Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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> SHOT BY CIRCUS EMPLOYES HORRIBLE MURDER OF PAUL WILLIAMS OX SPCIAL TP -\ IV ^ J. C. Weekly Tells How Friend Mel Death?Body Stripped and Everything of Value Taken. Paul A. Williams, 19 years of age of the Southern Railway in Columbia was murdered and robbed about 2:3C o'clock Sunday morning while riding with his friend. .J. C. Weekly, alsc of Columbia, on the first section ol \ the train which carried the Hagenbeck-Wallace circus to Augusta. The body was discovered lying besieje tho track, between Gilbert and Summit 26 miles from Columbia, by Conductor Thrift in charge of Southerr freight train Xo. 176 yesterday morning about 10:30 o'clock. There was V a bullet wound in the right eye. B. D. Clarke, coroner of Lexingtor county, held an inquest later in the day at Gilbert: The verdict of the jury was that Paul A. Williams came to his death by a gunshot wound ai the hands of parties unknown. J. C. Weekly was the only materia' witness and he told a dramatic stor\ of the shooting of his friend by three i white men and how he escaped b) hiding under a piece of canvas. -Pockets Searched. The pockets of young Williams were found turned wrong side out In them was a blood-stained one dollar bill which his murderers failec to find. His watch and about $5 which Weekly says Williams hac when he left Columbia, were miss ing. One of his shoes had been taker The body of the murdered mar was brought to Columbia last nighi at 7:30 o'clock on Southern train No 130 from Augusta. His parents, Mr and Mrs. F. J. Williams, who formerly lived in Columbia, where Mr. Williams had a jewelry store, but moved to Athens, Ga., a few months ago are expected to arrive this morning at 10:30 o'clock. Advices from Augusta say that 35 of the employees of the HagenbeckWallace circus were arrested wher the first section of the train arrived The circus authorities are quoted as ? saying that the train was held up anc robbed by eight negroes Sundaj morning between Gilbert and Bates burg. They deny that they knev that either young Williams or Weeklj were on the train. There was t great deal of rioting on the train anc three others who were employes oi the circus are said to be missing. Hagenbeck-Wallace circus is being held in Augusta by the police authorities. Special Agent Ehney oi the Southern was also active in making arrests. Statement of Weekly. When J. C. Weekly, who is em iT ployed by E. A. Beall & Co., of this city, arrived in Columbia last nigh from Gilbert, where he was present ai the inquest which was held over the body of his dead friend, he told th< story of the murder. "Last Saturday night after the cir * cus was over Paul Williams and my self went up to the Blanding stree1 station to watch the show load," saic Weekly. "While we were up there we fell in with one of the circus men a young fellow with a clean shaver face. He seemed to be a nice mar and, after talking to us a while, in ' . vited us to ride over to Augusta witl him on the first section of the circus train. "Paul said 'Let's go, just for th< fun of the thing.' I told him tha it would be a rough trip, but that i he wanted to go, then we would We went up to our room in the Syl van building and put on some olc clothes. Paul got a pass to August,' and return. I had about $10 and h< had about half that amount. "Then we went back to the Bland ing street yard and got aboard a fla car, loaded with wagons and the cir cus tent near the middle of the train We did not see anything of the younj * man who. had invited us to go t< Augusta. "Everything was quiet on the trail until we got near Lexington. Thei i we heard shooting and cursing to ward the rear of the train. 1 "A few minutes after the disturb ance began, a man passed the wagoi under hich we were sitting. H< halted and said, 'There's the . rr,, >- - ? V. +V, . men ue suui uuic uui ivnaiu m< bushes along the side of the tracl \ and went back toward the rear of th< train. The Attempted Assault. * "I said, 'Paul, we had better ge out of this.' We climbed up ove the side of the wagon under whicl we had been sitting and lay down In a minute or two, I saw the head j of three men coming over the sidof the wagon in which we were } I said, 'Run for it, Paul' and mad a break for the other end of th wagon. "As I sprang up, one of the men ; all' of whom I thiak were white yelled. 