The San Francisco call., 1896-04-15
For Months He Has ATTEMPTED
to Murder a Widow and
Her Children.
POISON PLACED IN THEIR FOOD.
Sought to Settle an OLD Feud Between
His Relatives and Their
NeighborS.

EUGENE, Or, April 14.-Oral Poindex-
ter, lad II years old, was arrested at his
home, four miles north of Coburg, yester-
day, and was brought to this city this
afternoon on charge of attempting to kill
the family of Mrs. Hiram Smith, widow,
who lives on farm adjoining that of the
Poindexters. The youth has made re-
peated attempts to poison the Smiths, and
on several occasions has nearly succeeded.
An old feud has existed between the Poin-
dexters and the Smiths, and it is believed
Oral felt that it devolved upon him to
settle the grudge by taking the lives of the
entire family.
For months Mrs. Smith and her chill
dren have been dwelling in constant fear
of death. When the family would be
| away some mysterious person would visit
the house and scatter poison about, but it
| seemed almost impossible to detect any
one. Several weeks ago the unknown
enemy left some kind of powder on the
top of the jars of milk. Mrs. Smith does
not know what the powder was, but be-
lieves it was the kind of poison used to
destroy rats and squirrels. On this visit
the poisoner left two notes of threaten
ing character. On the afternoon of the
next day he again visited the premises and
put another kind of powder on the cream
in the pantry. This substance was of a
whitish color, looked like soda and tasted
like concentrated I've. On this visit an
other notice was left as fellows:
The ones we want to kill is Hiram Smith,
L. Smith, Mary Smith, Clara Smith. 1 am
| coming again. This is done by one you will
| never know. God is building the fire for you
| now. d you.
1 ~
| poison were left Mrs. Smith and her two
little girls were alone at the farm, the
| young men-Leet and Hiram-being ab-
sent on business. Judging from the tone
| of the note it appeared that the unknown
desired to take the lives of the four orphan
| children who live with Mrs. Smith.
| About two weeks ago the family perse-
| cutor again gained admittance to the
premises unseen bv any one and scat
| tered poison about the well and in water
ing-troughs and in the grain bin
Thwarted thus far in his efforts to take the
lives of the family, the mysterious indi-
| vidual seemed determined to poison the
| stock on the ranch. Since then several
| other attempts were made by the posoner,
| and only by keeping their food and drink
| under lock and key have the Smiths es-
| CdpeU ueatn.
| The officials having failed to trap the
| fiend, S. o. Garrison. a neighbor was ap-
pointed special officer to investigate the
| repeated outrages. He obtained his first
clew Saturday. Mrs. Smith was away
from home, but one of the little girls was
| left to keep watch. She saw young Poin-
| dexter come with vial and pour some-
thing into the pump D. The next day, while
working about the chicken-house, she was
| struck over the back of the head with a
| club by Poindexter and was left uncon-
scious. Other evidence was secured against
the boy, until sufficient was had to war
rant his arrest. He is now held under $500
bonds. The boy is sullen and refuses to
| talk
| Mrs. Smith is the widow of the late
| Hiram Smith, man who was quito
wealthy and prominent in social and DO
| litcal life. He owned large tracts of land
| below Cobulg, and at one time was q can
| didate for Congress. He has been dead
| for number of years. Mrs. Smith is now
| 73' years old, and lives on farm about
| four miles below Coburg. She has no
children of her own, but adopted four
| children who were orphaned by the death
of another adopted son.
AS the first attempt to poison Mrs. Smith
was made ten years ago, it seems that
Poindexter was carrying on the dastardly
work begun by some other enemy of the
| family