Jack McCall was an Old West legend, and he left a name for himself, but not a good one. An impromptu group of locals charged him with killing Wild Bill Hickok in a Deadwood saloon in August of 1876.
A hasty “miners’ trial” ended with McCall’s acquittal, but the feds disputed the jurisdiction, being inside a Sioux reservation on federal land. Also, Deadwood had no court system.
McCall was arrested and extradited to Yankton, which was Dakota’s territorial capitol at the time. He pleaded not guilty to Hickok’s murder. McCall didn’t testify at his federal trial, and his defense could find no witnesses for his cause. A 12-man jury convicted him in December of 1876. McCall’s attorneys tried to appeal, and he even allegedly tried to escape from Yankton’s jail, but he was sentenced to execution by hanging, and that’s exactly what happened.
On this date in 1877, Jack McCall was the first person executed by the feds in Dakota Territory—and quite possibly the first government execution overall in Dakota. Yankton residents protested his hanging in town, so the gallows were moved just north of Yankton on school section land. A priest was with McCall “almost constantly” the day before his death, even to the gallows. McCall prayed before his execution, and reportedly died with a crucifix in his hand. He was twenty-four years old.
McCall was buried in a Catholic cemetery near the gallows, but the graveyard was later moved. His final resting place is unknown. Before statehood for North and South Dakota in 1889, at least four other men were executed in Dakota Territory, all for murder.
Dakota Datebook by Jack Dura
Sources
https://www.travelsouthdakota.com/newsroom/press-releases/marks-of-history/hanging-of-jack-mccall
https://history.sd.gov/Archives/forms/exhibits/executionlist.pdf
http://law.jrank.org/pages/2641/John-Jack-McCall-Trials-1876-First-Trial.html
http://law.jrank.org/pages/2642/John-Jack-McCall-Trials-1876-Federal-Trial-McCall.html
https://www.yankton.net/archives/article_28531346-e3de-52de-9a4b-b0becaf0f86c.html
https://www.ndcourts.gov/Court/News/ExecuteND.htm