'JJow we'll get the !' am fired once. I thought Paul was righ behind me when I went over the sid of the wagon head first. There was : i 1 > pile of canvas under a wagon at the of ' other end of the car. I crawled under ly it, but held it up waiting for Paul, cn , He didn't come. I was afraid to stir, on for a man was sleeping on the pile cai right above me. bu Crawled Under Canvas. trt "I heard some men. cursing and 110 shouting, coming toward where I was be lying. I let the canvas fall over me and crawled further under it. The fri crowd walked right over me and fell in to kicking the man who was asleep sci . above me. When they had mauled id< 1 him considerably he seemed to wake a r> up, as he started in to swear. They wi > told him that they wanted his money. m< : He replied that he did not have any-1 thing except some candy. Theyjg0 ? searched him and found that this was-' ' true, for one of them said. 'Here, takej tj1( ? your old candy, we don't want it.' -j "I am pretty sure that the men tj1) i were white. They spoke fairly good w8 English and did not talk like ne- do 5 Sroes. m. "After the firing of the shot as I t0( i was getting out of the wagon, things - got strangely quiet. I heard no more j-,e J shooting or cursing, but I was still ce; J afraid to move for fear that I would 0f t waken the man who was sleeping on the canvas above me. I "Finally, when day began to break, mi ' I crept out from beneath the canvas, j 7 ? and went back to the wagon to look w? * for Paul. I found his watch fob, made ^ of four coins strung together, two gr letters addressed to him, one from a - ? i-i J 5 his father ana one irom a gin mcuu s^j in Charleston. There was blood ou ? everywhere. The sides and bottom of i the wagon were smeared with it. I ejj . went back three cars and found it sp( 1 splattered all along the canvas. a , "When the train reached Warreni ville I got off and wired the chief of police in Augusta and told Special i Agent Ehney, of the Southern, who jnj i was back in the last car on the train. mi "I took Southern passenger train ej Xo. 8 back from Augusta, riding on ' the step on the lookout for Paul's W? - body, for I felt sure that he had been in I murdered and his body thrown off c;^ , the train. I did not look any more ! after we passed Leesville. I thought that the shooting had taken place thl > after we passed there. This accounts for my failure to find the body. i "When the train reached Columbia \y I went up to my room in the Sylvan 5 building. One of the Southern's men I came up after me in a little while. I went back to the union station with ^ - him and took a railroad motor car . with T. McGhee Phifer, chief clerk ' se< ' of the Southern, and Roadmaster gu i Faulks back to Gilbert, where they I told me that the body had been found. 3 [ I testified at the inquest and came ^ back to Columbia with the body. ^ ; "Last night was the most terrible - I have ever spent. It was cne long f wide-awake nightmare. I would like ' - to make one thing especially plain. . Paul and myself started to Augusta cq simply for the fun of the thing and po - because the young smooth-shaven . i fellow invited us to go. We meant to t spend the day and come back Sunday t afternoon, as we both had to go to i work Monday morning. I had money an i and Paul had a pass. We were not f beating our way, but were simply out - ior a iarK. . Prepared to Rob. t Weekly stood up well under the cQ I strain of the terrible night and the EJ , trying day that he spent. But when , seen last night he was almost ex- ^ 1 hausted and sadly in need of sleep. an 1 He is broken hearted over-the tragic ^ - death of his friend and room mate, ^ 1 Paul A. Williams. He believes that e(J 3 the young circus employe whom they ^ met at the Blanding street station en- ^ ? ticed them aboard the train for the ^ t purpose of robbing both of them. an f Weekly said that the men who shot . young Williams seemed to be search- ^ - ing for some one. On account of the ^ 1 darkness, he is unable to state ^ i whether the murderers were black or 5 white, but he is fairly certain that kr from their talk they were white men - and