaged head spotted, a week later the outlaw is finally found and arrested (without incident) outside of Jefferson City, thirty miles to northeast of Knoxville ... and excitement grabs the city as it discovers that the desperado now behind bars in the city jail is the notorious Harvey "Kid Curry" Logan on the Wild Bunch (at first, he will be thought to be Harry Longabaugh, aka the Sundance Kid). A celebrity villain (a local newspaper will describe him as the "Napoleon of Crime," which Logan considers a compliment), a large crowd greets the outlaw when he gets off the train that returns him to Knoxville, another is waiting at the jail when he arrives, and during his stay in town, there will be tours of the jail to see Logan, seats to his trial will be sold out daily, and local women will begin sending him love letters in scented envelopes, books, and food (six corn-cob pipes sent from an unknown admirer are found to also include a 23-inch long hacksaw blade inside). At the same time, Logan becomes friendly with the men guarding him, sharing whiskey and cigars he gets from his lawyers, seemingly complying with the rules of the jail, playing cards, and spending hours telling them stories of life out west (none having to do with his criminal exploits, throughout his stay in Knoxville he will claim to be an innocent named Charlie Johnson). Friendly most of the time, the ogre in Logan's personality does rear its head from time to time and there are several outbreaks in which the bandit trashes his cell and the cell block bathroom, refuses to let himself be photographed, and hides from visitors he isn't in the mood for by hanging blankets over the bars of his cell (Logan is the only prisoner on the second floor of the Knox County Jail ... the floor is roughly a square with a main entrance straddled by the sheriff's office and jailer's office at its north end, at the south end are three barred window that look out on the town and the Tennessee River ... within, an outer corridor wraps around a bar enclosed cell block, six cells on each side facing each other across an inside corridor).

Newspaper Drawing Of Logan - Note Head Wound With
Stitch From The Fight

Bird's Eye View Of Nashville - 1886

Found guilty of ten of the nineteen counts he is charged with (after the testimony of twenty-seven prosecution and seven defense witnesses ... the jury begins their deliberations at 11:40 in the morning, and are done by 2:45 in the afternoon of the same day), Logan is sentenced to twenty years of hard labor in the federal prison in Columbus, Ohio (and ten fines of $500 each).  Not happy with the verdict, the outlaw of course appeals ... and lawyers for both sides begin fighting over whether there should be another trial, where it will be, and when, while all the while, a special steel lined mail car awaits at the railroad station to take Logan to prison and the Pinkerton Detective Agency keeps telling the Knoxville authorities what a dangerous man they have in custody (they even volunteer to pay for an additional guard to keep an eye on the bandit, but the offer is turned down by Sheriff J. W. Fox).  By June of 1903, Logan is again ready to show Knoxville how correct the Pinkertons are.

