Beadle's Pocket Library No. 292

Joe Morey, the Night-Hawk

By Jos. E. Badger, Jr., this serial Western follows an organized band of horse thieves operating in territorial Kansas during the 1850s. The gang, led by a mysterious masked figure called the Black Rider, executes coordinated raids on homesteads. In the opening installment, the band attempts stealing horses from settler John Lansdown; Joe Morey, called "the Night-Hawk," inadvertently causes discovery when a horse treads on his foot, prompting him to strike the animal noisily, waking a farmhand. Morey tackles the farmer to prevent him firing on his fleeing companions. Lansdown pursues the thieves, and his riderless black horse—blood-stained and exhausted—returns to the homestead, alarming his wife and young niece Alice Walker, who fear he has been killed. The narrative situates itself amid the lawlessness of "Bleeding Kansas," with counterfeit money and nightly horse thefts plaguing the Territory.