The Billings gazette. [volume] (Billings, Mont.) 1896-1919, 1902-12-09
FOOD IN SHEEP CAMP is FOUND
POISONED.
TWO VICTIMS CLOSE CALL
CowardIy Attempt on the Lives Of
Several Men Almost Proves
Successful. :.
From Fridays Daily Gazette.

From Fridays Daily Gazette.
A story of a premediated and COW
ardly attempt at wholesale murder
was brought to the city today by cal"
Mclean, a rancher and sheepman re-
siding on the Musselshell, about four
miles below the crossing.
According to the facts as related
by Mr.. Mclean someone in that
neighborhood %entertains a deep seat
ed and malicious enmity toward him
or his employees and to be revenged
has not hesitated at employment of
the most horrible of ali means-the
administration of poison. Mr.. Nc
Lean says that last Friday one of
the men employed by him in his sheep
camp in the Bull mountains baked
bread and after p%artaking OF some OF
it was suddenly taken sick, with ev-
cry symptom of having been poisoned.
Fortunately the others realized what
had occurred and promptly admins
tered a large quantity of salt to the
sick man, which acted as al emetic
and he soon recovered.
The following day more bread was
baked and again one of the men was
Frustrated after eating Of it,
and it was with the utmost difficulty
hat his system was rid Of the poison,
for it was now very evident that the
bread contained a poisonous drug of
some sort. The same remedy applied
in the first case was also used in this
instance.
Fully convinced that someone had
been trying to kill them, one of the
men took what remained of the bread
toMr. McLean's.home and related what
had occurred. To satisfy himself,
Mr.. Mclean gave a piece of the bread
to a dog, but before doing SO took
the precaution to have a quantity of
lard at hand to be used as an emetic'
in cast it should develop that the
bread contained poison. At first the
dog refused the bread and some tai
low was placed on it. He then ate
it and almost instantly fell over and
became rigid. The antidote was ad-
ministered, but too late, as the effects
of the poison were almost instantan-
eous and in a few minutes the dog
was dead.
MI. Mclean saved the rest of the
bread and brought it to town with him
for the purpose of having it analysed.
This morning he gave it to DR.. Lind
sey to be examined by him.
Mr.. Mclean says that before CIV
ing the bread to the dog he tasted a
little of it and found it to be so bitter
as to be almost u%nbearable, which
caused him to think that strychnine
had been put into either the -four OF
the baking powder. The first man
who was poisoned said that he had
baked the bread so hard as to almost
burn it and to this he attributes the
fact that he was not so strongly af-
fected by the poison it contained as
was the man on the succeeding day,
when the bread was not baked so
hard.
Who the would-be p%oisoner is Mr..
McLean is at a loss to even surmise,
as he does not know of any enemy
he has made. But that somebody pos
sessed of a most diabolical mind has
taken it upon himself to do him harm
OF the utmost kind he is well salts.
held. AS very often happens in
cases of that kind the fiend who made
the attempt on the lives of those in
the camp failed to take into consid-
GRAFTON that in his hellish desire to
kill the one against whom he is
t~reasuring a grudge he was likely to
cause the death of others. The camp
is usually without an occupant from
early morning until late at night and
as 1t is located at a place where manv
persons are passing very frequently
men stop there and help themselves to
food, as the old frontier custom of
open hospitality still continues in
that locality.