Arrested Logan - Belle Fourche - 1897

Duded Up Logan - Fort Worth - 1900

Rattlesnake ready, on a very pleasant 6/27/1903 Saturday afternoon, with temperatures in the 70s, sheriff absent, attending a funeral, Logan strikes.  Use to chatting with the badman near the windows looking out on the Tennessee River after he completes his rounds, following five months of routine, guard Frank Irwin thinks nothing of turning his back on the outlaw to view the river when Logan points out that the Tennessee is running high and muddy. Gazing at the majestic scene, Irwin is suddenly yanked back into the bars of the interior cell area, lassoed by Logan using wire acquired from a broken broom.  Then, after warning Irwin he will kill him if he utters a sound, the outlaw turns Irwin around and ties the guard's hands through the bars and gags him, using strips of material from the hammock he has destroyed during one of his "fits" of rages.  That taken care of, Logan then goes to the bathroom cell and takes out a nine-foot pole he has hidden there, fashioned from broken window moldings held together with more hammock strips, and finished with a hook on the end made from the handle of a recently fractured bucket. Running to north end of the cell area, Logan uses the device to reach around the bars to an area thought to be out of reach of the jail's prisoners, where a .45 Colt and a .38 Smith & Wesson pistols are kept for guard use in a cardboard shoe box.  Weapons obtained, Logan then slides the box back to its original position so that there will be nothing to give guard Tom Bell a warning of what is coming when he arrives on the second floor.  Jail routine used again against his jailers, when Bell arrives at about 4:30, he finds Logan rapping an empty medicine bottle of cough syrup against the bars, demanding a refill. Reaching for the bottle, Bell suddenly finds a pistol pointing straight at his stomach, while Logan once more repeats the tale he has told Irwin, any interference with the escape will cost the guard his life   Believed, Bell lets Logan out of the cell area (nervous, he takes two tries with Logan's pistol placed to his temple), unlocks the door off the second floor, and with Logan behind him with a revolver in his back, the guard takes the outlaw down the stairs, past administrative offices for the jail's staff, out the facility's kitchen and into the jail's backyard.  There, Logan has Bell, and a jail worker named R. P. Swanee, saddle the sheriff's favorite mare (the sheriff, just returned from the funeral, unarmed, and just about to have something to eat, sees Logan escaping and runs up to the third floor of the jail to find a weapon, but by the time he is back down to the backyard, the bandit has escaped).  Mounted, Logan exits the jail compound on to Prince Street, turns immediately right down Hill Street, and then takes another right on to Gay Street (waving at a little girl that he has spent the last few weeks waving to from his jail cell) and gallops across the bridge over the Tennessee River ... leaving Knoxville at around 5:05 in the early evening with the clothes on his back, a stolen horse, two pistols, his razor, soap, a comb, a razor strap, a small mirror, and a one dollar bill.

Next Day Headlines

Fresh rewards offered, though posses start fanning out from the city within 30 minutes of Logan's escape, the outlaw is never officially seen again.  Some feel he dies trying to cross a desolate section of North Carolina called "Jeffrey's Hell," others think his end comes under the alias of Tap Duncan, when that cowboy commits suicide after being wounded by a posse following a failed train robbery outside of Parachute, Colorado in 1904 (a month in the ground, by the time it is dug up for further evaluation, rot has begun and scars known to be on Logan can not be found on the corpse), while a different frame of thought has him making his way down to Butch and Sundance in South America, or growing to old age under an alias while hiding among friends in Montana.  No one knows for certain, what is known however is that despite the passage of over a hundred years, Knoxville has not yet forgotten when a member of the Wild Bunch paid a visit to the town known as the Gateway to the Smoky Mountains (and home to the University of Tennessee) ... and raised Hell there.

Corpse Identified As Kid Curry

True West Rendition Of Kid Curry

The Logan Brothers - John, Harvey, and Lonie

NAZI SPIES IN AMERICA

6/13/1942 - Hoping to attack the infrastructure of the United States of America, Nazi Germany begins landing spies in America as part of Operation Pastorius (named for Francis Daniel Pastorius, the leader of the first organized German settlement in America in 1683).  Recruited by the Abwehr (the organization responsible for German military intelligence led by Admiral Wilhelm Canaris), eight men are selected for their ability to speak English and for the fact that they have all spent extended periods of time living in the United States before WWII (indeed, two are American citizens!), then sent to a secret sabotage training facility at an estate on Quenz Lake where they receive a three-week intensive crash course in how to create and use various explosives, and use an assortment of mechanical, electrical and chemical primers, along with memorizing their new American identities and assignments.  Their mission is to hit the hydroelectric plants at Niagara Falls, aluminum manufacturing facilities in Illinois, Tennessee, and New York, river locks on the Ohio near Louisville, a crucial railroad pass near Altoona, Pennsylvania, called Horseshoe Curve, a cryolite plant in Philadelphia, Hell Gate Bridge in New York, and Pennsylvania Station in Newark, New Jersey.  

