A Deadly Encounter at Holmes' Harbor
A logger's simple attempt to protect his food from local wildlife ends in a tragic, accidental shooting.
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.
Christian Zunnerman, of Holmes' Harbor, called at our office on Tuesday last. He informs us that a fatal accident took place there on Thursday, June 1st. The accident happened as follows: George Scott, a logger at that place, being greatly annoyed by a lot of Siwash dogs, rushed into his camp to get his gun and move it in the bunk. In attempting to pull it from behind his trunk where it was placed, the hammer was caught on the trunk, and was pulled back sufficiently to discharge the gun, the contents being lodged in his abdomen. He lived until the next day, when he died at about 10 o'clock P.M. Dr. Hill, of Coupeville, was sent for, who arrived after death had taken place. No inquest was held. He was buried by his friends, near the camp.
“In attempting to pull it from behind his trunk where it was placed, the hammer was caught on the trunk, and was pulled back sufficiently to discharge the gun.”
This account captures the raw, frontier nature of late 19th-century Whidbey Island life, where a stray dog and a misplaced rifle could turn a work camp into a place of sudden mourning. While the colloquialisms used for the local indigenous-owned dogs remind us of the era's biased language, the story serves as a stark reminder of how high-stakes and perilous life was for the laborers who built the infrastructure of the Puget Sound region.
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