When I gave up chewing tobacco and poker playing, Happy Peters agreed to marry me. The only suitable time was December 17th, the day after measuring day at the mine. We told no one of our plans and took off for Alpine, Texas to get wed in the home of Gene and Gladys Odell. A ride to Ft. Davis and one night at the Paisano Hotel in Marfa was the honeymoon.

Back at Shafter it was soon known that had happened. We spent the first night at the teacherage - for about an hour. We awoke to an insistent knock on the door. It seemed like everyone in Shafter came in led by my “friends” W. A. Estes and Bob Thurmond. I was dragged from the bed and hauled off to jail. My bride was taken to the pharmacy by the local ladies. Later I learned that she had been painted with mercurochrome in appropriate places as was I. She was given a ride around town on a burro and I languished in the chill of the barred iron box that was the local hoosegow.

Mrs. Hughes , who ran the mine boardinghouse, came in to see how I was doing. I persuaded the good lady to go to my room in the bachelor’s quarters and fetch me a file and a hacksaw blade. I went to work on the jail cell lock and was just about to regain my freedom when the Shivaree gang let me out. Bob Speed, the Sheriff, complained about the ruined lock and said I would have to pay for it.

I was hustled to Tio Fuller’s bar, made to undress and was flitted with cheap perfume while Charlie Stott, the mine manager, took revealing equipment photos. After a while of that plus other mistreatment, I was allowed to dress and the gals came in with my bride. The beer flowed freely and later on there was food. We danced till the wee hours and were finally freed.

Back at the teacherage we found our bed had been short sheeted and sprinkled with damp salt. It was a long time till we slept. To make matters worse, the very next day came the bill from Tio Fuller , some $87 for all the festivities. My salary was $90 a month, so the financial future was indeed dim. I stopped visiting Tio’s for my daily beer and we practiced other economies. It took three months but finally the $87 was accumulated.

It was time to pay up and I strode into Tio’s cantina and on back to where a grinning Tio Fuller presided over the cash register. He said he thought I’d died cause I hadn’t been around. The gang lined up at the bar, made the most of it with many snide remarks about guys that didn’t pay bills on time. I tendered the 87 bucks to Tio as he and the bar flies roared. Finally Tio told me that the company had paid the bill the day after the Shivaree.

I was determined to get even one way or another. The opportunity came when Bob Thurmond married Mrs. Hughes' daughter. I gave him the engraved watch my grandfather gave me when I finished high school. After a brief ceremony in the Shafter church, the happy couple drove to Marfa to catch the train to El Paso.

I telephoned the Sheriff in Van Horn and told him that I had been robbed of a valuable engraved watch and that the suspect, whom I described, might be on that day's train. Before long, a phone call from Van Horn came saying the thief had been apprehended and that I should come to prefer charges. Four hours later, I got to Van Horn and told the sheriff what was going on. He got a charge out of what I’d done and agreed to give me a 30 minute head start before releasing the prisoner to the custody of his bride.

My revenge was sweet!