 The Abwehr's Eight

Armed with hand weapons, explosives and primers, $84,000 in American currency, counterfeit birth certificates, Social Security cards, draft deferment documents, and driver's licenses, the first team of four agents (leader George Dasch, Ernest Burger, Richard Quirin, and Heinrich Heinck) arrive off the United States coast near the town of Amagansett (on Long Island, about 115 miles east of New York City) aboard the German submarine, U-202 (the second group of four will arrive in Florida at Ponte Verde Beach, just south of Jacksonville on June 16th).  Coming ashore shortly after midnight, in German Navy uniforms so if immediately captured they will not be shot as spies, the team changes to civilian clothes, buries their ordinance, and heads inland intent on devastating America ... and they might have done just that had it not been for the intrepid actions of U.S. Coast Guardsman John C. Cullen.  

 Cullen

On his regular nightly patrol, walking through the dark and summer fog about a half a mile from his lifeboat station, Cullen encounters Dasch burying boxes of explosives in the sand dunes.  Unarmed and threatened with being shot, he pretends to accept a $260 bribe (all Dasch has in his pocket at the moment) to look the other way ... what he actually does though as soon as he is clear of the German is to run back to his station and tell his superiors about the mystery man on the beach.  Dasch is missing by the time an armed Coast Guard team returns to the scene, but six inches under the sand at a spot pointed out by Cullen, the spy's equipment is found.  The next day the word goes out to law enforcement agencies around the country (though the information is kept secret from the public) that German saboteurs are on the loose.

Location

Frightened by his close call on the beach, and having lived in the United States for ten years (a stowaway arriving in Philadelphia in 1923, along with waiter stints in New York City, Miami Beach, San Francisco, Sacramento, and Los Angeles, the former Roman Catholic seminarian and soldier in the WWI German Imperial Army actually spends a year as a member of the U.S. Army with 72nd Bombardment Squadron in Hawaii), knowing the mistake he made the night before in not murdering Cullen will result in a massive manhunt being directed his way, Dasch develops a quick case of monstrously cold feet.  Deciding his wisest course is to rat out the other spies, the day after arriving in America, the German terrorist invites Burger (one of the two American citizens born in Germany) to his room to discuss a new plan ... join Dasch in telling the authorities about Operation Pastorius, or have Dasch pitch him out of the open window of his upper-story Manhattan hotel room.  Window waiting and having spent seventeen months in a Nazi concentration camp, Burger decides betraying the plan to the authorities sounds like a wonderful idea. 

 Burger

Seemingly a simple thing, when a series of calls to the FBI fails to convince a single agent that he is the real deal, Dasch takes a train to Washington D.C., checks in to the Mayflower Hotel, and then goes looking for J. Edgar Hoover.  Carrying a briefcase, at FBI headquarters the German spy runs into another set of agents who aren't buying his tale, but is finally believed when angered that Assistant Director D.M. Ladd, the agent in charge of the hunt for the spies, seems to be merely humoring him, Dasch opens the briefcase and reveals the mission money he has brought to America ... $84,000 in cash.  Finally taken seriously, Dasch is interrogated for hours and armed with the information he provides, within two weeks the FBI has all eight saboteurs in custody.    

 Headline

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And then it is time for some justice ... American style!

 Tribunal

Fearful that a normal civilian court might be too lenient (and this was YEARS before the O.J. jury showed their stupidity), FDR issues Executive Proclamation 2561 creating a military tribunal to prosecute the Germans.  And prosecute them the tribunal does!  Meeting in Assembly Hall #1 of the Department of Justice building in Washington D.C., the trial of the eight begins on July 8th and lasts until August 1st ... and two days later the sentences are given out.  Guilty all, though they gave themselves up and provided critical information, Dasch gets 30 years in prison and Burger is sentenced to life in prison ... AFTER FDR commutes their original death sentences!  The outcome is even harsher for the other six men ... all are given the death penalty, fried to a crisp in the District of Columbia jail's third floor electric chair, and then buried without names in a nearby potter's field.   

