[Missouri Crime]:

$3,500 · Offered by William Reese Company · No longer available

$600 REWARD! 2 MURDERERS AT LARGE! [caption title]. An unrecorded, possibly unique reward broadside, printed in the immediate aftermath of the brutal crime which became known as the "Lapine Murders." The broadside advertises a substantial reward from Washington County, Missouri Sheriff John T. Clarke for the apprehension of two men, Charles Jolly ("very dark complexion...about a half breed Indian") and John Armstrong ("shows Indian blood"). According to contemporary reports, Armstrong and Jolly, both men in their thirties, were working as miners just north of Potosi, Missouri. On November 19, 1870, they supposedly went in to town with Jolly's younger brother, Leon, to sell their minerals, where they purchased liquor and became aggressively drunk. The group went to the Lapine family home on the outskirts of town, where they left young Leon outside before entering the house. According to one slightly later account:"The most extensive, most horrible and outrageous crime ever committed in Washington County was the murder and burning of the Lapine family. This family consisted of David Lapine and Louisa, his wife, and their infant son, about eighteen months of age, and Mary Christopher and her infant daughter, a baby, and they lived in a log cabin about one mile northeast of Potosi. The murderers were John Armstrong and Charles Jolly, Jr....On the evening of November 19, 1870, these men, being under the influence of liquor, took with them a lad named Leon Jolly, and went to the ho

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