Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1890-05-01

At Least the Dempsey Brothers Found
Them So in Their Bear Fight


Them So in Their Bear Fight.
George Dempsey and his brother Tom
came into this place few days ago. says
an Oleana pa letter to the New York
Sun, with the carcasses of two large bears
and with two live cubs or weeks old.
The cubs were bought by Squire Rich for
SIS apiece. and the dead bears were sold to
Butcher Klein for $25.
The Dempsey boys tell an interesting
story about how they happened to get the
bear family. They are both pipeline
watchmen, and carry revolvers as part of
the equipment of their calling One
morning recently they were returning
home through the woods. and stopped for
a rest and to smoke a pipe on top of ledge
Of rocks along which path their home lay.
While they sat there smoking they were
surprised to see large bear come lazily
out of hole in the rocks just beneath them.
George Dempsey drew his revolver and
fired at the bear, which turned to 60 into
its den. Tom Dempsey also levied his pis
tol at the bear, and the two men poured a
volley of shots at the animal. The pistols
were of small caliber and not calculated
to make much OF an impression on the
tough hide of a bear, but the bullets pick
ed this bear enough to make him mad, and
he raised on his hind feet, growled fercely,
and showed fight. The sound of the dis
turbance brought another big bear on the
scene, and this one was followed from the
den in the rocks b. two cubs The situa-
ton was an unexpected one to the pipe
line watchmen, and they were at loss at
first how to deal with it. They finally con-
Guided that they had strategic advantage
of the bears, perched as they were on the
rocks, and they determined to stand their
ground, especially as a retreat ON their
part could easily be followed up by the
bears. The old bears put themselves at
once in battle array, the cubs taking places
on neutral ground The Dempseys soon
emptied thoir pistols in the two bears,
which seemed to be simply spurred on by
the smarting of the wounds the bullets
made The two animals assumed the Of
fensive, and began to climb up to where
their foes were standing. The men COM
batted this advance by pelting the bears
with heavy stones, with which the ground
about them was strewn. This repulsed
the bears for moment, but they quickly
adopted new line of attack. There
were two approaches to the top of the
ledge and one bear began an attack by one
while its mate advanced on the men by the
other. This divided the attention of the
men and weakened their defense material
ly. Fortunately one approach to the ledge
was considerably longer than the other, and
one bear was coming up within ten feet Of
the top before its mate was in position to
cooperate with it. By their united
strength the Dempsey brothers raised a
large stone from the ground, elevated it
breast high and hurled it down ON the
head of the rapidly advancing bear. The
shock was tremendous. The bear tumbled
back down the rocks and never moved
again. By this time the second bear had
drawn near, and heavy stone was hurled
upon her with the same result. The skulls
of both bears had been smashed fiat by the
stones. It was an easy matter to capture
the Mhining cubs alive.