of Schuylkill County; and all the defendants were held for and sent to Columbia County jail to await trial, which begun at Bloomsburg, Tuesday afternoon, the second of February, 1869. Donahue, Prior, Hester, and Duffy were brought into court, arraigned by the Prothonotary, and a plea of “not guilty” entered on the part of each. Upon application of Mr. Freeze, for the defense, separate trials were granted, and the Commonwealth elected to proceed against Donahue. Wednesday morning the prisoner entered court, accompanied by the sheriff, and took a seat by his counsel, Messrs. John W. Ryon, John G. Freeze, Meyer Strouse, S. P. Wolverton, and Wm. A. Marr, an array of talent which was well met by that included in the list of counsel for the Commonwealth, Messrs. Linn Bartholomew, Robert F. Clark, Edward H. Badly, M. M. L’Veile, and E. R. Ikler, the last-named the District Attorney. After a patient hearing the defendant was acquitted by the jury, and the prosecution, thereafter, thought it advisable to abandon the rest of the indictments. If Donahue could not be convicted—and that had been demonstrated by the defeat in his case—it was considered by the District Attorney and his corps of assistants it would be impossible, at that time, to fasten the murder upon any of the remaining defendants. [Illustration: _He fired a pistol shot into the left breast of the victim._] So commanding and pervading in the community was the subtle power of the Mollie Maguires, it was with the utmost difficulty that a jury could be secured to try the cause, and so abject had become the condition of terror under which the people submissively bowed their necks, seeing no possible avenue of escape, that witnesses accredited with knowledge of important points bearing against the prisoners, dare not, in fear of their lives, mount the witness stand. So united were the Mollie Maguires, or whatever at that time they were called, they swore to _alibis_ without number, and barred all further immediate proceedings. The next important outrage of this character, charged to the sanguinary clique under consideration, was that upon the person of Wm. H. Littlehales, Superintendent of the Glen Carbon Coal Company, which occurred March 15, 1869. Mr. Littlehales was also killed on the road, in Cass township, Schuylkill County, while _en route_ for his home in Pottsville. The act was witnessed by several persons, but the perpetrators escaped, and, up to the hour that I sent James McParlan, otherwise James McKenna, into the coal region, no information had been obtained concerning the identity of the guilty persons.