Waterbury Democrat., 1900-11-01
DURANT'S SCARE
Caused By Boys Playing All
 Halloween Tricks.
HARRY WAS NOT SHOT AT.

The Broken Window Caused by . siun& Shot, probably-The Senator ial Candidate Laughs at the Idea l of Anybody Attempting to Kill
 Hlm-Some People Say Harry's Boom Was Dying Out and This
 Method Was Taken to Give It New
 Life.
 The alleged attempt to assassinate Prosecuting Attorney Harold R. Dur anu, IGpuDncan nominee for state saua toi, was the talk of the town to-day ana the concensuS of opinion on tie subJect, so far as a representative of thls paper could learn, was that the question would never be answered. in satisfactory way, but was doomed to heccne as much of a conundr1lm as the familiar chestnut: "Who struck Billy Patterson?' | MT Durant and a friend. Mir Chris 'ic. were ln Naugatuck last night and | te'Crueo nome about midnight, satis- ntu ,hat they had done considerable missionary work for one night. Nr Durant resides at 5S Holmes avenua ana when himself and AIr Christie reached the house. the attorney sat I'oWn near the window and commenced h.iHlh& hlS shoes preparatory to re- 'llnG Tor the night while his com i,"Hloh went down cellar to see how the furnace was working. AIr Durant was m the act of pulling off one of his S,HtS when the window got q banr e ti'" H utmost scared the wits out of him TOT the time being. but upon. second ,uou%n he recoliected that it was Hal toWe'cn and just the hour taa +ba+ ,he Spooks have to get of 5flia eartb TOT another year. so he did not take n.ut notlco of the thing until srr oHilSIle. Who was in the, cellar and .ir ooWan. who was in the land of area ms in one of the rooms un-stoirs noth or whom had heard the noise ,"hle 'foopIn@ around and wanted to hioW What had happened. An inyes "'ioll lol'oWod. when it was noticed t, t,'"' thP WindoW had been struck from the outside and a small hole crt through the plate glass that Ionlad fo,. all me world as though it had been made by bullet. but which SIr Duy- ant who was a boy once upon a time suspected was fhe woRl Of a sIl,nr Shct Tn the hands of some piischiaroI,s urchln who had missed his aim and lost no ti-'e in getting out of the way when he saw what he had done. The Nafd and the immediate vicinity of the hoHSe Wor" searched thoroughly. hut l'o race or anyone could be found. De-. tecriVH tahev looked over. fhe erroI1nd but he could make 17cthino. cut of if heIond the fact. that the small hole was in tue window. but how it came TO ne there even the detective cOuldn't tol in
 hefeFrin" to the matter to-day. Mr l'ufant said to Democrat reporter that he had no idea that anyone meant to dc him bodily harm. ''In fact."s he said. T don't think there was any shooting at all. I heard the report. brt whether it was q shot or a hang of stone I couldn't tell. but I have no hesitation whatever in stating that ~I believe it was the work of boys who were cutting I'D and hit the window by mistake. The idea of anyone try ing to kill me. Such a thing is pre- posterouS. If anyone wanted to shoot me he could have done so without any trouble, for I was close enough to the window for a man to hit me. no matter how poor marksman might have tried it. I wish you would say in the Dem ocrat that l re@ard the incident as purely an accident and that, in my judgment, the racket was caused by youngsters who did not mean to dam- age the window. much less to injure
 mo or anybody else
 This is Mr Durant's version of the affair. but others are uncharitable enough to put different construction upon it and make no bones of the statement that the shooting was nothing more than the result of little scheme on the part of Harry himself in the hope of winning the votes of all good citizens on election day. Of course people will take this for what they consider it worth. but in any case the thing was rather unfortunate for MT Durapt. for. as everybody knows. the public are very apt to put the worst construction possible upon 1t. Buf, what matter about that. We want to tell the neonle of Waterbury. those who intend to vote for Mr Durant as well as those who do not not for oettine the neonle who have no votes at all, that Mir Durant was not kitled- as reported. and that he was about town to-day looking as bright and cheerful as ever.