New York Bar, a sandbar on the Snake River some 20 miles north of present-day Dayton, Wash., is a place of hauntingly stark geological formations carved during the ancient Missoula floods. The Snake winds west from its headwaters in Wyoming’s Yellowstone country through deep canyons across Idaho before flowing into the Columbia River in southeast Washington. Farming flourished along these waterways due to the ancient alluvial soil deposited by ice age floods. Bavarian-born Henry Villard (1835–1900) had a vision to transport wheat and other products from Washington Territory by river and rail, so he built a great warehouse and shipping station on the broad sandbar in northeastern Columbia County. It proved an ideal landing for riverboats offloading and taking on cargo. It was also the site of a notorious murder in 1882.
By that year Villard’s Oregon Railroad & Navigation Co. (OR&N) had completed construction of the warehouse and an attached one-room cabin for station agent Elijah H. Cummins. A Wisconsin native, Cummins had settled with his family just across the border in Oregon and since fallen in love with pretty widow Mary Shelton. He wanted to marry and advance with the OR&N, and the station agent job at New York Bar seemed like a good steppingstone for the ambitious young man.
Mrs. Iva Leland lived along the river a few miles from the bar. Around 2 a.m. on July 26 she woke to the sound of gunfire, peered out a window and saw figures in the distance riding along the riverbank. It was not unusual for sheepherders to fire shots to keep predators at bay. She returned to sleep unaware the gunshots heralded a gruesome crime.
William Suttie and John Butterfield drove a wagon west from Pataha City to the station to pick up supplies. Arriving in the afternoon, they found the warehouse locked and station agent Cummins nowhere around. After calling out and getting no response,
