FARMERS THRASH POLICE

Evening Star, Issue 22145, 27 September 1935, Page 14

FARMERS THRASH POLICE

SCENE AT A FORGED SALE One thousand angry farmers, uttering threats, tearing clothes, and swinging fists, surrounded Henry Dillingham, United States marshal, and three aides on the courthouse lawn at Plattsburg recently and forcibly prevented the foreclosure sale of a farm. “ It was awful,” Mr Dillingham said later in describing how farmers circled him and kept him prisoner from 1.30 to 5 p.m. “ They were in an ugly mood.” The crowd tore the trousers of George Colburn. a Federal court • bailiff, snatched his pistol from him, and beat him with fists. The farmers also seized the pistol of E. E. Fisher, another bailiff. They jostled Robert Pulhum, a deputy, who drove the motor car which carried the four from Kansas City to Plattsburg. Some of the throng cut ft tyre on the car to let out the air, and removed the carburettor, Dillingham related later at his home in Platte City. “ They belonged to some sort of a farmers’ union, which is planning to do the same thing at foreclosure sales throughout this section,” he said. “ The farmers told me that I was just doing the bidding of a Republican Federal judge, Merrill E. Otis. They said ugly things about the United States Supreme Court. They told me that Governor Park, of Missouri, had issued a moratorium for every onp except the farmers.” In Kansas City Judge Otis refused “ to comment on a case which may come before me.” A spokesman for the farmers, who would not disclose his identity, said their action was directed at loan companies.