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2.

The 11 Rangers and their Captain moved slowly forward entering the cabin one by one and each taking up position in front of one of the gang. The Captain waited patiently until each one was in position, and gently nudged the one he took to be the leader in the stomach with his carbine. The man opened his eyes to see the muzzle of a carbine staring back at him. " I`m Captain Travis of the Texas Rangers and my men have you and your men covered so it might be a good idea if you told your boys to behave and not make a foolish move that could get them shot! I`m here to take you all in" " I`d rather fight and die than let the local Sheriff get his hands on me, and that goes for my men aswell. That Sheriff would kill us all for sure!" " I heard about that Sheriff," said the Captain, " but we bin ordered to take you in so if you don't put up a fight well take you all to our camp and keep you there until the circuit judge arrives". " How do I know youll keep your word?" "`Cause it's the word of a Ranger officer, and we pride ourselves on keeping to what we say, come what may!" replied Travis angrily. "Sounds about right to me boys" said the gang leader, "so don't any of you make a fool move and get me shot, lets just do what the Captain says" The Rangers stepped back from the gang who were now wide awake and allowed them to dress while keeping them covered with their carbines. They continued to be kept under guard while two of the Rangers got their horses out of the barn and saddled up, then making sure there were no hidden weapons amongst their clothing all were mounted and the rangers horses were brought up to the cabin by Grant. The trail back to Ranger camp passed without event, indeed the Rangers and their prisoners passed the time in pleasant conversation. Two days passed with the Rangers feeding the prisoners from their meagre rations.

On the third day the Captain rode into town early in the morning, returning at around midday to say that the circuit judge had arrived in town and the prisoners should be taken into town to appear in court by 3 in the afternoon. The Rangers took them strait to the court house and they were held on the second floor. Once the judge and the sheriff entered the court house , the sheriff came to the Rangers and said that he would take care of the prisoners and escort them down to the courtroom. Captain Travis told the Rangers to first go into the court room and clear it of weapons, but the sheriff assured him that he had already done that, whereupon Travis told his Rangers to go ahead and do it anyhow. This got the sheriffs hackles up and he started to object to the Captains attitude

The Captain looked at him and said, "You may be the sheriff here, but I am in charge of the prisoners, and until I am sure that the court room is safe they wont move from this room. I gave these men a promise that they would safe under my guard and I intend to see that they are. There are plenty of people in this town that would like to see these men dead, and most of them are in that court-room." Sergeant Dawson came into the room and said he had secured the room, but there was a danger that the proceedings would be interrupted by those they had unarmed as they were already making threats against the judge. "Go get the boys and come back here ! " said Travis. When the Rangers were back in the room Travis turned to the Sheriff and said, "You come with me, were going to see the Judge!" The two lawmen entered the room where the Judge was waiting. "Judge!" said Captain Travis, "There could be trouble in the court house here because of the feeling of the crowd, so here is what you are going to do. You will open the court and then adjourn it and decree that the case will be moved to a neutral town." " But what if it gets rough out there before I can get the procedure over?" said the Judge "Let me worry about that" said Travis. The Captain then turned to the Sheriff and told him to go out and tell his cohorts in the crowd to calm things down before the Judge came into the court-room. A few minutes later the Judge was sat in his place with a Ranger each side of him carbine slanted at the ready , and the court-room was quiet. The Prisoners entered the room and took up their places in the dock, charges were read out, the Judge announced that the case would be moved to another town. Several people in the crowd started to mutter something, but the mood changed when the Rangers started to move towards them.

The case was moved to another County and after much court wrangling was moved again to another County. The leader was jailed for 10 years, but his appeals and other court procedures ended in the final sentence being greatly reduced. Most of the other members of the Gang were freed on lack of evidence because of the length of time it took to get the case settled. Capt Travis was commended for completing the near impossible task of arresting the men in the first place, as nobody had dared go against the gang before.

FOOTNOTE:
This story is loosely based on the Horrell-Higgins feud, only the names of the rangers and locations have been altered