 The Chair

War won, with Harry S. Truman in office there is a little more lightness of the heart in the Oval Office, and in 1948 the president grants Burger and Dasch executive clemency under the condition the men are deported to the American Zone of occupied Germany.  Once more in the Fatherland, the men receive no heroes welcome for their actions in America and are instead treated like pariahs for the rest of their lives ... Burger dies at the age of 69, and Dasch kicks the bucket in the city of Ludwigshafen at the age of 89 in 1992.

 Truman

Why today mattered ... spies in America is why ... 6/13/1942!

THE TAP DUNCAN DEATH

6/9/1904 - Following his amazing 6/27/1903 escape from the Knox County jail in Knoxville, Tennessee (bedding is used to create a lariat that captures one guard around the throat, and wall molding is used to fashion a nine foot long pole and hook that allows access to a shoe box the guards put their guns in before entering the cell house), Wild Bunch gunman, Harvey "Kid Curry" Logan rides west out of town and vanishes, becoming a vast wind of rumors.  Some believe he died trying to cross a wilderness area of North Carolina called Jeffrey's Hell, others that he is hiding with friends in Montana, or on his Allie's horse ranch in Missouri, a letter is received at the Daily Journal and Tribune newspaper of Knoxville posted from Perkins, California, in Sacramento County, claiming to be from the escapee, a man named Edgar Young claims to have spent time with Logan in Brazil, he is said to be with Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid in the wilds of Patagonia, he secretly works as a section hand for the Great Northern Railroad (which he robbed in 1901), disguised as a hobo, Logan takes odd jobs around the Chinook, Montana region, he hangs out around Rock Springs, Wyoming, asking lots of questions at the local train station, and a hotel clerk and bellhop in Denver claim that Logan is the man that checks in carrying a large valise stuffed with cash (who then flees when he is disturbed by the bellhop bringing him a pitcher of water while he is counting out cash on his bed).    

Logan In His "Hobo" Disguise

Train robbery not quite over despite the new century being in its infancy, on the Tuesday evening of 6/7/1904, three cowboys hit the seven-coach Denver and Rio Grande Western Mail train, #5, just outside the town of Parachute, Colorado (located seventeen miles west of Rifle and forty miles east of Grand Junction), on the Colorado River (a fruit producing and shipping center, the town's name comes from a butchering of the Ute word, "Pahchouc," meaning twins, which referred to a nearby stream passing through two almost identical mountains), then known as the Grand River.

Site Of The Robbery

The train raid begins in typical Wild Bunch fashion with a robber climbing aboard, making his way forward, taking command of the engine, its engineer, Ed Allison, and its fireman, John Anders, and then having the men stop the train at a large bonfire where the robber's two confederates are waiting.  Coming forward to find out why the train has stopped, conductor Charles Ware and head brakeman Ed Shellenberger instantly recognize a robbery is taking place when shots shatter the lantern that Ware is carrying (vanishing with the lost light, Ware runs back to town and gets the pursuit of the bandits started), and a round hits Shellenberger in the thigh.  The outlaws then have the other members of the crew separate the passenger cars from the express and baggage car, before moving forward about a mile down the line, to Streit Flats, for the actual looting of the train. 

Core Members Of The Wild Bunch
Standing L To R - Will "News" Carver,
Harvey "Kid Curry" Logan
Sitting L To R - Harry "The Sundance Kid" Longabaugh,
Ben "The Tall Texan" Kilpatrick, and Robert Leroy
"Butch Cassidy" Parker

