The Butte Miner of Feb. 9, 1889 carried a dispatch from Missoula that “W.E. Harris of Wardner, Idaho” had been arrested and charged with stealing cattle.

 

Subsequent reports indicated the 15 head in question belonged to Telesphore Jacques (T.J.) DeMers, who was described as “one of the oldest pioneers of Montana” and had been “engaged in farming and stock raising for nearly 30 years.” He was namesake of the boomtown of Demersville, founded in 1887.

 

Short items about the case appeared in several newspapers, although they disagreed on the amount of Arthur’s bail, which was set at either $1,000 or $2,000 (or maybe it was two sureties of $1,000 each?). The Missoulian said the money was “readily found,” while other papers seemed to indicate that Arthur remained in custody.

 

One paper also said the Montana Cattle Association would help prosecute the case, but The Missoulian said this was “without any foundation in fact.”

 

The Missoulian did report something else that had occurred shortly before Arthur’s arrest. While doing business with a Col. J.A. McGowan of Horse Plains, Arthur reportedly “used very insulting language, whereupon the Colonel let go his right giving Harris the trouncing he deserved for forgetting he was talking to a gentleman.”

 

About a month and a half after Arthur’s arrest, his case was put before a grand jury — which refused to return an indictment. That would be the same outcome when Johnny was arrested in the shooting of Zach Lewis (pages 281-91). The Missoulian was the only paper to report Arthur was off the hook, and only devoted a single sentence. That was also similar to Johnny’s case, where the initial incident was covered extensively, but the anticlimactic resolution received almost no attention.

 

A postscript: T.J. DeMers died a few months later, in May 1889, age 55. For a little while, Demersville outlived him. It peaked around 1891, but for a variety of reasons, it was mostly a ghost town by 1893.