The Colville examiner. [volume] (Colville, Wash.) 1907-1948, 1922-04-15
Co|vi||e Boy Tells
Of Siberian Trio
Experience With a Bear
Leaves Lasting impress
sion on His Head

mer Colville boy, was not sure that
he would be able to return to Col
vile to tell the story.
But he is here. He bears the
marks of the bears teeth on his
scalp and the scars of the claws
cover his face, body and legs. He
is somewhat reluctant to tell of his
sufrerings during the days he travel
ed for help, through unfriendly ST.
IBERIA, and of the treatment he re-
ceived
Frazier who attended Colville high
school in 1915, lived at Bossburg
four years ago, at the home of Omer
f. Foust. Joining the navy during
the war, he was on convoy duty out
of New York during the time the
United States participated. After
his discharge from the navy in 1920,
he joined the employ of the Orsk
Goldfield, Inc, of London, mining
concern, his duties taking him with
the manager to a mining property
100 miles up the Amur river in
Siberia. This property had been
wrecked by the Bolsheviks, and it
was to take an inventory of the
property that the company had dis
patched the manager and his party.
Frazier, who had learned to speak
the Russian tongues while in the
navy, found that the destruction
caused by the army of the Reds had
made the mine practically worthless.
The Reds had seized the mining
property, but were unable to operate
it with sufficient profit to pay the
army, so had thoroughly destroyed
it. The buildings had been burned,
the dredges blown up, and the ma
chinery wrecked by bombs and fire.
When the Reds were finally driven
out of the country by the natives,
assisted by the Japs, the mine was
in bad shape.
On September 26, 1921, while on
patrol duty, Frazier suddenly ran
onto a bear with her cub by the side
of a small stream. There were no
trees, and the bear had evidently
been asleep. The cub started to
run away, and the bear started for
Frazier, who was armed with only
.32 revolver. Without any oppor-
tunity for thought of strategy or
accuracy of aim, Frazier took shot
at the bear, striking her in the head,
the bullet ranging downward into
the breast.
The bear Immediately reached him,
knocked him down, and seized his
head in her mouth, endeavoring to
crush his skull. Finding the revol-
yer had jammed, Frazier worked the
gun into the bears mouth in an en-
deavor to save himself, and was
successful, for the bear, within half
minute, died from the effect of the
bullet wound which Frazier did not
know would prove fatal.
With the scalp torn from the left
side of his head, and his face, body
and legs terribly torn by the bears
claws, Frazier started toward camp,
16 miles away, for assistance. How
he made the trip he does not know
After he had gone 13 miles he met
party of Chinese coolies who carried
him the remaining three miles to
the camp. There was no surgeon
available, and the Chinese cook and
a Canadian helper performed all the
rough surgery that he received.
Four days later he started for
Nikolaevsk for aid, travelling four
days in an open boat, and on
arriving was refused surgical treat
ment by the japanese because he was
foreigner. He secured Russian
surgeon who sewed his wounds, but
it was not until his return to the
United States that he received treat
ment which closed the wounds.
Frazier believes that if the great
nations will permit Russia to form
a government, the people will drive
the Japs from Siberia, and that with
the assistance of China the Japs will
be driven from northern China and
Korea. He says that the Russian
peasant is very friendly to Americans,
but that the Japs are unfriendly to
all foreigners, especially Americans,
although good to the Koreans. Japan
is now living on Russia, Korea and
China, according to Frazier, and there
is little hope for the development of
these countries resources by Ameri-
cans until the Japs are driven out.
And did Frazier get any further
souvenier of the bear?
He sent Jap back up the river
to secure the hide and claws, but the
weather has been such that the jar
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