Dr. Edmund Earl Rivers
Information comes from Treasured Tidbits of Time Volume I by Jens Patrick Wilde
Dr. Edmund Earl Rivers wandered from one railroad town to the next until he finally reached Montpelier in 1890 and established a residency and a medical practice. At that time 11th street near the railroad was a prominent part of the business section of Montpelier. There he located in the Arcade Hotel. It faced Washington street and just around the corner was Hanak's Saloon. In the top of the Saloon, Dr. Rivers established a two-room office. He resided in the hotel and took his meals at the boarding room on the main floor of the hotel.
In this setting, Dr. Rivers became acquainted with the teenage step-daughter of the hotel owner, Sam B McCart. Rivers, by his own standards was a ladies man. Before long a romance was developing. In an effort to squelch it, the daughter, Birdie was sent off to school in Utah. Somehow the doctor managed to smuggle notes to the girl with traveling salesmen who dropped them off at a drugstore where the girl picked them up. McCart eventually discovered many of his daughter's letters while cleaning the doctor's room.
These he read and then in a fit of rage carried them to the supper table where the doctor was seated for his evening meal. McCart threw the letters on the table in front of the doctor and then grabbed a chair with which he knocked the doctor to the floor. As he raised the heavy chair to strike the prostrate doctor, Rivers took a pistol from inside his coat and shot the hotel manager dead on the spot.
Then he grabbed the lettes and left. Later they were no where to be found and although witnesses had seen the issue from start to finished they were never obtained as evidence and so one could only guess as to the contents. The death became a thorny issue.
Public sentiment seemed to support McCart's actions. Others had known of the romance and had felt the manager acted in good judgment to break it off. Still others recalled incidents of other familiarity with other young women in the community. There was talk of a lynching, but through all this the young doctor remained calm and apparently unworried. It was not until he obtained the best legal counsel did his actions betray his personal fears.
First his lawyers asked for asylum for their client outside Montpelier and he was transferred to Malad City. Next his lawyers, J H Hawley, prominent Boise attorney, John A Bagley of Montpelier and J Ed Smith of Pocatello, were successful in getting a change of venue and the case was moved to Oneida County. There, away from the local gossip and sentiment of the individuals on the street, Rivers felt more secure. Although he was not released on bond because of the first degree murder charge, he was extended great hospitality at the jail and given many privileges he would not have received in Bear Lake County.
After several months, the came came up before District Judge Standrod of Pocatello and after two days the case went to the jury who deliberated for 36 hours. It was decided that regardless of what other actions Rivers might have been guilty of, he was not guilty of first degree murder and had acted in self defense. And for lack of evidence (the letters) that might have proved why McCart was so enraged, the doctor was released.
The decision did not set well with the people in Montpelier. Unknown to most of them, Rivers slipped quietly into town one night after dark, picked up his personal belongings and medical tools and disappeared. Later he established a practice with a cousin in Idaho Falls and served that community with distinction.