ff,
which had been secured to his right wrist only "inflicted
some hard wounds on the countenances" of his assailants.
Covered with blood, he broke from them, rushed from the
house, and plunged in the river close by, exclaiming, "I will
be drowned rather than taken alive." He was pursued, fired
upon repeatedly, ordered to come out of the water, where he
stood immersed to his neck, or "they would blow his brains
out." He replied, "I will die first." They then deliberately
fired at him four or five different times, the last ball
supposed to have struck on his head, for his face was
instantly covered with blood, and he sprang up and shrieked.
The by-standers began to cry "shame" and the kidnappers
retired a short distance for consultation. Bill came out of
the water and lay down on the shore. His pursuers, supposing
him dying, said, "Dead niggers are not worth taking South."
Some one brought and put on him a pair of pantaloons. He was
helped to his feet by a colored man named Rex; on seeing
which, Wynkoop and party headed him and presented their
revolvers, when BILL again ran into the river, "where he
remained upwards of an hour, nothing but his head above
water, covered with blood, and in full view of hundreds who
lined the banks." His claimants dared not follow him into
the water; for, as he said afterward, "he would have died
contented, could he have carried two or three of them down
with him." Preparations [rather slow it would appear,] were
made to arrest the murderous gang, but they had departed
from the place. BILL then waded some distance up the stream,
and "was found by some women flat on his face in a
corn-field. They carried him to a place of safety, dressed
his wounds," and the suffering man was seen no more in
Wilkesbarre.--_Correspondence of New York Tribune_.

Wynkoop and another were afterwards arrested in Philadelphia, on a
charge of riot, the warrant issuing from a State magistrate of
Wilkesbarre, on the complaint of William C. Gildersleeve, of the
place. Mr. Jackson, the constable who held them in custody, was
brought before Judge Grier, of the United States Supreme Court, by
_habeas corpus_. Judge Grier, during the examination, said:--

"I will not have the officers of the United States harassed
at every step in the performance of their