(1) A TRAGEDY NEAR PRESSWOOD.
A NOTED CITIZEN FATALLY WOUNDED.
Phillips Shot by Lon May, Who from a Log House Defies the Officers, Who Expect Trouble.
PRESSWOOD, Tex., July 5.-Lon May about 6 o’clock killed a well-known and prominent citizen of this county, Mr. Clarence Phillips. The affray took place at Peterson’s woodyard, near this place.
FROM ANOTHER SOURCE.
HOUSTON, Tex., July 5.-A telegram came to the city this evening that Clarence Phillips of Presswood had been shot and killed at 6 o’clock this morning by a man named May. No particulars of the affair came with the dispatch. Phillips is widely known in this section of Texas as a great bear hunter. He owned packs of dogs and spent much of his time in the big thicket hunting bears.
LATER.-Capt. Gaston Ashe of Houston, arrived tonight with Clarence Phillips in his care. Phillips had received a pistol ball just below the left eye, the ball lodging in the head. Phillips is probably fatally wounded. He was sent to the infirmary for treatment. The difficulty occurred near Presswood. Phillips and a man named Lon May had been to a party during the night. In the morning May took a violin belonging to Phillips, remarking that he would cut it to pieces. Phillips attempted to take the instrument away from May, who became enraged and fired the shot with the above results. Phillips fell, covered with blood and insensible, and it was generally believed that the shot would prove fatal. After firing the shot May loitered about in the vicinity during the day. This evening a constable and justice went after May and found him in a old log house armed with a double barreled shotgun and a six shooter. The officers ordered him to surrender but he treated them with indifference. The sheriff of Montgomery County, where the shooting was done, and of Harris County, have been notified of the shooting and the character of the man who did it, and it is probable that blood will flow when the capture is attempted. Phillips is an old citizen of Montgomery County, and is generally liked.
Source: The Dallas Morning News, Dallas, Texas, Wednesday, July 6, 1887; Pg. 1
(2) Add’l. Info.
Houston, Tex., July 16.-At 8 o’clock this morning at Stuart & Boyle’s infirmary, Clarence Phillips breathed his last. Justice A.R. Railey was summoned and held an inquest on the body, receiving the following testimony:
Dr. T.J. Boyles, resident physician of the infirmary, swore: I am the physician in charge of the infirmary. Mr. Phillips came to the infirmary on July 5. He was suffering from a gunshot wound in the brain, which caused his death. He died in the infirmary this morning, July 16, at about 8 o’clock. Upon examination after death we found that the ball had entered at the union of the nasal and frontal bones and passed through the othenoid bone, through the brain substance, but did not make its exit through the skull.
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Source: The Galveston Daily News, Galveston, Texas, Sunday, July 17, 1887; Pg. 3
