Burglary in Clinton
Submitted by Donnie PickardClinton Banner, January 19, 1882, page 3
For some time past a number of the stores around town have been burglariously entered, and small sums of money and articles of goods taken away. About every week some store was thus robbed, but no clue to the guilty party could be had, though it was evident that whoever he might be he was perfectly familiar with all the surroundings in the stores which he entered; and this fact forced the conviction that it must be some one about town.
On last Tuesday night the store of Messrs. Bradshaw & Thornbrough was entered from the south up-stairs window, the party ascending to the roof of the side room, approached the window, broke in a pane of glass and removed the bar, raised the window and went in. On Wednesday morning the proprietors discovered what had been done, but neither did or said anything publicly about the burglary, keeping watch that night and the next, without making any discovery. On Friday night last they again kept watch, and about ten o-clock they heard some one in sock feet approaching the window. On reaching the window he stopped, looked in, and then putting his hand through the hole which he had made the Tuesday night before, removed the bar, raised the window, crawled in, and let the window down behind him, and just as he was in the act of straightening up, Dr. Thornbrough, armed with a club and standing within four feet of him, demanded that he stand and hold up his hands, while at the same time W.J. Pate, who was keeping watch with the doctor, exhibited the muzzle of a double-barrelled shot-gun. There was nothing to do but to surrender. A match was lighted, and the burglar proved to be Charlie Duncan, a young man about eighteen years old, and one of our own town boys, of good family, and heretofore well thought of. He was lodged in jail that night, and on Saturday morning carried before A.J. Leonard, Esq., and waiving an examination was held to bail in the sum of five hundred dollars. The bail has been given.
Many citizens about town were surprised, and all were grieved that Charlie should have been guilty of such an offense, while his father and mother grieve as if a son had been buried. The entire community sympathize with the parents.