FRAIDY CAT: BLOG #40

Have you ever been so scared that you could hardly walk? I mean, 'trembling in your britches' scared? When a young fellow from Herman Junction finds himself in Bay on a Saturday night when the old town is bustling with people, that can happen. And it did happen to me. Not just one time but several times.

I was in Bay with the family one Saturday night and Mom and the little ones were at E.D. Smith's grocery store visiting with E.D. and Aunt Mollie. I had walked around to the front with Dad and then he got to talking and I just wondered up and down the street by myself. After while I heard some men talking about a man that had been murdered at Truman earlier in the evening. His throat was cut from ear to ear! Can you imagine the images that formed in my head when I heard that? They also said that the murderer was last seen headed toward Bay! Holy Cow! Here I was by myself just walking around watching the people, etc. I remember very well looking for any stranger and if I saw one I hastened to the other side of the street or turned and walked the other way quickly. I just knew that if the throat cutter was in town I would be his next victim and a knife cutting me from ear to ear was about the most gruesome thing that I had ever heard of. I was absolutely scared to death and went hurriedly around the corner to E.D. and Aunt Mollie's store where I knew I would be safe. I never did know whether the killer was caught or not and don't know anything else about the case but I do remember it happening very well.

We went to church services one Sunday night, Dec. 13, 1948, as we always did. When we got out of services we heard that there was some kind of commotion going on down on Main Street but Dad took us down another street and took us on home. He immediately went back to Bay and came home some time later. I heard him tell Mom that a black man that we had always known had come into town that night waving a shotgun around and yelling and hollering for someone. The man was known to have a mental defect. Dad knew this man and had thought that he could go back to town and calm the guy down and everything would be alright. However, when Dad arrived the man, Early Hughes had already been shot and killed by the city marshal. When they went to check Early's body they found that the gun was not loaded but of course the marshal did not know that. The man was out on Main street near the depot and the marshal stationed himself behind the theater and shot him from there. Again, when I heard that story I never wanted to go to Bay again! Herman Junction seemed to me to be a lot safer place.

It was Saturday night again. The town had a small brick building out in an alley behind the post office and some business places, that was the jail. That night a couple of guys were put in the jail, probably because of drunkenness, but I don't know for sure. The next morning when we went to church we learned that the jail had burned in the wee hours of the morning and the two guys inside had died. I do not know who the fellows were or anything about them but I know how I squirmed when I was told that two men had burned to death in that jail house. I never wanted to walk through that alley again.

Many years later My Lady and I with our children went to Bay for a family reunion. We started home in the evening and just pulled up at the corner of Main Street and Church St. Then, I heard gunshots and a man with his arm out the window of a car shooting at some other men across the street by Wayne Hill's grocery store and we were right square in between. I yelled, "Get down" and took off. Am I in Dodge City? What is going on here? I went and told the police and while they were pecking out the information on a typewriter a couple of other guys had run down the shooter and brought him in while we were still there.

Yes, Sir, I have been 'trembling in your britches' scared at Bay and that made Herman Junction seem so much a better place to be.