Deafening Shot
James Hare was a meat peddler for Edward A. Kellogg in the Feeding Hills section of Agawam,
Massachusetts. (Edward Kellogg's store was at the crossroads in Feeding Hills Center. It was the largest village store in the area, employing seven to nine clerks and maintaining a fleet of delivery wagons.)
Part of James's route included the Longyard District in neighboring Southwick - a place you did not want to be at night, especially if you were someone like James, who was known to carry a lot of money on his person from his meat route, which he would usually finish and return to his Feeding Hills home by 6:00 p.m. However, on November 17, 1898, James's route took longer, probably due to the rainy weather and muddy roads.
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| Feeding Hills Produce was Kellogg's Store at one time. |
While driving his covered meat wagon through a dark, lonely stretch of the Longyard, a team sped past James as he went up a small hill beyond the last house he passed. The men in the wagon stopped their horse and waited for James.
As James approached, he heard a man in the road groaning in distress. So, he stopped his wagon and grabbed his lantern from the footboard. As James held up his lantern and leaned forward to investigate, a bullet struck his left ear, rupturing his ear drum. (The shooter was so close to James's wagon that the shot burned James's face and hair.)
The gunshot startled James's horse, which took off, eventually turning at the road leading to the center of town (modern day's Feeding Hils Road).
The would-be robbers followed James but lost sight of him when the wind blew his lantern out. Before reaching the railroad tracks, James's horse veered off the road, and the men passed him by without realizing it.
Disoriented in the total darkness, without the help of his lantern, James got back on the road and accidentally headed west toward Southwick Center. He stopped at the first place he came to, the Crowley farm. Mr. Jackson, a neighbor of the Crowleys, accompanied James to his Feeding Hills home and summonsed the local doctor.
James's pain was so intense that they had to restrain him so the doctor could examine him and treat his wounds. The doctor decided against removing the bullet that ruptured James's left ear drum, rendering him deaf in that ear.
Mr. Kellogg went to the Springfield Police Department and reported the assault on James's life. He also notified Southwick Selectman E. C. Dibble. Detectives from Springfield traveled to Feeding Hills and met with James, who retold his story, albeit differently from the one he told Mr. Jackson. After speaking with James, the detectives went to Southwick to talk to officials. Since the Longyard was outside the Springfield detectives' jurisdiction, all they could do was point out several clues they found and offer advice on the best methods to solve the case before returning to the City of Firsts.
Following their meeting with the Springfield detectives, Southwick selectmen announced that they were offering a $100 reward for information leading to the arrest of James's assailants.
On November 19, authorities arrested three men in connection with the shooting. They were George Moran, who lived in the Longyard, and William Thayer and Arthur Cruena of the Little River section of Westfield. (The arresting officer said Moran trembled like a leaf when he arrived at his house.)
Authorities brought the men to the Westfield lockup and forbade them from talking to each other on the way there. Once they arrived, authorities interrogated them separately, with the men giving widely different stories. Now, fans of the Southwick Time Machine may recall, David Moran was murdered in the Longyard in 1908. He was George's father.
Edited Out/Author's Additional Research Notes
Edward Kellogg was born in Feeding Hills on September 23, 1851. He married Southwick school teacher Alice Rising on November 29, 1871. She was born in Southwick on September 26, 1853. Edward died on January 24, 1933. Alice died on February 12, 1934. They were two of Agawam's best-known residents.
Kellogg's store was in a few locations- the largest at the crossroads. He opened his store in 1897. A couple of gentlemen purchased the former E. A. Kellogg store and opened it as Ferry & Bardwell in 1928.
James Hare got married about six weeks before the shooting. He started his meat route in October 1898.
Thieves broke into Kellogg's store several times over the years.
A hailstorm in July 1915 damaged Kellogg's store. Kellogg said a hailstone the size of two walnuts landed in front of his store.
When James was a sailor, he wrecked in the South Pacific. His rescuers carried him to Hong Kong. James eventually found his way to Liverpool before returning to America on the Dominion Line's Royal Mail steamship Cambroman. The ship carrying James left Liverpool on August 31, 1895, and arrived in Boston on September 10.
Some accounts say that James kicked his horse to get it to run. However, getting startled by the gunshot appears correct.
By January 1899, James had moved to Springfield.
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