MOMENTS IN TIME: Alleged Knotts Store Robber in Jail in 1914

(08/03/2023)
Transcribed by Norma Knotts Shaffer from microfilm of the Calhoun Chronicle dated 7/30/1914.

Alleged Burglar Caught and Is in Jail

If guilty of the crimes which it is alleged he has committed, George Smith, who now reposes in the county jail at this place, probably considers himself a most unlucky individual.

Along in the fall of 1911 the store of R. J. Knotts, at Frozen, this county, was broken into and robbed by unknown parties.  An attempt was made to find the guilty parties and rewards offered for their arrests, but they made good their escape.  At the same time other stores in that section of the country were burglarized.

Wednesday evening of last week an individual giving his name to the officers as George Smith and claiming his home at Parkersburg, was arrested on the charge of frightening two little girls who were playing on the Scott hill east of town.  He was brought to town and lodged in the county jail by Sheriff Knotts.  When Mrs. Knotts took his supper to him she at once recognized him as a suspicious character who was in the store at Frozen on the day of the robbery of Mr. Knott's store.  She immediately notified her husband and Roy Parsons, who also saw the man in the Frozen vicinity carrying a peculiarly shaped cane, was also summoned here and identified him as the man with the cane.  The cane was left in the store the night the robbery was committed.

Thursday Justice F. S. Wilson issued a warrant fixing his preliminary trial for today (Wednesday) at which time other witnesses will be examined and an attempt made to fasten the robbery upon Smith.