KinSource - Tale of the Week - Boy Trails A Man Who Cut Another

KinSource

Minnesota Tales

The St. Paul Globe, May 25, 1904, p. 2

BOY TRAILS A MAN WHO CUT ANOTHER

Detectives Arrest William Baumeister for Stabbing George Berger Dangerously.

"That fellow stabbed a man!" cried William Jones, a fifteen-year-old boy living at 16½ West Third street, as he pointed out a hurrying figure to Detectives Fraser and O'Brien, at the corner of Third and Market streets, at midnight last night.

The boy had shadowed the man from the upper levee, where the stabbing occurred, and, recognizing the officers, called their attention to him. The man, whose name is William Baumeister, alias Mason, was caught and locked up at the station.

In a little shack at No. 6 Upper Levee George Berger, twenty-six years old, was lying with his back slashed with knife wounds and bleeding profusely from three deep gashes, thought to have penetrated the lungs. When Dr. Moore, police surgeon, reached him he was extremely weak from loss of blood. After being bandaged he was hurried to the city hospital.

Berger, who owns the shack in which he lived with two lodgers, had given Baumeister shelter during the last three nights. Last night, when Baumeister was to retire to a bunk, he is said to have become abusive. Berger then ordered him from the shack.

Stabs His Host.

Baumeister swore at Berger, and when the latter attempted to drive him away, Baumeister drew a knife. Berger clinched with Baumeister, but relinquished his hold and fell to the ground, after being cut.

Baumeister then walked away, but he was followed by young Jones, who witnessed the encounter, and who trailed him till he turned him over to the officers. Baumeister was wanted by the police on a charge of larceny, a warrant having been issued for him last winter.

"I was going to stop into Berger's place for a few minutes while on my way home," said the boy to a Globe reporter, "when I saw Berger chase Baumeister from the shack and into the road. Before I reached them they had come together, and I saw Berger fall. When I reached him Baumeister had left him and was on his way down the road towards the city. The men in the shack came out and carried Berger in and laid him on a couch, while I ran after Baumeister. I kept a safe distance behind him, and he didn't see me. I trailed him nearly a mile. He walked up Hill street, and when he reached Market street I saw Detectives Fraser and O'Brien, and I yelled to them. They ran to him and found his hands all covered with blood, and took him to the station."

Berger, while very weak, was able to give an account of the affair. He said he had ordered Baumeister from his shack on account of a disturbance the man had created. When Baumeister swore at him he ran to him and was met in the road. Baumeister showed fight, and when they clenched stabbed him in the back.