But the crowning act of the Mollie Maguires, up to the time of my engagement in the matter of their investigation, and the one reaching the culmination of many previous and similar events, which exasperated the good people of the anthracite region to the pitch where endurance ceases to be a virtue, was the unprovoked killing, during the early evening of December 2, 1871, of Morgan Powell, Assistant Superintendent of the Lehigh and Wilkesbarre Coal and Iron Company, at Summit Hill, Carbon County. The murder was done at about seven o’clock, on the street, not more than twenty feet from the store of Henry Williamson, which place Powell had but a few moments earlier left to go to the office of Mr. Zehner, the General Superintendent of the Company. It seems that one of three men, who had been seen by different parties waiting near the store, approached Mr. Powell from the rear, close beside a gate leading into the stables, and fired a pistol shot into the left breast of the victim, leaning toward and reaching over the shoulder of Powell to accomplish his deadly purpose. The bullet passed nearly through Powell’s body, lodging in the back near the spinal column, producing immediate paralysis of the lower limbs, and resulting in death two days afterward. The wounded man was carried back to the store by some of his friends and his son, Charles Powell, the latter then but fourteen years of age, and there remained all night. The next day he was removed to the residence of Morgan Price, where his death occurred as stated. Hardly had the smoke from the murderous pistol melted into and mingled with the air of that star-lit winter evening, when the assassins were discovered rapidly making their way from the scene of their savage deed toward the top of Plane No. 1. They were met by Rev. Allan John Morton and Lewis Richards, who were hurrying to the spot to learn what had caused the firing. Mr. Morton asked, as they stopped on the rigging-stand, what was the trouble, when one of the three strangers answered: “I guess a man has been shot!” One of this trio was described as a short person, wearing a soldier’s overcoat, and the second also as being low in stature, but the third seemed taller, and had on a long, black coat. Mr. Morton and his friend passed on, and the murderers started forward, taking the direction in which Mr. Powell had pointed when asked by Morrison which way the attacking party had gone. They paused but a moment, when confronted by Morton and Richards, and appeared to be surprised to see any one in the vicinity. Mr. Morton thought that he might identify the smaller individual, should he see him again, as he was only four or five yards from him when he spoke in response to his inquiry.