Lincoln County leader. [volume] (Toledo, Lincoln County, Or.) 1893-1987, 1912-01-05
DEAD MAN IN A TREE.
OFFICIALS BAFFLED AT LATEST
TURN IN STRANGE CASE.
Corpse, Had Been Suspended In Air
Two Months-Supposed to Have
Been Remains of Man Who
Is Alive.

Watertown, N. -Y.-Last July, one
Sunday night, Harry Newton broke
jail here in a highly ingenious man.
ner.
Newton had been arrested few
weeks before. charged with robbing
rooms at the Woodruff House during
Masonic conclave. He was q
stranger in these parts, and there was
much evidence to show that he was a
superior man in his line Of business.
The sheriff employed bloodhounds and
spent many days trying to locate the
smooth jailbreaker, but all in vain.
A short time ago a startling dis
covery was made, ten miles from
town by farmers. 1t was the body of a
dead man, suspended by its neck in a
tree, on the back end of "a farm re-
mote from any public highway.
Coroner Smith and other officials
hastened to the scene and promptly
cut down the corpse. They were puz-
zled, OF course, and because the dead
man was apparently about the age of
Newton, and because a bullet hole
was found through the clothing of the
corpse. and because the body had evil
IDENTIFY been placed in the tree within
short time after Newton escaped, it
was unanimously decided that the de-
composed remains were those of New
ton. Accordingly, without much ad-
'ditional ceremony, they were laid to
rest In potters field
The matter, strange to say, was
given no further thought till recently,
when 1t was discovered that Newton
was working in an electrical plant at
Northeast. Pa. He was apprehended
there by the Watertown sheriff, who
brought him back here, where he con-
fessed to robbing guests at the hotel
breaking Jail, etc.
The minute 1t was known that New
ton was alive the officials began the
work of solving the mystery of the
man in the tree. No satisfactory So
luton has yet been reached, and pos
sibly none ever will be.
Coroner Smith states that the body
hung twenty feet from the ground in
one of the upper branches, the chin
and head wedged firmly in crotch.
the neck stretched to twice its natural
length by the weight of the body.
There was no branches about capable
of supporting climber. 1t was thus
impossible that the man could have
slipped from a higher footing and
tumbled into the trap, even were 1t
feasible that man would catch by
his chin in such a way. The theory
of suicide seems equally unsupport.
able, for rope is too easily secured to
tempt man to hook himself on a
limb in the hope of breaking his neck
or strangling to death.
But granting the possibility of one
of these theories, the cause of the sup
posed bullet hole through the cloth
Ing of the unfortunate remains unac-
counted for. At the time the officers
believed that a shot fired by one of
the deputies on the night of Newton's
escape had found its victim. The con.
ultion Oh tne corpse was such as to
render 1t impossible to determine II a
bullet had penetrated the body. but
the marks which remained in the
clothing convinced the police that the
man had been wounded.
No man, unaided, hung the corpse
In the tree. This is not only self evil
dent, but is the opinion and belief OF
Coroner Smith. who assisted in the
removal of the remains. At least two
men were involved, he AYERS. "And
they had their hands full,". he con.
cluded.
No papers or Identification marks
were found in the clothing save an
envelope. such as is used by railroads
in paying off their help and bearing
the number 261. This remains as the