LAST STAGE ROBBERY
I cannot vouch as to the factual exactness of the story of what is said to have been the final robbery of stage coach in the Shenandoah Valley section of Virginia. I have heard the tale several times from different sources and it seems to be one of those pieces based on fact or one of the many pieces of fiction which keep cropping up in histories of specific localities.
The site of the crime, it is said, was just south of the border line which divides Rockingham County and August County today. It is said that those who planned the attack, counted on the grade of the steadily rising hills south of the place on the Indian or Valley Road where travelers had forded the North Fork of the Shenandoah River to cause the horses to slow down a bit.. That would have placed the site near Weyers Cave, in Augusta County.
That town did not exist at the time, of course, having come about when the railroad put this area on maps when it was it was designated as Weyer's Cave Station, the jumping off place for those passengers who intended visiting Dr. Bernard Weyers' Spa and Caverns at what is now known ss Grand Caverns, Grottoes,Va.
Our story is confined to the Stage Line which existed in the early l8th Century years between Staunton and Winchester, Va. The robbery is said to have taken place on the final hill of the gradual incline the old road took after South Bound coaches had forded the North fork of the Shenandoah River at Crawford's Store. It was seen as a logical site fore such a planned robbery because of the grade of the terrain, even with fresh horses. To complicate the story I have heard that it was not uncommon for stages to refuse new mounts at that location. The next station was called “Ten Mile Stage”which was known later as Mount Sidney, Va. So, robbers, knowing this, may have selected the best site possible.
The three boys who were undertaking the robbery planned it well enough, it seems but they made the mistake talking about their plan the day before in a barn without knowing that the girl friend of one of the boys was within listening distance. What she heard made try to think of some way by which she could prevent her boy friend from taking part in the night time robbery. At supper that night she managed sprinkle “just a smidgen” of dusty flakes of rat poison over his food. By the time of departure time rolled around she was nursing one sick critter, and the other two boys left without him.
That night the robbery went pretty much as planned. The two hold-up men stopped the stage on the hill, robbed the passengers of their valuables, and making their getaway when a coach passenger wounded one of them in the leg with a revolver he had successfully hidden. The driver and others overpowered the highwaymen' tied them up and took them to the next stop. They were, in time, duly tried, found guilty, served several months in jail and it is said both migrated to the far West to become desperadoes.
The girl? Two versions are available.
One account says she nursed her boy friend back to good health and mutual tranquility, but the other reports he never quite got over his ordeal and refused to have anything whatsoever to do with her in any way, shape or form.
If the romantic ending had survived the story would, probably, have been better remembered. The supposed site is still visible although the Route 11 surface is up the hill somewhat but the general contours of the old road can still be seen..
A.L.M. October 19, 2003 [c541wds]
