BATTLE WITH BANDITS

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 116, 24 August 1910, Page 3

BATTLE WITH BANDITS

DUEL TO THE DEATH IN AN AMERICAN TOWN. TRAIL OF .SILVER. 'New York, June 26.

An extraordinary shooting outrage occurred yesterday at Lynn, Massachusetts, where three armed desperadoes attempted to rob Thomas Landregan, a boot manufacturer, pf £BOO. The three men, ;who were notorious thieves, of Polish nationality, attacked Mr. Landregan after he had drawn the money from the bank to pay his employees. He wias killed, as well as a policeman'who tried to rescue him, while one bandit received fatal iiijuries, another was seriously wounded by the mob Which went in pursuit, and the third narrowly escaped JyneMng. The attack was one of the most daring ever attempted in an American »uu recalls the sensational tragedies'of the Western mining towns. It had well planned, and the principals* ( their ground thoroughly. ) ■" Mr. Landregan went to the banjc every Saturday morning, carrying a leather bag in 'which were the wages' of his own workmen deposited by the bank cashier. Yesterday the amount drawn from the bank was £BOO, in 'bank notes and silver, the latter being in rolls of twenty dollars each.

The bandits were waiting for him near • his office, and one of them shot him in. the head while another snatched the leather bag from his hand, and the third stood behind to prevent him pulling the J 'revolver which he always carried. . " A policeman named Carroll, 'who. was I only a few hundred feet ( away, * the shot, and, turning, saw the bandits fleeing with the, bag. He started in pur-' suit, and as the men refused to surrender he fired at them with his revolver. One of the fugitives immediately turned 1 and shot him through the chest. Carroll afterwards died in the hospital. The workmen, of the various factory buildings rushed to the windows when they heard the shots. They saw the ibandits running, and some of them hurl- ( ed hammers and pieces of metal at them. Within two minutes, the streets were filled, with a mob of pursuers. Although the bandits managed to elude the mob for. several miles, it was easy to trace them by the trail of silver dollars, dropped from the bag in order to .ligihten their burden.' Two of the bandits were cornered in a field about four miles from the scene of the surrender they promptly opened fire on the, crowd. A • volley of revolver shots was the response, and both robbers fell with many wounds. One of them died in the ambulance while being taken to i the hospital. ! The third bandit surrendered, and would have been hanged from a telegraph pole by the infuriated workmen but for the firm stand made by the police. He was eventually taken to prison, and identified as a robber who had served several sentences for burglary and highway robbery. This outrage is almost identical in its details with the Tottenham outrage of January, 1909. Two Russians robbed a clerk in the open street of a bag containing £BO of wages for workmen. iAn enormous crowd followed them, and as they fled they fired on their pursuers, killing Police Constable Tyler and a boy named Jocelyn. One of the fugitives committed suicide in a house and the other died of injuries.