PIKE COUTNY, Mo. — To this day, justice somehow doesn’t seem to have been served.

   Louisiana Police Officer Lowell Pew was shot shortly after 1 a.m. on Feb. 14, 1900. It happened on the K Line near the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad depot along the Mississippi River just as Pew was about to arrest three burglars.

   The case touched off a bi-state investigation, created a firestorm of resentment toward the three suspects and contributed to additional deaths.

   “Pew was a very popular officer, and the brutal manner in which he was murdered created general excitement and indignation throughout Pike County,” the St. Louis Republic reported.

 

‘Brave’ officer

   Pew joined the Louisiana Police Department as a night patrolman on Aug. 14, 1899.

   Less than six months later, a cop whom the Mexico Ledger called “a brave, faithful and efficient officer” would die moments after being struck in the neck by a bullet.

   Authorities learned that three men had arrived in Louisiana on a train late the night of Feb. 13. Hours later, they allegedly were spotted near the freight house just west of the passenger station. Investigators later found a pick and a file nearby.

   Depot Agent Frank Beacham, who had been robbed before, called police and said the men were acting suspiciously. Pew arrived within minutes.

   A full moon helped illuminate the night as Pew slowly walked north from the station and Beacham searched to the south. Pew spotted the three, asked them what they were doing and ordered them to stop.

   “One of the robbers threw up his hands, but he had a revolver in one of them and before the officer had a chance to draw his own weapon, the robber shot,” the Quincy Daily Whig reported. “The three men then turned and fled.”

   The bullet severed an artery and Pew bled out before help could arrive. Beacham rushed around to the north side of the depot and got off what would turn out to be a remarkable shot.

   Pike County Sheriff Henry Hopke was called and immediately organized a posse. Beacham had not gotten a good look at the men, so authorities were left with vague descriptions. Nevertheless, the nature of the crime meant that no stone would go unturned.

   Bulletins were issued throughout Missouri and Illinois, and trains on both sides of the river were stopped and searched in an effort to find the elusive suspects. The Furlong Secret Service detective agency of St. Louis was brought in to help.

   “Officers are scouring the country for the desperadoes, and if they are caught it may go hard with them,” the Quincy Daily Journal told readers. “The officer was murdered in the discharge of his duty, and the citizens are thoroughly incensed.”

   Hopke and his men “traced the gang…from Louisiana to a barn several miles west” of the city, the Whig reported. While the suspects were not there, traces of the barn’s contents would soon come in handy.

   The Louisiana City Council offered a $250 reward and local residents added $400 – all told, the equivalent of more than $19,000 today.

   Pew was “a highly respected young man, and leaves a father, mother and one brother and many friends to mourn his death,” the Journal said.

 

Gotcha, gotcha, gotcha

   The suspects could avoid the law, but one of them could not escape a virus.

   On Feb. 15, a sickened stranger had to be helped off the train that arrived in Quincy from Hannibal. He checked into St. Mary Hospital and was diagnosed with pneumonia.

   Quincy Police Chief John Ahern soon got a tip that the man was one of the three wanted in connection with Pew’s murder, and contacted Missouri authorities.

   Hopke and one of his Pike County deputies joined the Louisiana city marshal, a Hannibal detective and the owner of the St. Louis investigative agency in taking a train to Quincy on Feb. 19. The sheriff immediately recognized the man as 32-year-old Edward Burns, who had served time the previous year at the Pike County Jail in Bowling Green.

   “Burns was so weak that he could hardly talk at all, but he expressed a willingness to go to Bowling Green without requisition papers, as soon as he is able,” the Journal said. “He denies having ever been in Louisiana, but Sheriff Hopke is confident that he is one of the three murderers and believes that he is the one who shot Officer Pew.”

   In Hannibal, meanwhile, 25-year-old Richard Logan and 24-year-old Edward Weaver were arrested late the night of Feb. 16.

   They were accused of breaking into the pump house of the Short Line Railroad Depot in Peno near Frankford as they fled from Louisiana on Feb. 14.

   “The prisoners admitted breaking into the pump house, but denied any complicity in the murder of Pew, or even that they had been in Louisiana,” the Whig reported.

   Beacham, the station agent, identified the men as two of those he saw running away from the Louisiana depot, even though he had not gotten a good look at them.

   While they wouldn’t discuss the Louisiana shooting, the men ratted out their buddy. The Whig said they admitted traveling with Burns until just two days before they were arrested, and that Burns was in Quincy.

   Logan had been on the run since escaping on July 4, 1899, from the Louisiana city jail, where he was awaiting trial on charges of breaking into a train shipment of beer.

   Weaver had broken out of the Pike County Jail at Bowling Green about the same time. He, too, had been charged with trying to burglarize a train car on the K line at Louisiana.

   Weaver had a curious wound to one of his ears and told authorities that cold weather was the cause. However, the physical damage and continued bleeding indicated that he had been hit by a bullet.

   Investigators were “confident that this wound was made by the night operator at Louisiana when he shot at the robbers’ retreating forms,” the Journal said.

   Back in Quincy, detectives looked through Burns’ clothing and found hayseed in his shoes that apparently matched that from the rural Louisiana barn. The Whig made its thoughts about Burns very clear, saying that illness made it “impossible to move him from the hospital for ten days or two weeks, unless in the meantime he is carried out feet first.”

   While Burns remained under 24-hour guard, plans were made to take Logan and Weaver back to Louisiana from Hannibal. Authorities changed their minds after a crowd of 500 people gathered at the Louisiana depot awaiting the suspects’ train.

   “There was little said, but it was plain to be seen that under that calm exterior was a volcano only awaiting the arrival of the prisoners to cause it to burst forth in all its fury,” the Whig observed.

   The crowd surged toward the tracks as the whistle of the approaching locomotive was heard. As the train “came puffing into the station, there was a grand rush,” the Whig reported. “There was a clanking of arms against the seats of the coaches as they went through the train vainly seeking” Logan and Burns.

   “Then, someone let the cat out of the bag,” the newspaper continued. “It was learned warning had been sent to Hannibal and the prisoners were still there. There were muttered curses and oaths deep and loud. Several of the leaders held a council of war and it was determined that a strong posse should be sent to Hannibal and a demand made for the surrender of the prisoners.”

   The vigilantes did not follow through, and the Journal said the fact that Sheriff Hopke had “anticipated trouble and decided to leave the prisoners at Hannibal” proved wise.