The Noted Female Horse Thief And Male Companion Landed in Jail

Dora Cox, the most talked about female outlaw in the west and perhaps the most notorious female horse thief in the world, was landed in the county jail, together with a male companion, last Monday evening by Sheriff Dickerson and Deputy Jack Aultman.

Dora had adorned a good many jails in Oklahoma at various times and has somehow managed to keep out of the clutches of the law a good portion of the time. Her last performance before being captured his time was escaping from jail at Kingfisher about a month ago. That was not her first experience, however, for she has been the central figure in a number of other sensational performances during the past few months and hardly a week has passed that the newspapers of the territory haven’t been filled with accounts of capers cut by Dora Cox. The greatest mistake of her life if she desired to successfully reign as the queen of female horse thieves, was the invasion of this county. For a horse thief in this county means a prisoner—thanks to an efficient sheriff and force of deputies.

J. C. Aultman, who is a special deputy at Burnett, noticed the woman and a strange man in Burnett. The woman was riding horseback and when she left the town and went south Mr. Aultman pursued and arrested her some four miles south of Burnett and brought her back. Sheriff Dickerson was down in that part of the country and he and Aultman started to town with the prisoner. When within a few miles of town Sheriff Dickerson stopped in the road to talk with a citizen whom they had met, and Deputy Aultman and the prisoner came on. In a few minutes a man came along on horseback and passed them, and as he was armed the sheriff suspected that he was endeavoring to overtake the deputy and prisoner, so he left the gentleman he was talking with and followed after the strainer. The man evidently didn’t know that Mr. Dickerson was an officer and paid no attention to him. When he came up with Aultman and the prisoner he began talking with the woman, and Sheriff Dickerson, who came up with them about the same time, placed him under arrest and disarmed him. He proved to be the same fellow that Aultman had seen talking with the woman in Burnett. He gave his name as H. B. Allen and said that he lived in Pott County, but he couldn’t tell what part of the county and finally acknowledge that he was traveling. No doubt he was traveling, for his health but he came to a mighty unhealthy place-- for criminals. He wears a wooden leg and is a very stubborn customer, giving the officers a good deal of trouble. Both he and the woman were riding ponies, which were no doubt stolen.

When captured Dora was riding bareback, was barefooted, wore a red Mother Hubbard dress and a man's jumper and had a cartridge belt bucked around her. She wears her hair short, and unlike the traditional female outlaw, she is neither pretty nor prepossessing, but is just about as hardened and tough as it would be possible for a woman to become. She will be returned to Kingfisher, where she was awaiting sentence for horse stealing when she made her escape. The man paid a fine for carrying a gun and was released, there being no other evidence on which to hold him.