Stop, start, then stop again, with gun shots and shouted commands also in the mix, realizing the train is probably about to be robbed, mail agent Fred Hawley hides registered mail and other valuables in various bags and nooks in the car, while express messenger D. M. Shea barricades the door with heavy baggage and trunks.  A robbery indeed, when the men refuse to open the door, the outlaws produce dynamite and blow an entrance into the car (blown off his feet in the blast, Shea will later get a cash reward from the Globe Express Company for his bravery) ... where, when they see the style safe they must crack, the bandits realize they are robbing the wrong train ... delayed, the Denver and Rio Grande train has passed the Colorado Midland train, that uses part of the same tracks, that is heading to the Philadelphia Mint to drop off $150,000 in gold bullion (a different disaster, had the outlaws been correct, it would have been three bandits versus fifteen armed guards).  Making the most of the mistake, the outlaws blast open the safe (after two tries) and find their booty consists of a bag of coins worth around a hundred dollars, numerous 50 cent pieces, a handful of sealed packages, and as an unhappy goodbye, Shea's gold watch is also taken.  Robbery completed, the outlaws allow the train to back up towards Parachute, while they vanish into the darkness, making their way down to the river, where they use a stolen boat to cross over to where they have left their horses on the south side. Mounted, the men head for the forested wilds of ten thousand foot Battlement Mesa.

Battlement Mesa

Not a Wild Bunch getaway where hard riding to hidden supplies and fresh mounts results in posses being escaped, the outlaws steal horses and beg food from ranches and homesteads they pass through, mistakenly thinking that they have left pursuit far behind on the other side of the river.  Alarm sounded by Ware and passed on to the railroad's offices in Denver, Pueblo, Salida, and Grand Junction, within hours of the robbery though, posses depart from the Colorado towns of Glenwood Springs, Grand Junction, and Meeker, and a contingent of lawmen is dispatched by train from Leadville that heads towards the robbery site with a pack of trained bloodhounds (the amount of activity is surprising given that no one was gravely wounded or killed, and because a big score did not take place, the reward for capturing any of the bandits is only $300).  Already in trouble, a gunfight between the fleeing crooks and authorities becomes inevitable when an invention just coming into its own is used to contact the latest location of the criminal trio ... the telephone at rancher Joe Banta's home, where the outlaws stop and demand breakfast (which they pay for with a single dollar), and steal three horses (unsurprisingly, after Banta splices together the telephone wire the outlaws have cut, he joins up with the outlaw hunters when a posse arrives at his place later in the day).

Posse Member - Garfield County Sheriff Francis Adams

A bad day for the bandits, 6/9/1904 begins at the Banta homestead (after the phone call, a Mrs. Trumble, the telephone operator for Garfield County, spends the day keeping the authorities coordinated as to the latest sightings of the outlaws).  Finding one of the horses they pilfered is lame, the outlaws attempt to steal more horses from the nearby Larson ranch (in Divide Valley, south of the town of Silt) ... where Mrs. Larson, spying the theft, runs outside and reprimands the men, who respond by chasing her back into her house ... another bad move, for inside she has allies in the form of her two young sons (the Larson men are already out with one of the posses combing the area) who grab guns and begin firing at the fleeing outlaws ... just as a posse shows up at the ranch.

Robbery Remembered

Trying to escape, the outlaws ride into a nearby gulch, make their way from there into a gulch on upper Divide Creek, and eventually push their way into a deep gorge in Garfield Creek Canyon, where they abandon their fatigued horses and begin climbing up and out of the steep, boulder-strewn area ... with the posse right behind. "Okay you SOBs, that is far enough.  Just turn your horses around and head down the mountain.  If you try to follow us again, I will shoot the first man that comes in my sights around the corner down there," calls out one of the outlaws, and then to punctuate his words, the bandits open fire ... Deputy Elmer Chapmen is grazed in the face by a round, and the horses of Deputies Rolly Gardner and Joe Doby are shot out from under them (they are about fifty feet from the outlaws when the shooting begins).  Seeing Doby fleeing on foot, the outlaw that had given the warning takes deadly aim with his rifle on the back of the running deputy, but before he can fire, is hit by a rifle bullet from Gardner (the round breaks the bandit's left arm, grazes across his chest, and exits the man's right arm, blowing off the top of bicep ... a fatal hit if not taken care of immediately) who has hunkered down behind his dead horse to engage the outlaws.

