Man given year in prison after bloody fight

(Today, we continue the story told to me by Dale Selle about the fight between two railroad workers, John Quigley and John Vallino. We left off last week when Quigley got Vallino’s fingers in his mouth and bit down hard. Vallino yelled out in pain as a bystander yelled, “Kill him! Kill him!”)

Vallino punched Quigley repeatedly to make him let go of his fingers. The men exchanged more blows and Vallino finally struggled free and ran out of the section house. He ran up a steep path to J. G. Hawkins’ house. Hawkins was sitting alone in his kitchen when Vallino came running in. Vallino told Hawkins that John Quigley had tried to beat him up down at the section house and that he (Vallino) did not want to fight.

Shortly after Vallino arrived, James Scannell came into Hawkins’ kitchen followed by John Quigley who still wanted to fight. Scannell and Hawkins kept the men apart and they soon agreed to finish the fight the next day after they sobered up. Hawkins and Scannell thought that the fight was over so Scannell left. Then the boss, Mike Burke, came up to the Hawkins house. Even though Burke was as drunk as the rest of his crew, Hawkins was sure that Burke would keep the men apart, so he went out to do some work.

After Hawkins went outside, Quigley attacked Vallino again. He grabbed Vallino by the throat with one hand and grabbed a tin dipper with the other hand. He got Vallino down on the floor and began hitting him on the head with the wooden handle of the dipper. Vallino turned his face to keep from being hit in the face and it was then that Quigley got Vallino’s right ear in his mouth and chewed the ear off. J.G. Hawkins came back into his kitchen and saw that the two bloody men were fighting again and that they had broken some of his furniture. Hawkins was angry that Burke was present but did nothing to stop the fight. Instead, Burke was speaking Gaelic to Quigley and it appeared to Hawkins that Burke was the instigator of the fighting.

Unaware that Vallino had lost an ear, Hawkins kicked the two men out his back door where they continued to fight. Burke refused to try to stop them and said, “Let ‘em go at it and let the best man win.” Hawkins replied, “Fine! Then let’s get them each a shotgun and let them settle it that way.” Seeing how upset Hawkins was and not wanting trouble with his neighbor, Burke went out and separated the men.

After the fight ended, John Vallino walked more than three miles to Hope across the long trestle, to file assault charges against John Quigley with justice of the peace, Kline Wanamaker. Seeing how badly battered Vallino was, Justice Wanamaker issued a warrant for Quigley’s arrest.

On Nov. 7, 1892, Deputy Sheriff G. W. Brockhagen served the arrest warrant on Quigley at Pack River siding and brought the defendant and the witnesses — James Scannell, J.G. Hawkins, Scott Monhart, and Mike Burke — back to Hope for a hearing in the Honorable K. Wanamaker’s court. Earlier that morning, when John Hawkins was sweeping his kitchen floor, he found John Vallino’s ear. This was the first that he knew that someone had lost an ear in the previous day’s fight. Hawkins saved the ear and the deputy sheriff ordered him to bring it to court. 

After hearing the testimony and seeing the evidence, Wanamaker bound John Quigley over for a hearing by a grand jury and set bail at $300.  Quigley was taken into custody and sent by train to Rathdrum (the county seat of Kootenai County), where he was jailed until his grand jury hearing. The ear was placed in formaldehyde to preserve it as evidence.

After hearing the testimony of John Vallino, J. G. Hawkins, and Michael Burke, the grand jury handed down an indictment against John Quigley on Nov. 29, 1892, charging him with the crime of “mayhem” because he “feloniously, unlawfully and maliciously, did bite and disfigure one John Vallino.”

A jury trial was held on Jan. 2, 1893, with Judge J. Holleman presiding. District Attorney Charles O’Neil prosecuted the case. John Vallino, J. G. Hawkins, Michael Burke, James Scannell, anal Scott Monhart all testified at the trial. John Quigley’s court appointed attorneys, Keat and Fogg, did not put on much of a defense. The jury found the defendant guilty as charged, and Quigley was sentenced to one year of hard labor at the state prison in Boise. He got a year for an ear.