The Butcher Who Walked to Kill the President
John Bushey, a displaced laborer from Pendleton, was arrested in Walla Walla after claiming he carried a rifle and cartridges for both Theodore Roosevelt and the German Emperor.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
MEANT NO HARM John Bushey, Socialist, Arrested Yesterday HAD THREATENED THE PRESIDENT Police Fearful He Might Do Some Damage Locked Him Up—Says He Is an Honest Citizen and Would Not Shed Blood.
Charged with making threats against the president's life, John Bushey, a butcher, was arrested by Officer Morse at the Walla Walla Meat Company’s Main Street market at 1 o'clock yesterday afternoon, where he was employed. Bushey made no resistance and was locked up in the county jail. To Chief Kauffman he gave the name of Joseph Becker, but this morning to a Statesman representative he admitted giving a fictitious name.
With tears streaming down his face Bushey denied that he had contemplated the taking of the president's life. The police say otherwise, however. Deputy Sheriff Blakley arrived in the city early yesterday morning and informed Chief Kauffman of statements Bushey had made in Pendleton Saturday in which he is alleged to have said he was coming to Walla Walla Monday to kill the president. He had a rifle and two cartridges, one for Roosevelt and one for the German Emperor.
Bushey arrived in Walla Walla Sunday evening, walking the entire distance from Pendleton, carrying a .15-calibre Winchester. This he left at the Farmers' livery stable in Fifth street, and alleged to have said that he would call for it Monday as yet.
Yesterday morning he applied at the Walla Walla Meat Company's market for a position and Manager Herry put him on for the day. Everyone noticed the new man acted rather peculiarly. And in the rush of business little attention was paid to him. Officer Morse and three other policemen appeared at the shop at 1 o'clock and placed him under arrest.
At the jail when questioned Bushey broke down this morning to a Statesman reporter, denying that he was an anarchist, but a second later made the statement that he was a socialist in the truest sense of the word. He disclaimed any intention of making hate statements.
Bushey explained his movements of the past month by saying that he was originally from the Sound, working at his trade as a butcher. He had been thrown out of employment and went to Portland. Strikes and general labor disturbances prevented him from obtaining a situation, and he had joined a party of prospectors and gone into the Huntington district on a prospecting trip. At the suggestion of a member of the party that, as they were going into a wild country, it would be well to take a gun along, one of the party purchased a Winchester. During the trip into the interior and his own owner of the gun contemplated throwing it away to lighten his pack.
The trip did not pan out, leading him to Pendleton where he worked for a few days. Saturday he left on foot.
In an era before modern mental health interventions or background checks, economic precarity often manifested as public spectacle and violence. Bushey’s story is a stark reminder of how labor displacement—caused by the strikes and joblessness mentioned in his own defense—could push vulnerable individuals toward desperate, theatrical acts of political grievance, blurring the line between genuine radicalism and personal crisis.
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