From True West Magazine - Gardner Firing

From True West Magazine - Site Of The Gunfight With The Posse

From True West Magazine - The Hit

"Are you hit?" one of the outlaws calls over to his downed confederate.  "Yes," is the weakly spoken reply.  "Are you hurt bad, Sam?"  "Yes, I am all in, I guess, and I'm going to put an end to it." Seconds later, a shot rings out as the wounded man places his revolver to his head and pulls the trigger.  Gunfight over, as the posse's attention is focused on the wounded or dead outlaw, his confederates finish their climb up the hillside and vanish, never to be caught or identified.

Harvey Logan's Revolver?

The dead man is clean shaven, has large, deeply sunken black eyes, syphilis scars on his legs, and skin that appears slightly tinted yellow with jaundice.  On or with the corpse are two revolvers, a Winchester rifle, a pair of field glasses, bullets, a compass, a listing of railroad timetables, and a crudely drawn map of the region. Horse to wagon to train, the body eventually makes its way to Glenwood Springs for identification and internment ... and the "who is the fiend" fun begins!

Newspaper Drawing Of Logan At His Nashville Trial

The Corpse

The body is first thought to be a local cowboy named J. H. Ross (but Ross is found to be still very much alive), then a Nebraska outlaw named George Kendricks is honored (but he is found behind bars in Omaha), a Leadville thug named Brennick is thought of as a possibility, and then the corpse is called Tap Duncan ... a quiet cowboy who showed up in the region the previous year with exceptional gunslinging abilities (upset when his fellow ranch hands can't hit empty bottles set on a fence, Duncan draws his revolver and shatters all the bottles, then demonstrating his rattlesnake quickness at drawing and firing with accuracy, places a card on the back of his hand, which he flips up in the air and hits five times before it falls to the ground).  Unknown and starting to go ripe, the body is photographed in four different positions, a death mask is made, and full hand prints are taken before the mystery man is buried in a pauper's grave.  Pictures sent to law enforcement agencies around the country, Lowell Spence of the Pinkerton Detective Agency quickly comes up with a new identification for the dead desperado ... the body is the man known as "The Tiger of the Wild Bunch," Harvey "Kid Curry" Logan.

Girlfriend Annie Rogers & Logan

Controversy brewing, a month after going into the ground, a court order gets the mystery outlaw exhumed for an evaluation of whether scarring on the body matches any of Logan's known wounds (at the examination along with Spence, are railroad special agent R. Brunazzi, Union Pacific's chief of detectives, William Canada, local Undersheriff Mohn, Deputy Crissman, and a few other locals).  Unfortunately though, the body is too badly decomposed to come up with a definitive identification ... a scar known to be on Logan's hand can't be found, and no one thinks to check the corpse's head for permanent souvenirs of the pistol whipping the outlaw took resisting arrest in Knoxville in 1902. Inconclusive, Spence sticks by his identification of the bandit (a face he'd probably remember, while visiting Logan while he is behind bars, the outlaw tells the Pinkerton he will kill him as soon as he is free again ... not everyone agrees though, and in part, legendary detective Charlie Siringo, who has chased the Wild Bunch all over the West, retires in 1907 because he thinks Spence is wrong and that Logan is still on the loose), while the railroad representatives say the dead bandit isn't Logan (whether it has anything to do with the fact that the railroad will have to pay out $30,000 in reward money if the body really is Logan's is unknown).

Pinkerton Logo

Replanted in Glenwood Springs (just a short distance from Doc Holliday's memorial), under a tombstone stating the body below is Logan's, the corpse mystery remains unreconciled still today ... with most historians going with the Kid Curry identification because from 1904 on, his presence is never attached to another robbery ... while others say no, Logan lived out his life under an alias (like Butch Cassidy, friends and family members will state the outlaw in his old age would sometimes visit places from his youth in Montana, Wyoming, Utah, and Colorado). 

From True West Magazine - The Four Pictures Of The Body

Tombstone

Kid Curry or Tap Duncan ... on this day in 1904, an outlaw goes down in the wilds of northwest Colorado ... if Logan, the bandit would have been 37 when he ends his violent life, with a violent death.

Harvey "Kid Curry" Logan