The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1912-07-06
AGILE CONVICT
 CLIMBS IN A HAIL OF BULLETS
Blue Goats Seize Him at Top of Bridge and He Goes Back
 to Stone Pile

New York, July 6.-Bullets batter led against the steel girderss of the centre pillar of the Queensborough
 negro convict, climbed up the lattice
 work to the roadway in an attempt
 to escape from the Workhouse in
 BlackwelTs Island. The leaden pei lets flattened all about the fugitive as he mounted spiderlike to the
 beams supporting the roadway. He
 emerged unhurt to the wagon path just in time to run into the arms of two bicycle policemen who had been attracted by the shots. The convict, David D. Lewis, two hours after he had broken out of the lockstepped line, was back in the Workhouse again.
 / As remarkable as the negros agil- ity in reaching the bridge roadway was his runaway attire. He was dressed in trousers improvised from an old blanket and his shirt was q patchwork of toweling. It required more than month for Lewis to stitch the blanket and toweljng into shape, and he had to work in darkness. guided only by his sense of touch. It was this garb which the convict wore under his striped uniform when he leaped from the line yesterday. He shed the telltale outer garments be- fore he began his perilous climb for freedom.
 Lewis was sent to jail five months ago after several years of prosperous living at the expense of various rail- roads throughout the country. He made a profession of falling from cars and collecting damages from the roads afterward. Usually he would be found apparently semi conscious sitting beside a railroad track and would tell any one who would listen that he had been thrown or had falls en from a car or train. To ambu- lance surgeons or other physcians he would exhibit bruises resembling those man might receive in being scraped over a roadway. It was learned that Lewis beat his body into bruises and then rubbed sandpaper over the spots to give this ssemb blance of injury from accident. Finally the local roads got him and he was sent away for eleven months and twenty-nine days and a fine of $500 was imposed. With this fine waiting to be worked off Lewis had about 4twos years more tO serseA
 For three hot days Lewis had worn his tailored suit under his uniform in the hope of getting an opportunity, but none came until yesterday. The men with hands on shoulders and stepping high in the lockstep were marching; from the messrOom to the stone pile. when two men at the head of the line began to quarrel. Every keeper ran to separate them, and IS attention was distracted Lewis drop ped out of line and fled to crooked alley. He dropped his uniform as he ran and then found himself near the toolh0use under the granite base of the bridge pillar. Jumping from barrel, he climbed to the roof of the toolhousea: Above him swung a loose wire cable. Lewis sprang for this and made it. Then hand over hand he lifted himself up until he had passed the granite work and was on a level with the girder structure,
 He had covered thre-quarters of the road to safety when the guards discovered him. Within "a few sec onds the bullets began to batter about Lewis head, but he continued upward unheeding. The shots, had been heard by two bicycle policemen, who sped down to the centre of the bridge. They found Lewis just climbing over the, railing. He pushed the police men in an effort to throw them off their balance, but they kept in pur- suit, and after a short fight over powered the negro. They took him to the East Slxty-seventh street sta tlon, where they learned that a gen eral alarm had been sent out'for him.
 Lewis had attempted his escape att g o'clock. At II he was breaking big stones into little ones to get up an for dinner, in the workhouse