Evening Republican, Volume 17, Number 257, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 October 1913 — MONTICELLO LAD ACCIDENTALLY SHOT [ARTICLE]

MONTICELLO LAD ACCIDENTALLY SHOT

Ten-Year-Old Boys Play With Rifle and Chester Fross Was Shot in Neck Saturday. Monticello Journal Today Chester Fross, of Water street, is lying hovering between life and death as the result of the illegal use of fire arms by minors of very tender age. He and Thomas Meridith and several others about the same age were out Saturday afternoon with a small rifle of 25 special guage. The gun was in the hands of young Meridith and pointing in the direction of Fross. It went off, the bullet penetrating the left side of the boy’s neck low down to the shoulder and just to the rear of the jugular vein, thence it rounded backward through the heavy musele of the neck, stopping jiist under the skin. The wounded Jboy was taken to Dr. Gable’s office, where he was put under the influence of nitrous gas and the bullet ■quickly removed. The boy rested ■fairly easy yesterday but the inlerease in fever this morning caused [Dr. Gable to think it advisable to (administer anti-toxin, which was done this forenoon. There are various stories sis the ac- , cident; in one it is said that the Meredith boy pointed the gun at Fross and snapped the trigger not knowing that the weapon was loaded; another story has it that a cartridge was stuck in the barrel and he was trying to remove it when, the cartridge exploded with the barrel pointing at Fross. Be that as it may, the accident is a deplorable affair; one that would not have happened if the laws governing the sale of cartridges and the use of firearms had been more closely observed. The injured boy is the son of Mr. and Mrs. George Fross. The lad’s mother was formerly Miss Carrie Temple, well known to many Monticello people.