Prison Escape

Warden Frank Conley at the Montana State Prison in Deer Lodge kept fearsome full-blooded hounds trained to track escapees. They were enclosed in a high fence inside the prison walls. In 1902, prisoner Thomas O'Brien foiled these hounds in a spectacular getaway. O'Brien, who claimed he was innocent of grand larceny, had served half of his five-year sentence. He was a trustworthy prisoner who had some freedom in his assigned job as stable boss of the large barn outside the prison walls. O'Brien...