Mexican Gunfighter Part 2

Howdy folks and greetings from the Great Plains of North Texas!

We're in a series about the best Texas Ranger to ever wear the badge, the great Frank Hamer, who was brought out of retirement to take down Bonnie and Clyde.

Recap

In the last post of this series a Mexican miner turned into a vicious murderer because he was jealous of a girl who is partner was also seeing.

His name was Ralphael Lopez but I call him Ralphie because he was a fool and a cold-blooded killer.

After he shot his friend out of jealousy he then shot and killed three lawmen and vanished into the countryside. This triggered a massive manhunt around Bingham, Utah.

source

Today's story

As expected, the murder of Ralphie's partner and the three officers made national headlines and every law enforcement agency in the Bingham, Utah region was looking for him.

Roadblocks were set up on every road and trail, thousands of volunteers were working with hundreds of officers.

At one point one of the posses located him 18 miles South of Sarasota Springs and engaged in a firefight. He used his pistols and the posse shot at least 300 rounds until they lost him.

Once again he'd vanished without a trace. That was November 22, 1913.

Ralphie was tough and dangerous

Somehow he walked 65 miles through the freezing cold with snow and sleet back towards Bingham where his home territory was. He stopped at a friend's cabin and got food, supplies, and his friend's 30-30 Winchester rifle and ammo.

The friend was scared stiff so he didn't tell anyone about Ralphie until the next day when he told the mine foreman. They figured he was in the main mine, which he knew like the back of his hand.

Over a hundred men were guarding the 17 entrances.

Smoke 'em out

There were 25 miles of tunnels and shafts which he could be hiding in. Well, they figured he could avoid them for weeks down there so they decided to take bales of kerosene-soaked hay and light em on fire which would create a tremendous amount of smoke.

That was a good idea so a 6 man team headed down with one of those bales. They got to the 300 ft level and went another 900 feet down a tunnel until they came to the mouth of another shaft. At that point the shots of Ralphie's 30-30 made a deafening roar.

One of the deputies and a volunteer were both shot through the heart. The team couldn't see a thing but they knew the shots came from above them. The rest of the team made their way back out and all the entrances were sealed up and dozens of fires were lit to drive him out.

The people were right

There was no sign of him and the Sheriff was embarrassed that they couldn't find him so he said Ralphie died in the mine somewhere. Without a body though, the public didn't really believe it.

It wasn't long before Ralphie's rifle, or rather the one that he'd borrowed from his friend, the Winchester 30-30, was found under a railroad bridge. The rifle was identified by his friend.

Ralphie had left it there and kept his pistols and hopped aboard an outgoing ore train.

Again?!

Yep, he'd vanished once again. Of course people were arrested all over the United States over the next few years but they always turned out to be the wrong man. Frank Hamer knew about the case, yes sir you bet he did.

This was 7 men killed by this fool, FIVE of them officers of the law. Frank had assumed that Ralphie had made his way back to his home town in Mexico. The guy had killed lawmen at will. But, he hadn't met up with Frank yet.

Frank and the notorious Ralphie meet in the next post.

Thanks for reading folks, God bless you all!
-jonboy
Texas