Evening Republican, Volume 18, Number 226, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 September 1914 — CHICKEN THIEF DODGED BULLETS [ARTICLE]

CHICKEN THIEF DODGED BULLETS

W. S. Parks Fired Four Times At Man Who Invaded His Hen Tuesday .Evening.

W. S. Parks almost put the finish to the career of a chicken thief Tuesday evening. Mr. Parks lives on College road, and Mrs. Parks raises quite a number of chickens. Tuesday .evening between 8 and 9 o’clock Mr. Parks heard a noise in the chicken park. He was shaving and before he could get ready to interfere the chicken thief had made his way down the road with 'his hands full of fowls.- Mrs. Parks heard the chickens, also, and her husband informed her that,he felt sure they would return -and he took his revolver and posted himself where he could watch. Soon a man cautiously climbed over the chicken park fence aiid entered the chicken house. Billy expected to capture him in the coop, but as h& started to enter- the park the thief saw him and beat a retreat He went with such speed and apparent fright that he forgot the location of the fence he had ©limbed over a moment before and he hit the fence While running at full speed. The staples pulled loose frc\ji the posts and the man went over some how. BiHy„' at short Tange, had aimed hi® revolver and pulled the trigger but the cartridge missed fire. He then fired four bullets in rapid succession, making direct aim, but he did not hit the fleeing target He blames the failure to hit him to the fact that his gun. was poor. He had the pleasure, however, of so ing the fastest moving man he had ever seen in his life. JH© was the kind Who would have made rabbits get out of the way. As a part of the armament of the Parks home is a rifle and a Shotgun and these have been placed In a handy position and if the chicken thief ever puts in an appearance there again he will probably get what is coming to him. An amusing part of the incident was the fact that two men who were ing at the college happened to be passing the Parks home at the time Billy opened fire. They could hear the whizzing bullets and they dropped flat in the ditch along the roadside, fearing that they might get hit. The thief cut across the fields to the south of the Parks residence. It is probable that he had a confederate with a wagon or a gunnysack.