not negroes. w t At Gilbert, near which the murder ^ - must have occurred, drops of blood wj . were found on the crossties from 250 tr. I yards leading to the place where the ^ > body of Wiliams was found lying with be his head on his right arm, his face l turned downward. His coat was l pulled up over his head. The pockets tb - in his trousers and coat had all been 1\ L turned wrong side out, but in one of - them was found a crumpled, bloodd. IJ l stained one dollar bill. Williams's R]3 watch, which his friends say, was an lTV ' open faced, old-fashioned one, was ? gone fcnd one foot was shoeless. Ex- e t cept for a few bruises and the bullet ta ? wound in his right eye, the body was r.ot mutilated. The bruises go to prove that the body was thrown from ar t the train after the shooting and rob- bv r bery. Wiliams was inside a wagon, [ i and it is hardly probable that he th . could have fallen over the side. s Sheriff T. H. Corley and Coroner le, e Clarke, of Lexington, have both gone f. to Augusta. They are determined to . e arrest the guilty parties or hold the ^ e Hagenbeck-Wallace circus in Augusta until the murderers are discovered. l? Body Brought Back. !, Last night at 7:30 o'clock, when St d Southern passenger train No. 8, bear- th t ing the body of Paul Ainsley Wil- hi e liams, arrived at the union station it ex a was met by about 200 of the friends at the young man who was so brutalmurdered. It was a sad and silent >wd. Willing hands lifted the body its stretcher out of the baggage r and carried it to the waiting amlance. It was carried to VauMe>'s. The funeral arrangements will t be made until the arrival of the reaved parents this morning. "Paul Williams." said one of his ends last night, "hadn't an enemy the world. Although he was a conentious fellow and had his own ?as about what was right, he was fun-loving boy, always jolly and th a good word for everybody he >t." D. L. Bryan, freight agent of the uthern Railway in Columbia, under torn Paul Williams had worked for ? past three years, said last night, considered Paul Williams one of s best men in the department. He is careful about his work and selm made a mistake. He not only maged his own desk well, but he ?k an interest in all the desks in e office and was always ready to lp wherever he could. He had retitly been promoted to the position report clerk." Father Highly Respected. F. J. Williams, the father of the lrdered youth, came to Columbia years ago from Lowell, Mass. He is employed as a jeweler by Charles Sentz and afterwards by Sylvan others. In a few years he opened jewelry store of his own on Main eet. Several months ago he closed t and went to Athens, Ga., where is the manager of the Brant Jew y company. He was a highly re ected citizen of Columbia and noias responsible position in Athens. Two years ago Paul Williams lost e sight in his left eye in an accint which occurred while out hunt?. The bullet from his unknown irderer's pistol entered the right e. Rumor has it that young Williams is to have been maried to a girl Charleston in the next few months, e was notified by telegram of his ath yesterday afternoon. The officials and special agents of e Southern Railway are co-operatg with the officers of the law in the tempt to bring the slayer of Paul illiams to justice. Xegro Has Confessed. Augusta, Ga., Oct. 2.?As a result employes of the Hagenbeek-Wal;e circus trying to rob other em>yes of the company, on the first ction of the train coming to Austa from Columbia last night, Paul Williams is known to be dead, and missing negro is believed to be ad, though no trace can be found him. William Gresham, a negro canvasm, employed by the circus, one of number of the help arrested to-day the Augusta police, has made a nfession in which he says the rert that the train was held up is en aIi imtriio and that thp trouble CIJ irted and ended on the train while was in motion. At the conclusion of the performce in Columbia last night, the work rce was paid off and the larger imber of the help indulged freely liquor. After the train had left ilumbia, according to Gresham's nfession, he, John Wilson and ijah Clarke were in the canvas igon, when two white men and a *ange negro joined them. Clark d Wilson are negroes employed by e circus and seem to be