biglam/hmd_newspapers huggingface dataset:
The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1878-06-29

A MARVELLOUS MARKSMAN.

A marvellous marksman has arrived at New York.
His name is Dr. Carver, and he is supposed to be the
most wonderful rifle shot in the world. He was
carried off when a child by the Dakota Indians, and
lived with them sixteen years. At the age of nine he
began to shoot birds on the wing with a rifle, and sub.
sequently became so expert at shooting that the
Dakotas regarded him as superhuman. He rarely
missed a shot at a bird even when on horseback, and
killed buffaloes and deer shooting from his hip, never
raising his rifle to his eye when shooting at sitting or
standing game. After leaving the Dakotas he shot in
matches in San Francisco and elsewhere, and
his wonderful exploits "electrified the Pacific coast."
One of his most extraordinary feats was breaking all
but seven glass balls out of 2,000 with a rifle at ten
paces. This feat was performed at Oakland, California.
On another occasion he broke fifty successive glass
balls while riding a horse at full speed. The horse was
a "green animal" from a livery stable, from whose
back a gun had never before been fired. He prides
himself especially upon his fancy shots. From the hip
he claims to be a dead shot at anything stationary
within a reasonable distance. A ball being thrown
twenty or thirty feet in the air, before it falls he will
fire at it and reload his gun twice, breaking it on the
third shot. At from , twelve to fifteen yards
he will break as many balls as one man can keep
in the air, thrown as high as possible, reloading
at every shot. He shatters a ball thrown straight
at his head by a man thirty yards distant.
He shoots right and left with a man on each side
throwing the balls in the air. At the crack of the
rifle the balls are cracked. He throws two halls in
the air at once, breaking one, loading his rifle and
shattering the other before it reaches the ground. At
Logansport he hit with a rifle-ball seventeen succes-
sive trade dollars thrown over a tree. He shoots at
half-dollars and dimes tossed in the air, and knocks
the spots out of nickels. He declares that he has
broken glass balls while he was mounted and his horse
was in the act of leaping a fence four feet high. Dr.
Carver asserts that he can shoot by sound almost as
well as by sight. He has appeared on the stage
blindfolded, and sent the ball through a bell rung
behind him. He can give no explanation of his skill
but states that "it comes natural. —Pail Mali
Ga:ette.