NEWS:  Cambria Freeman; 15 Mar 1912; Ebensburg, Cambria Cnty., PA

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Cambria Freeman
Ebensburg, Pa.
Friday, 15 Mar 1912
Volume 45, Number 11


Local and Personal 

Because of the fact that a child who had been attending the parochial school in this 
place became ill with a very mild case of diphtheria, Father H. M. O'Neill has ordered 
that the schools be closed for one week and properly fumigated.  Dr. F. C. Jones, 
President of the Board of Health of Ebensburg, advised against the closing of the school,
feeling that under the circumstances such action was unnecessary.

The County Commissioners have reappointed Major W. H. H. Bell, of Patton, an agent to 
see that soldiers of the Rebellion are buried and their graves marked with head stones 
and markers to hold the flag, he having held that office for over two years.  Any one 
who finds a grave of a soldier that is not marked or when a soldier dies, if they will 
inform the agent, it will have the proper attention.


Lilly Operator Receives Black Hand Letter
Lilly, March 11

M. P. Piper, the coal operator, yesterday received a "Black Hand" letter demanding $500 
under penalty of death. Accompanying the missive was a cartridge, indicating that 
refusal of the demand would mean a bullet.  County Detective S. J. McClune and local 
officers are working on the case but up until noon today had not made any arrests.


"I Didn't Mean to Kill Dad," He Says.
John Parrish Declares He Wouldn't Have Had the Heart to Do It.
Says 'Twas Accident

John Parrish, 13-year-old son of the late Bernard J. Parrish, Thursday made a written 
statement, confessing that he had shot and killed his father in the barn on the Parrish 
farm, but claiming that the gun had been discharged accidentally while he was trying to 
put the trigger down and that he did not at first know that he had shot his parent.  The 
boy makes affidavit to the statement which in full is as follows:

"I started out to trap polecats, went out to set some traps, went to town to buy some 
things and then went down to the lake and then I went to Addie Pryce's to see Harry, 
then I went to Scanlon's and Leo wasn't home, he was in town.  I waited on him until he 
came home and asked him for his gun; then we was shooting mark.  I then went back 
to the woods to see some traps.  I shot at a squirrel and went to pull the box with the 
shells out of my pocket and they all fell out of my pocket. But three.  I then went up to 
the barn, hoping to see some rats or squirrels.  I went into the fodder room, laid the 
gun upon the sill loaded and I went to put the trigger down, it slipped and went off.

"I heard something fall again and I thought that I had shot father.  I got sick and didn't 
know what I was doing.  I ran to tell Edward about it; he went to Henry O'Harra.  I went 
back to Scanlon's with the gun, then to Edward Parrish's place, then to Boley's, then 
back home.   I had no thoughts to shoot him; he always treated me right.  I did not 
know I shot him for I couldn't do it. I couldn't have the heart."

Bernard J. Parrish, a prominent farmer, was found dead in his barn at Winterset 
Wednesday evening.  Death had been caused by a bullet fired into the top of his head 
from above him and physicians declare the wound could not have been self-inflicted.  At 
3:30 Wednesday afternoon John Parrish, 13 years old, borrowed a neighbor boy's 
flobert rifle.  When he returned the gun two hours later he said:  "I just found Dad dead 
in the barn.  Somebody must have killed him."

The elder Parrish was gathering eggs apparently when shot.  When he was found, he 
was sitting in a corner of the barn, a pile of eggs overturned at his side.

John Parrish played truant from school Wednesday.  His brother, Edward, 16, went to 
school as usual.  While John Parrish was returning the rife he borrowed from Leo 
Scanlan, the neighbor, his brother returned home and found the dead body.  A few 
minutes later John returned with Leo Scanlan.  The boys ran to the home of A. Pryce 
and told them of the finding of their father's body.  County Detective S. J. McClune 
investigated the affair and as a result arrested John Parrish and brought him to jail. The 
boy is apparently unconcerned, while his brother is greatly affected.

Some weeks ago John Parrish ran away from home and was arrested by the Altoona 
police.  He was brought home by his father and watched closely so that he could not run 
away again. The boy is said to have been very angry with his father because his mother 
left home some weeks ago and later brought suit for divorce against the elder Parrish.  
He was devoted to his mother who went to live in Cresson when she left the elder 
Parrish.

The county detective Wednesday night examined young Parrish closely.  The boy 
admitted that he played hook from school that day and said he spent the morning in 
Ebensburg, returning home in the afternoon to hunt polecats.  He had a lot of 
cartridges, .22 long and borrowed young Scanlan's rifle.  When asked what he did with 
the cartridges he didn't use, he said they got wet and he threw them away.


Henry C. Orbagast
Altoona

As a result of a wound received in the body during the battle of the Wilderness, Henry 
C. Orbagast, aged 70, died here.  He served with distinction in the Forty-ninth 
Pennsylvania volunteers and participated in many of the hardest engagements of the 
Civil War. 


Dr. Guiley 

Word was received here last week of the death at Easton of Doctor Guiley, a brother of 
Mrs. H. A. Tompkins, of this place, and on Sunday, Mrs. Tompkins and children, Isabel 
and Guiley and Mrs. Alice Chapman departed for Easton to attend the funeral.