The Turnbo Manuscripts
by Silas Claiborne Turnbo
1844-1925
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A DEER THAT WAS HARD TO KILL
By S. C. Turnbo
Mr. Robert Sullivan, a long resident near Protem, Taney County, Mo., furnished the writer with the following interesting account one day in April, 1895, but the incident occurred many years before that. "One time," said Mr. Sullivan, "while I and Bill Adams and Jim Adams, son of Bill, were on a camp hunt on the head of the Cardwell Hollow that runs into Elbow Creek I shot a deer’s neckbone off or hock as some call it. As soon as I could reload my gun I shot it the second time and broke its foreleg below the knee which put the deer in a bad shape for running. It did not go straight forward but went in a circle. When I had reloaded my gun again I shot it in the hip, then the deer hobbled near 30 yards and lay down. At this time Jim Adams come up and shot the deer also and as soon as we both reloaded our rifles each of us shot it simultaneously. My ball hit it in the breast and Jim’s behind the shoulder or upper foreleg rather. After all these 6 shots it had received the deer held onto life and got up and hobbled to a pool of water and we followed it up and one of us hurled a stone at it and struck it on the head, and cut its throat and we kicked it into the water where death relieved its suffering." Continuing Mr. Sullivan said, "This was very barbarous to treat a deer in this way but we were hunters and was not on the mission of mercy. The statement I give you is correct and I give it to show the great hold on life some wild animals have," said Mr. Sullivan.
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