intimate iends. Just before the train reachGilbert, 25 miles from Columbia, esham declares, Wilson, Clark and e two white men began quarreling, ilson shot one of the white men .d threw his body off the train, ark, who also had a pistol, forced e unknown negro to get on top of e canvas wagon and jump off while e train was running. Whether he is killed or not Gresham does not 10w. According to Gresham's statement, ilson and Clark then decided to go rough the train and rob the help ao had been paid off before the ain left Columbia, with the inten>n of themselves leaving the train fore it entered the city of Augusta. What became of the second white an on the train and who was in e canvas wagon Gresham does not iow. The three negroes, Wilson, Clark, :d Gresham, have been sent to the chmond county jail. Besides these, o white and a negro, employes of e circus, are being neia as wnsses, but their names are not obinable, the police declining to give it any of the details. Earlier during the day wholesale rests were made of the circus help the local authorities, and whe~e Dse questioning developed that ere was no possible connection with e crime, the men arrested were leased. Ten men have been committed to il for complicity in the murder. The her men arrested ha^e been reased. The books for the collection of ate and County taxes will open on e 15th instant. The levy is much gher this year than usual, and we :pect to hear lots of complaint >out high taxes. SAW MILL PLANT BURNS. I). W. Alderman & Sons Corpor- 3c ation Suffers Heavy Loss. Alcolu. Sept. 30.?The big saw mill plant of the D. \V. Alderman ? & Sons Co. was destroyed by fire @ this morning about 5 o'clock. It seems that the fire started on Jx the interior of the building about the S? second floor and had gained consid- ? erable headway when discovered. The heavy rains yesterday afternoon and last night, together with Int? SUilllfSb ui tilt; iliui mug, yiuuauA* saved the destruction of the entire >Sj| lumber plant. Had the conditions not been so favorable the planing @ mills, dry kilns, machine shops, to- ?& gether with several million feet of lumber, would have gone up in 5K flames. It is impossible to estimate w just what the loss will amount to. @ but it is supposed that it will be @ something like $100,000, with some insurance. a Several hundred employees have been thrown out of employment. vi7 Fear Lynching in Greenville. Greenville, Oct. 2.?Apparently in- ? tent on lynching a negro named ^9 Parks, a crowed of 100 Greenville @ county citizens surrounded a clump of woods where the negro has secreted himself. The negro is said to be well ___ armed and this evidently deters the 1Ml crowd from a hasty approach. WW The pursuit of Parks results from a difficulty between the negro and r-k o ffat* n Ann Pq rlrc o V-Jiiii >> auc cuui 11 > au^i uwu. A u&uw is a tenant on the farm of J. E. Smith between Pelham and Greer, 12 miles from Greenville. Wade is a relative of Mr. Smith and he and the negro engaged in a difficulty that grew into I IV a fisticuff on Mr. Smith's farm. Mrs. Smith coming out to separate the combatants, was struck once or twice by the negro who then effected his escape. The crowd now surrounding the negro was soon organized and taking up the search finally located him in the clump of woods where he is now entrenched. Neither Mrs. J. E. Smith nor John Wade are seriously injured in the affair with the negro that precipitated the present situation. Sheriff Poole and two deputies, returning to Greenville late to-night, say there is little doubt but that the negro will be captured to-night. The officers returned from the seat of trouble in an automobile. Parks is said to have been at Gresham's farm this afternoon, where he told other negroes that he had not intended to hit Mrs. Smith, but after doing so he considered it best to take to the woods. ?= A Remarkable Occurrence. igj Receently a Japanese torpedo boat 23 of the submarine type was sunk while engaged in drill, all the officers and men on board being drowned. ?8 When the boat was finally brought ?{ to the surface a most remarkable ? 