The Fugitive from Gadsden
A young man who killed a railroad yardmaster in Alabama over a dispute about coupling pins surrenders in Seattle after more than a year on the run.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Colin E. Daughdrill, a member of a prominent family of Gadsden, Alabama, who shot and killed Armstrong J. Stewart, a yardmaster, in March 1892, voluntarily surrendered to Sheriff Woolery in Seattle. Daughdrill, only 23 years old, had been living at the Ripley on Pike Street since July 4th. He approached Mayor Ronald to turn himself in, expressing a desire to see his wife and child and clear his conscience. The original conflict in Alabama stemmed from a dispute between the Louisville & Nashville and the East Tennessee, Virginia & Georgia railroads regarding missing equipment. When Daughdrill and Stewart argued, Stewart struck Daughdrill, leading to the fatal shooting. Daughdrill then fled, traveling across the U.S. and Mexico before settling in Seattle.
“I don't care to go into Gadsden with handcuffs on when they are unnecessary.”
While the specific violence of railroad equipment disputes has vanished, the 'fugitive' story reflects the era's transient population—men coming to Seattle to disappear—which still resonates in modern discussions about the city as a place of reinvention or evasion.
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