The Emporia news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1859-1881, 1875-03-05

A Good Pair OF Legs Prevents Blood
shed.
EmpOria is eighteen and has never
had q murder. But she came near
having one last Saturday night. Go
ing home that evening about nine
o'clock, when just opposite the Fifth
Avenue ho:el, we heard the report OF a
pistol, which seemed to be in the Office
OF that hashery. We stopped to listen.
In an instant there was q tumbIing
about Of chairs, a violent shutting Of
feet, some hurried EXPLANATIONS, and
Immediately afterward the screams of
women issued from the building.
soon three or four parties ran across
from loves livery stable, and officers
Nichols and Patterson who were
standing on Bundrem's corner, half
block east of the tavern, speedily ar
rived. By this time we arrived. We
never hankered after being ''first on the
ground where excited men were care
lessly fOOlin' around with fire arms.
We soon found that Mr.. Mcdowell, one
of the proprietOrs of the Fifth Avenue,
aged over fifty, we should think, had
shot and tried to kill S. j. Houts, his
son-in-law and partner. Houts was
armed, and had threatened to kill the
old gentleman and his son George that
night before going to sleep. This Is
what we were told by young man
who says he heard him say 1t. There
had been much trouble between the
parties since HOuts become a member
of the family in the early part of the
winter. The old gentleman had armed
himself, and coming into the Office
about nine o'clock, found H. sitting in
q chair by the stove, when he walked
up to him and told him to draw his
pistol and defend himself. Completing
the sentence he raised q six inch
Smith & Wesson and banged away at
IIouts. There Is no doubt but that it
was his intention to kill him. Houts
Is an able bodied and active young
man. He eyeide ntly strongly objects
to turn his manly form into a bullet
stopper, to suit the whims of a father
in-ia'V. SO he got out at the back
door quicker than we can tell about It.
His trusty legs brought him up town
at good rate of speed, and he soon
appeared at Spencer & Cutters drug
store, where his wound was dressed by
DIR. Jacobs. The ball had struck him
on the back part of the shoulder, and
passed out at the other side, making an
ugly flesh wound. Half an inch deep
er and it would have ''flxed" him.
Houts came here last fall and soon
became acquainted with Miss Mary
Mcdowell, very estlmable and up
right girl, and married her. He
represented himself as the DOS
SCISSOR OF wealth, and began to lavish
1t freely on horse flesh and whisky,
"a We learn. 1t Is now believed he had
nothing beyond the few hundred dol
lars In his pocket book. He
and the McDowells, the old
gentleman and George, rented
the Fifth Avenue. Here, ac-
cording to rumor, they quarreled fire.
qnently. HOuts, we learn, was abus-
i've. His reputation about town is not
good by any means. 1t seems the old
gentleman, who, so far as we have
been able to observe, is a quiet person
who attends to his own business, stood
his abuse and insults until fOrbearance
ceased 10 be n virtue, and concluded to
end them in the terrible way rela-
ted above. He was arrested Saturday
night and lodged in Jail. No one hav-
ing made affidavit against him he was
released on Monday, and thus the af-
fair stands at this writing.
We have learned since writing the
above that HOuts has left the country.
II so all will say "good radiance"
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