The body of Tiebalt bore the marks of a small lariat about the throat, which had been used to drag him, while still living, to the place of concealment. The hands were filled with fragments of sage brush, torn off in the agony of that terrible process; and the bullet wound over the left eye showed how the murder had been accomplished.
These appalling witnesses to the cruelty and fiendishness of the perpetrator of this bloody deed roused the indignation of the people to a fearful pitch. They went to work to avenge the crime with an alacrity sharpened by the consciousness of that long and criminal neglect on their part, but for which it might have been averted. They felt themselves to be, in some degree, participants in the diabolical tragedy. In the presence of that dead body the reaction commenced, which knew no abatement until the country was entirely freed of its bloodthirsty persecutors. That same evening, twenty-five citizens of Nevada subscribed an obligation of mutual support and protection, mounted their horses, and, under the leadership of a competent man, at ten o’clock started in pursuit of the murderer. Obtaining an accession of one good man on their route, and avoiding Dempsey’s by a hill trail, they rode six miles beyond it to a cabin, and with the aid of its proprietor found their way to the point of destination. At an early hour in the morning, they crossed Wisconsin Creek, breaking through the frozen surface, and emerging from it with clothing perfectly rigid from frost and wet. A mile beyond this they were ordered to alight and stand by their horses until daybreak. An hour or more passed, when they remounted and rode quietly on, until in sight of Long John’s wakiup. A dog was heard to bark; and in anticipation of the alarm it might occasion, they dashed forward at full speed, surrounding the wakiup, each man halting with his gun bearing upon it. Jumping from his horse, the leader discovered eight or ten men wrapped in their blankets, sleeping in front of the entrance. Raising his voice, he exclaimed,
“The first man that rises will get a quart of buckshot in him before he can say ‘Jack Robinson.’”
It was too dark to distinguish the sleepers. With half of his company at his back, the leader strode on to the entrance. Peering into the darkness, he asked,