The Portland daily press., 1890-11-20
A SUSPICION OF A GLUE.
some Light at Last Thrown Upon
the Martins Point Mystery.
A White Horse Had a Hemcrrhage
On the Bridge.

The public has probablynot entirely for
gotten the Martin Point mystery that passed
for nine days wonder last January The
facts of the case were briefly these On
Saturday, January 18th, tug boat captain
reported that there were stains of blood on
the sides and draw Of Martins Point bridge.
The papers took it up and reporters and
policemen carefully examined the bridge. A
substance said to resemble human brains
was found. also hair Of various kinds caught
in cracks Of the bridge, and a broken button
was found underneath. Out of this material
thrilling murder was constructed by enter
prising reporters. and bloody fight by the
police. Nobody turned up missing, how
ever, and no broken heads were reported
and In course of time these theories we re
abandoned One responsible man, Mr.. Al
bion FL. Brown of Knightville told PRESS
reporter that he was passing over the bridge
on Friday morning. the time when the blood
first appeared, and saw o white horse at
tached to pung and attended by two men
down on the bridge evidently in fit Of
blind staggers. We have always been con-
WINGED that that horse knew something about
the blood and have tried more or less to find
him since. Whether or not we have sue
ceeded. our readers must judge for them
selves from the following facts
A reporter of the PRESS while engaged In
conversation with Mr.. Nichols. the teamster,
yesterday, happened to speak of the famous
Winslow case In which the owner of a herd
OF cattle in Falmouth was in controversy fer
a long time with the state cattle commits
sioners, as to whether the animals had tlber-
culesis or not. Mr.. Nichols said that there
seemed to be strange fatality hanging over
animals in Falmouth, not cattle alone, but
horses also. He said that some one had
told him of milkman named Cobb who
lived on the shore road In that town who
had white horse that died of genuine con-
sumption during the summer. Mr.. Nichols
said that his informant, Mr.. Reed, told
him that one morning in January, near the
middle of the month, this Mr.. Cobb's horse
had had terrible attack of coughing and
bleeding on Martins Point bridge. The
mention of this bridge at once aroused the
reporters attention and questions followed
which fixed the case pretty closely. The
horse was hitched to pung and there were
his stall very early and seemed to have
chill. For this reason rough skin robe was
thrown over his back and the trip to town
commenced. When the horse came to the
bridge he stopped on the draw and CON-
menced to cough and vomit blood and
mucous. His violent retchings weakened
him so that he first leaned up against the
side of the bridge then fell down and stayed
there until another team was secured and he
was taken home. The horse recovered from
this attack but soon afterward had another
from which he died.
bered that there was large amount of
blood on the pier Of tine draw, underneath
as well as stains on the bridge itself.
Whether this was portion Of the hemor-
rhage of course cannot be told. There were
also hairs stuck in the cracks of the bridge.
Whether these were pulled out of the robe
that was on the horse while he thrashed
around during his paroxysm, of course can
only be conjectured But we submit that it
would be very strange If there were two
eseapades either of man or horse in which
blood was spilled on this somewhat retired
bridge on or about the 18th day of January.
While this story may not carry conviction it
must be admitted to be as credible at least
as any Of the other theories that have been
is not Willard 81. Cobb of Deering, could be
found, 1t could no doubt be settled con-
clusively what bled on Martins Point bridge
on the morning of January II, 1890.