Editorial in the Gold Creek Optimist, Concerning the Shooting Death
of Willie Pilgrim by Sheriff Dennehy, Colorado Territory, 1870

"It is unfortunate when one so young--
no one certain of the boy's age,
for his years a captive of savage Utes--
is scythed like unripe barley,
especially sorrowful
when that brief life ends violently.

"Some may criticize our Sheriff,
for the boy was unarmed
except with a Bible, that, in noon glare,
Big Ed mistook for a drawn pistol
the boy repeatedly refused to drop.

"Irony piles on tragedy in this case,
since Sheriff Dennehy saved the lad
when our expedition against marauding
savages discovered one white child
among the brutes who had slaughtered
a family working its gold claim.

"Would we so value our Sheriff
were he less vigilant against
the forces of confusion,
which, sadly, that boy represented,
in his maniacle cacklings and spasms,
his string of shouted epithets
not even a whoremaster dared emulate:
less a child than Satan's marionette.

"His adoptive parents--
Reverend and Mrs. White--
should consider this: the one practical
alternative to his early demise
would have been encoffinment in an asylum,
no place for him in civilized society."

copyright 2004 Robert Cooperman
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