Popular.com

There were 13 men and the A-smoker of a train on the Sioux City and Pacific Railroad

when it drew out of Omaha at 6 o'clock on Friday evening, November 4, 1892,

and started on its eastward run.

Among these 13, sitting about halfway down the aisle,

enjoying a good cigar, was Mr. W.G. Pollock of New York, a traveling salesman

for W.L. Pollock and company of the same city, dealers and diamonds.

In the inside pocket of his vest, he carried $15,000 worth of uncut diamonds, while a leather

satchel on the seat beside him contained a quantity of valuable stones in settings.

On the front seat of the car, just behind the stove, sat a stolid-looking young man who would have passed for a farmer's lad.

He seemed scarcely over 20, having neither beard nor mustache, and a stranger would have put him down

as a rather stupid, inoffensive fellow. Compared with Mr. Pollock, he was slighter in build,

although an inch or so taller. As he sat there staring at the stove, the passenger in the seat

beside him, J. H. Shaw, and Omaha well- digger, a bluff, hearty man of social instincts, tried to draw him into a conversation.

But the young fellow only shook his head sulkily, and the well digger relapsed into silence.

Presently, as the train was approaching California Junction, the young man on the front seat rose and started down the aisle.

Curiously enough, he now wore a full beard of black hair five or six inches long.

No one paid any attention to him until he stopped at Mr. Pollock's seat, drew a revolver, and said,

loud enough for everyone in the car to hear him, give me them diamonds.

Then, without waiting for a reply, he shifted the revolver to his left hand, drew a slung shot

from his coat pocket, and struck Mr. Pollock over the head such a heavy blow that the bag of slungshot burst and the shot itself fell to the floor.

Then he said again, give me them diamonds.

...