3 written statement was found, prepar- j| a ed by the commander of the boat, :j 5 Lieut. Saturn. "When this officer * j found that all his efforts to raise the I I boat were of no avail," says the New J | Orleans Picayune, "he proceeded to I f write what might be considered his g g official report to his superiors. He ? jj described the cause of the accident, j * and took all the blame on his own fj I shoulders. He told how all the crew, ?i f officers and men, had worked man- I 5 fully and described the way in which 5 gj they were slowly suffocating to death. As a description of the terrible situa- 7 tion in which the unfortunate crew was placed and the gradual approach of death, the communication is about ^ the most remarkable ever developed, j" The pitiful narrative, apparently written without fear and in full realization of certain death, is a remarkable tribute to the discipline in the jZ, Japanese navy. The story is fully in "J keeping with the many tales told of Japanese courage and fearlessness J during ti e war with Russia, and is apother evidence oi the utter insensibility to danger shown by that re- ^2, markable nation." m Shot Five Times. fBi Lancaster, Oct. 1.?A difficulty oc- fC* cured in the Longsville section yes- gZ terday afternoon between two white 'J farmers, James Long and Beech McPlanus, in which the latter was shot five times, and it is thought that his wounds will prove fatal. The shooting grew out of domestic troubles, I MnMomic Kaino T.nnp-'c SOri-i Tl-13 W. I H >UV/*MaUUO w, ? ? The desperately wounded man is a son of R. C. McManus of the mill community here. Certainly Not. Attorney General Wickersham at a dinner in Washington said of a wrong-headed financier: "His methods are so deplorable that when he tries to defend them he goes to pieces. In fact, he reminds me of an old man who was brought up before a county judge. " 'Jethro,' said the judge, 'you are accused of stealing Gen. Johnson's chickens. Have you any witnesses?' ? " 'No, sah,' old Jethro answered, haughtily; 'I hab not, sah. I don't steal chickens befo' witnesses, sah.' '* Jgn >'SJq ....OUR SHOWING OF.... @ Fall Millinery. Hats. & Cloaks 1 IS COMPLETE 1 ijl Let Us Show You 1 1 Mvo 17 P fAnJonili fl ifii d? L* i? v/up^iauu | m Ehrhardt :::::: South Carolina ? E ARE FOLLY PREPARED I To take care of your needs. Our great variety of....?..... ; '||B wsfinnds. ladies' Cloaks. Skirts 1 Or any other ladies' garment will enable you to pick just what you want at the very lowest price, comparing favorably with the short crop of cotton in our section. Before you go to buy your fall suit for yourself or for your boys, it will be to your benefit, as well /%?? as ours to look over our immense selection in that line. ? ' s Did you say Shoes? We have the largest Stock of . Shoes in this county. We dre selling lots of Shoes .] " ^69 now, but we have plenty more to fit your feet and your pocket. Anything else? Yes. Come and see. It will be our pleasure to show you H. KARESH EHRHARDT, S. C. KEEP COOL! KEEP COOL! WM DRINK TETLEY'S TEAS. DELICIOUS WHEN ICED. g ?? T1? mal/.l tk* Kmad like 9 ' * PR* If 1 f\J " IDC riUUl UlOi UJW%VO ?UW m+m mmmwB ?-- ,s/ lLIxfLV/ 1 Iv/li mother made. 24 pound sack for 85c. H/. Lunch Tongue, Chipped Beef, Fresh Crackers Fine for Auto Lunches. "GET THE HABIT." RINQ 'PHONE 32 jno. w. McCUE: mm "The Quality Store." 'Phone 32. Bamberg, S. C. :||8 No More*TWiMetB with that automobile, bicycle, gun or pistol if you will have me to put it in first-class repair. I am just as well Mm ' prepared to do your work as anyone outside the larger ^ cities, and my prices are about twice as reasonable. I also have in stock a well selected line of AiHYwnmi f P.* RirYri.E SUPPLIES T rw X V/1TIVU1U1J Vk. V.w which I will sell to you at closest prices. If I haven't J ?-3Ss9 wliat you need I will get it for you just as prompt as -|31 the next one. When in need of anything in ray line ? r^fJH don't forget me. \11 work guaranteed. x* j. b. brickleIm The Ee^ir S. 0-* 4?!^ t Horses Lack Nothing Jjg?| that will improve their condition and appearance. They are as carefully looked after as those of any priOVR LIVERY SERVICE M is at your command for any kind of rig you require. /? Say the word and the buggy, phaeton, coach or any other carriage will be at your dis \/ !* \ <uri*l<-*"r~ posal at ana ior any muc H ,? ' you wish. I -> . 3m SMOAK'S SALE AND LIVERY STABLE I I J. J. SMOAK, Proprietor Telephone OS I