On this road, not a great distance from Red Creek, there is an extensive morass, which has been cross-wayed for public accommodation, which otherwise would be impassable on horseback. When Shoemake and his assistant arrived at this place they remained, according to the statements of persons in the neighborhood, one or two days in ambush, stationing themselves one on each side of the cross-way, evidently with a design to prevent the Sheriff from seeing either until he had advanced some distance on it, then to close in upon him from both directions, which would have prevented any earthly chance of escape by any other way—the morass is of such a nature as to swallow up in any other part. [Illustration: AUTHOR MAKING HIS ESCAPE FROM TWO OF THE COPELAND CLAN.—[See Page 135.] At last becoming impatient, they decided to move on toward the Gulf; and, accordingly, stopped at Red Creek for the night following. But, let it be borne in mind, that they so arranged as to remain at different houses, one on the north, and the other on the south side of the creek, so as to be certain not to miss the Sheriff on his return by that way. The houses where they stopped at for the night were near the ferry—kept for the accommodation of travelers. If the Sheriff had left the coast that morning, as anticipated by the two, he, according to the day’s ride, would have been almost certain to have reached one of the houses here referred to, as no other suitable place near could have been found, which would have brought him in direct contact with the pursuers. But by being detained that morning at Mississippi City, he did not leave in time to reach either place where they were staying, and he of necessity stopped the night in question with an old gentleman by the name of Byrd—about fifteen or twenty miles from the ferry. This old gentleman had been a resident of that section of country for a great number of years, and was well acquainted with Wages and McGrath; also with the truth of many of the incidents as related in Copeland’s confessions.