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Research
Question Number 4: What's the story on reports of Magruder's and
Charles Allen's bodies having been discovered up north while Beachey
was
still in California?
One of the striking features of Magruder's case for custody of the four suspects was the absence of compelling evidence that Magruder and his crew had actually been murdered. Beachey had no bodies and had seen no bodies. Yet, and oddly, the lawyer for the defense did not employ this glaring weakness in Beachey's case on his clients' behalf.
Why?
One possible explanation may lie in contemporary reports received in California that both Lloyd Magruder's and Charles Allen's bodies had been found.
For example, an article in the Nov 5, 1863 edition of San Francisco's Daily Alta California conveyed the following:
The Nov 17 issue of the Sacramento Daily Union offered another such report, though clearly of a different finding, in a passage reprinted from the Nov 2 issue of the Dalles Journal:
One of the striking features of Magruder's case for custody of the four suspects was the absence of compelling evidence that Magruder and his crew had actually been murdered. Beachey had no bodies and had seen no bodies. Yet, and oddly, the lawyer for the defense did not employ this glaring weakness in Beachey's case on his clients' behalf.
Why?
One possible explanation may lie in contemporary reports received in California that both Lloyd Magruder's and Charles Allen's bodies had been found.
For example, an article in the Nov 5, 1863 edition of San Francisco's Daily Alta California conveyed the following:
The next morning, October 24th, a party
of men came in [to Lewiston] and reported that the Indians at Hell Gate
had found dead Boston man in the snow, and a party was immediately
despatched to rescue the remains, which were those of Magruder and
Allen.
The Nov 17 issue of the Sacramento Daily Union offered another such report, though clearly of a different finding, in a passage reprinted from the Nov 2 issue of the Dalles Journal:
A
stranger,
who came from the upper country last Saturday, states that the body of
Magruder,
who is supposed to have been murdered by Romaine and his party, has
been found.
The gentleman says that he was well acquainted
with Magruder, and recognized the body at once. Magruder lay as
he was shot from his horse,
with his watch and pocket money undisturbed.
He had a shotgun grasped in his hand, as if in the act of raising it to
his
shoulder to fire.
It is generally agreed that Magruder's remains were not in fact discovered until the following Spring, when an investigative team, including Beachey and led by Billy Page, located the grizzly murder site on the South Nez Perce Trail.
But one has to wonder: Was there in fact a prevailing belief -- among those who followed the case or had some role in it -- while Beachey was in California in late October or early November, 1863, prompted by contemporary newspaper reports, that Magruder's and Allen's bodies had already been found and identified up north? And, if so, did this misperception affect the handling of the case by California officials, lawyers, and courts?
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