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Wabash Freight Depot Visited by Robbers this Morning.\The safe in the Wabash depot was blown open at 3:10 o’clock this morning and $10 or $12 carried away.At the above named hour night policeman Gns Wahl while near the Catholic church, on Jackson street, heard a heavy explosion and located the sound in the vicinity of the Wabash depot. He went at once to the ticket office at the passenger depot and asked the night operator, Mr. Kurtz, if he had heard an ex plosion. Kurtz had heard a noise but supposed it was the horses stamping r their feet in an adjacent stable. Officer | j Wahl discovered that some one on the platform at the freight depot was striking matches. He asked Kurtz if there were any of the employes of the road there and learned not.Wahl and Kurtz then concluded tomake an investigation. When they came within about thirty yards of the depot a man standing at the corner, next to Mike Streit’s place, commanded them to halt. Officer Wahl commanded the fellow to throw up his hands. The man replied with a revolver shot 1 and then the firing oprned up all along the line, a dozen or more shots being fired by Wahl and Kurtz and the robbers. One man was standing on the track next to the water tank and as ne ar as could be ascertained there werefour men in the job.So far as known no persons was hurt during the shooting. One ball from Officer Wahl's revolver chipped a piece out of a pole standing at the corner next to Streit’s place, which shows that he was doing some close shooting.A general alarm was given following the shooting and officers have been searching the purrounding country all day.The safe was in the private office of Agent W. T. Hill and is badly wrecked. It is thought the combination knob was knocked off with a sledge hammer, found in the room, and the stem knocked out with a punch that was atao found in the room The safe was then doubtless loaded and the fun began. Two doors of the safe, one inside and one outside, were blown tojpieces and only the tumblers left of the combination lock. A jimmy had been used in removing the cash drawer and it was carried away. There was blood on some of the drawers in the safe, which showed that some of the operators had been hurt. The marks of a jimmy are also seen at the cash drawer in R.W. Webb’s desk, but it was not opened. Mr.Webb the cashier, says there was not over $10 or $12 in the safe as he had remitted $55 to the general offices Saturday evening.A cigar box, Coony’s Little Havana, with a square hole cut in one side, was used as a dark lantern,Gillum’p diod hounds were brought to the seen ’ the robbery, and while they tracke he men around the yards, the owner v. -u-d not allow the dogs to run unleashed unless insured against loss of the dogs. That could not be done at that moment and when they were brought back a second time it was too late.The explosion and the shooting of the officer and robbers aroused the surrounding neighborhood and created a great commotion.The robbers entered the building through one of the west windows and passed out of a door on the east side, which was found open.It is thought the safe crackers caught an outgoing freight train and will not very likely be heard of again. It was a bold job.
Newspaper Details
Defiance Daily Express
Defiance, Ohio, US
Mon, Apr 04, 1898
Page 3
Full Page
Clipped by
Tricia S.
USA 11 Mar 2019
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