Rensselaer Journal, Volume 10, Number 50, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 May 1901 — BLOODY DEEDS OF A MANIAC [ARTICLE]

BLOODY DEEDS OF A MANIAC

Succession of Tragedies in Evansville Sunday Morning. THREE DEADj THREE INJURED. Marder er. After Killing a Married Couple, Faially Wounding a Policeman and Seriously Hurting Others, Kill. Him•e f—Foretell* His Plans in Letter. Three persons dead, a fourth dying, a score of men and women wounded, a barn burned, nine cows killed, a siege by police, and a mob of citizens demanding the life of a murderer are features of a tragedy enacted in Evansville, Ind., Sunday. All these unusual events are results of a fit of madness, caused by brooding over fancied wrongs, which took possession of Everett Conway. The series of crimes culminated when Conway, driven to bay and facing certain death at the hands of infuriated men, kissed his wife and babies good-by and fired a revolver bullet into his own heart. Conway, who lived next door to William Garrison, has long been at outs with his neighbor, claiming the latter worsted the elder Conway in the purchase of a dairy business two years ago. He had threatened to square accounts, and the prosperity of the dairyman preyed upon his mind, until he determined to avenge the supposed wrong. Taking a repeating rifle, Conway Sunday went to his neighbor’s place. Meeting Garrison in the yard, he took careful aim, and sent a bullet through the dairy owner’s heart. Conway’s father, whose home also adjoins the Garrison place, was in the barn, and, attracted by the report of the shot, he ran out to learn tlw rea-> son. The madman turned the rifle upon tne eldeo - man and fired, but the father was not shot and he fled, sopn distancing his pursuer. Mrs. Garrison was the next to appear and become an object for Conway’s fury. As she approached the man shot her, and she dropped dead at his feet. Ki'ls Cows and Burnt Barn. Conway entered the dairy barn, where he found nine milk cows. These he killed, reloading his rifle from a supply of cartridges he had in his pocket. When the last of these animals went down before his bullets the madman piled hay against the sides of the building and ignited it in half a dozen places. As the flames swept up the walls of the dairy Conway turned to seek more vicitinjs, but all intelligent persons on the premises had fled. Barricading himself in the house Conway opened fire upon the officers with a repeating shotgun. By this time a crowd of several persons had assembled, and the tiny leaden pellets scattered among the spectators. Officer Walks was struck five times and cannot recover, while fully twenty men and women were wounded by the shot. Write* Letter Telling of Plan*. The deed was premeditated, as Conway had sent the following letter to a local paper, asking its publication: “Well friend readers, what I will do will be a plenty. I will tell you why. This man Garrison has bulldozed the whole ranch since he has been here,

but he run against a snag when he landed on me, so I think he will sink. He got the ranch under control, and he got it for nothing. My dad gave him everything he got He run the whole family away and has caused my dad to disown me. I am from Kentucky and you know what’s in them people. He threatened to kill me, and you know the jig is up. I need not tell you what I am going to do.forit will be in sight, so come and see.**