LION HUNT IN DORSET

Taranaki Daily News, 6 August 1929, Page 12

LION HUNT IN DORSET

ESCAPE FROM MENAGERIE TERROR-STRICKEN PEOPLE. KILL BY VILLAGE POSTMAN. London, June 28. A lion leaped through the fields at Charmouth, a. Dorsetshire village, last week, scattering terror and panic at every leap. It had escaped from a passing circus menagerie. Men bolted, women screamed, children shrieked, but tho lion went on leaping. It roared frightfully. It sprang among a herd of cows and brought one down. The moment produced the man. Ho was Air. Percy Smith, the village postman. Mr. Smith fought in the 31st Regiment of the Canadian Division in France. He stalked the lion with a German souvenir revolver, and shot it dead. The animal was in a that was being pulled along the road by a tractor. The driver appeared to be in difficulties, and backed the vehicles into the side of the road. In doing so the cage containing the lion struck a tree. The impact caused the door of the cage to become unfastened.

The lion first of all prowled about the road, and holidaymakers coming 'along in cars pulled up in amazement, and backed away in a hurry. The road was soon crowded with cars, which pulled up at some distance from the lion on either side. The lion eventually lay down beside the road, and it remained there quite unconcerned for about an hour, while the lines of held-up traffic grew longer. Then Air. Flcxmore, the manager of the show, and Air. Faber, the lion trainer, arrived on the scene and endeavoured to capture the lion. Hundreds of people had by this time reached the spot, but they took good care to keep at a distance from the lion, which lay down awaiting events. The trainer approached the lion, which knew him well, and allowed him to pat it on the head. He went as far as to put a walking stick in the lion’s mouth. The excited crowd looked on in astonishment at this extraordinary performance on the King’s highway. When, however, the trainer endeavoured to put a rope around the lion’s neck it became angry and growled at him. All at once it sprang up and jumped over the hedge into a field. This was the signal for the crowds of onlookers to take to their heels. Some rushed for the shelter of houses, and thereafter watched from bedroom windows. Others climbed telegraph poles and trees. The lion at first prowled among the cows in the field, taking no notice of them until one of the cows, which .had a calf, put her horns down and made for the lion. Then the lion sprang at the cow and mauled her badly. The trainer and manager realised that now the lion had drawn blood the only thing to do was to shoot it. Two or three of the men had ordinary shotguns, and although such weapons were useless as far as killing the lion was concerned, three shots were fired at the beast while it was mauling the cow. The shots sent the lion into a rage. It abandoned the cow and leaped across the field. Air. Alarsh, a Carmouth butcher, and the manager of the zoo both fired, and the lion was hit in the eye and hind leg. The wounds infuriated the lion still more, and it chased one of the men round a shed.

It dashed finely into a shed in which ‘gardening imploments were stored. Here Mr. Smith, the postman, fired :thre< shots at the lion with his. revolver, Farmers who had arrived with theii guns fired other shots to make sure that the lion was killed.