City there was an absolute wilderness, wholly unsettled, four
hundred and seventy-five miles in width. "There was no post office in
the Territory. Letters were brought from Salt Lake first at a cost of
two dollars and a half each, and later in the season at one dollar each.
All money at infinite risk was sent to the nearest express office at
Salt Lake City by private hands."

Practically every man in the new gold-fields was aware of the existence
of a secret band of well-organized ruffians and robbers. The general
feeling was one of extreme uneasiness. There were plenty of men who had
taken out of the ground considerable quantities of gold, and who would
have been glad to get back to the East with their little fortunes, but
they dared not start. Time after time the express coach, the solitary
rider, the unguarded wagon-train, were held up and robbed, usually with
the concomitant of murder. When the miners did start out from one camp
to another they took all manner of precautions to conceal their gold
dust. We are told that on one occasion one party bored a hole in the end
of the wagon tongue with an auger and filled it full of gold dust, thus
escaping observation! The robbers learned to know the express agents,
and always had advice of every large shipment of gold. It was almost
useless to undertake to conceal anything from them; and resistance was
met with death. Such a reign of terror, such an organized system of
highway robbery, such a light valuing of human life, has been seldom
found in any other time or place.

There were, as we have seen, good men in these camps--although the best
of them probably let down the standards of living somewhat after their
arrival there; but the trouble was that the good men did not know one
another, had no organization, and scarcely dared at first to attempt
one. On the other hand, the robbers' organization was complete and kept
its secrets as the grave; indeed, many and many a lonesome grave held
secrets none ever was to know. How many men went out from Eastern States
and disappeared, their fate always to remain a mystery, is a part of the
untold story of the mining frontier.

There are known to have been a hundred and two men killed by Plummer
and his gang; how many were murdered without their fate ever being
discovered can not be told. Plummer was the leader of the band, but,
arch-hypocrite that he was, he managed to keep his own connection with
it a secret. His position as sher