Volume 15 , Issue 35

Bender Fate Is Related

It was August 24, 1908, Monday newspaper, The Rock Island Argus, Rock Island, Illinois, page 6, that we found this article about the Benders of Cherryvale, Kansas: "Fate Is Related."

What happened to famous Bender family is told by one of slaying posse. Kept secret many years. George E. Downer on death bed declares father, moth, son and daughter were shot.

When the Bender family of infamous memory fled thirty-five years ago from their blood reeking shanty on a Kansas prairie, their disappearance was as absolute as if they had been swallowed by an earthquake. Time and again rumors of how they escaped to foreign countries or that a sheriff and a United States marshal had annihilated them were circulated and discredited. Their fate was recently revealed for the first time by a man sick unto death, who for over thirty years lived the life of a respected and honored business man in a Chicago suburb in 1908.

The man who told the wonderful story gave nothing from hearsay, nothing from rumor or "reasoning," but his was the recital of an eyewitness, of a man who watched the fiends, who helped to organize the posse which pursued the fiendish murderers and was present, gun in hand, until Kate Bender, fighting to the last, plunged, with a bullet in her mother, father and brother.

George Evans Downer of Downer's Grove, grandson of Pierce Downer, who founded the settlement in 1823, told the story, fully believing he was on his deathbed and that it was his duty to publish the truth to the world, says a correspondent of the Chicago Tribune. A compact entered into by the members of the vigilance committee at the time kept his lips sealed all these years, but realization of the fact that if he did not speak the truth might never be known induced him to tell how he assisted in the extermination of the fiendish family.

Mr. Downer lived at Independence, Kansas, during the bloody reign of the Benders. He personally visited the Bender farm on the road between Osage, Missouri, and Independence. He went several times i an effort to gain a clue to the mysterious disappearances from that neighborhood. It will be remembered the Benders fled after the murder of Dr. York. It has always been supposed the butchers got clear out of the country. As a matter of fact, as Mr. Downer revealed for the first time, the Benders were put to dath the night of their flight.

Downer, whose visits to the Bender place had convinced him that the Benders were guilty of monstrous crimes, associated himself with four other men in an effort to capture the human butchers. They had no idea of infliction summary justice themselves. They planned to capture the Benders and turn them over to the legal authorities. They discovered that the Benders had fled and took up the trail only a few hours later. From this point Downer's story is told just as he gasped it with dying breath to his wife and son. He said:

"The night was dark, and we feared that they might escape us, but our luck was good. We sighted them racing as fast as they could over the prairie and shouted to them. The moon had risen, but frequently was obscured by heavy clouds, and the riding was anything but good. As soon as we shouted they opened fire on us, and this determined our course." No thought of capture, Downer continued his story, "There was now no question of taking them prisoners or giving them a trial. There was only on thing to do, and, though it had as troubled me all my life, I couldn't see how I could have acted differently."

"We set our horses going at breakneck speed, and the bullets flew fast from both sides. The bad light and the rough going over the hilly prairie made aiming almost impossible, but we were overtaking them rapidly when a shot from the wagon struck one of our party, idling him instantly. Then the older Bender, who was firing from the back of the wagon, pitched out on the prairie dead, and John, his son, jumped and ran. He was shot before he had run a hundred feet from the wagon. "Kate had been driving, but at this she stopped the wagon short, sprang out, cut one of the horses loose, the one said to have been given her by her wooer, and sped away on it. One of our party shot her horse under her. It rolled over on her, and before she could extract herself we overtook her.

"We dismounted and went toward her, expecting to help her and with no thought of trouble. But, my, how she did fight! She fought tooth and nail like a tigress, and we had to handle her like a bucking bronco. At last she was firmly tied, hand and foot, and thrown over the front of a saddle by one of the men.

"When we got back to the Bender wagon we found that the old woman within had been killed by a bullet. The old man and John were dead, and we found our poor comrade stark dead on the prairie, guarded by his faithful horse, who stood over him like a sentinel.

"Kate, whose hands had been partly loosened, calmly admitted that they had killed Dr. York and many others, burring their bodies in the orchard. We asked her why she had done it, asking why some of the people who were known to have no money had been killed.

"" ' I liked to see the blood come,' she answered.

"As she talked I thought of the time I sat at her invitation on that fatal bench, and the goose flesh came all over me. The others were as absorbed as I when she turned suddenly, snatched the gun from the belt of her neighbor and fired at him point blank. The bullet buried itself in his arm.

"Before she could make another move a bullet struck her square between the eyes. With a groan she pitched forward across the bodies of her father, mother and brother. It was all done in a flash, and it was fully a minute before there was a word spoken.

"The man who fired the shot had, it seemed, anticipated some such move on her part from the beginning and in consequence was the only one on his guard.

"A Sigh of relief went up from us all when the last of these cutthroats was buried. We burned every trace of them and made a compact not to reveal the names of the vigilantes nor the fate of the Benders.

"We returned to the house and excavated in places where traces of clay showed on top of the black loam soil of the orchard. We turned up the body of Langchor and his seven-year-old daughter. The body of the man, as in all other cases, was naked, but the arms of the little girl were tightly clasped around his neck, and in her hands were clutched handfuls of clay, showing that she had been alive when buried.

"We then notified Senator York, and 200 men were on the place the next day. We allowed a story to circulate that the Benders and got away some time before and that our attention had been attracted by the deserted appearance of the place and the disturbance of a starving clad. This was largely in order that the attention of the supposed confederates of the Benders might not be attracted to us."

It is not known how many murders the notorious Bender family committed during their stay in Labette county, Kansas, in the early seventies. It was known that no member of the family was ever legally punished for any one of the crimes committed by them. The family consisted of William Bender about sixty years old; his wife, about fifty-five years old; Kate, about twenty-five years old; and John, perhaps twenty-three.

In the early 1870's the only roads were trails across the Kansas prairies, and the Bender farm was located on what was now the northeast squatter of a section. The house stood on what was the north line of the quarter and was on the main traveled road between Osage mission and Independence. Here the Benders kept a little store supplied with food for man and beast, but it was said to have been more a decoy or weary travelers than anything else. Here it was that many crimes were committed of which the world would never know.

Kate Bender professed to be a magnetic healer. A description of the house in which these crimes were committed read like fiction. Nevertheless what was discovered after their sudden departure bears out ally eh details. It was a small frame house not more than 16 by 20 and fronted north. There was a floor at either end, and the room was divided by a canvas partition drawn tightly over upright scantlings. This partition was the death trap. The victim was decoyed to a seat close against the canvas, and Kate did the murder.

Kate used a shoe hammer from behind the canvas, and the old man followed with blows on the empale with the blacksmith's hammer. Afterward a loose board was taken up and the throat cut. Then the body was robbed of clothing and valuables and cast into the cellar to await a convenient opportunity for burial.   |  View or Add Comments (0 Comments)   |   Receive updates ( subscribers)  |   Unsubscribe

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