J.E. Mitchell, 48, was an inmate in Carson City who volunteered to help fight fires and was killed in a wild fire on September 29, 1926. Mitchell and the rest of the volunteers were working against the blaze in the vicinity of the “Double Barrels about six miles from Carson on the road to Glenbrook. They were on the western side of the road when a sudden turn of the wind sent the flames at their heels as they ran for cover in the ledge of rocks up the hillside. Some of the volunteers made it to safety however, Mitchell was among those who did not. He had been sentenced to fourteen years for assault with a deadly weapon in Clark County but was recommended for parole in November.
” The loss of the prisoners Mitchell and Brown and the faithful Indian Morse is of no lesser gravity. These men volunteered for the work and cheerfully did their part. The trusties cancelled their debt to society and in the end society is in their debt.”
– Govenor Scrugham