SHOT A NEIGHBOR, THEN
ACTED GOOD SAMARITAN.
German Woman Gardner Attempted
to Frighten Victor Marten With
Gun That Wasn't Loaded.
MRS. MARY WILSDORF.
After emptying the contents of a shotgun into the left thigh of Victor Marten, a gardener, Mrs. Mary Wilsdorf, 46 years old, wife of a gardener at Seventy-seventh street and Walrond avenue, yesterday afternoon got on a Marlborough street car and came to the city and gave herself up to Chief of Police Frank F. Snow.
Before leaving her home she gave the wounded man a glass of water and left him lying on the ground near her house in charge of her husband, Carl Wilsdorf, who was later arrested by Mounted Patrolman E. B. Chiles.
Mrs. Wildorf and Marten are neighbors, each owning a ten acre tract of land.
From the facts elicited from the woman through Dr. George Ringle, surgeon at the Emergency hospital, who acted as interpreter for the police, the shooting followed a quarrel, about Marten's horses getting into the truck garden of the Wilsdorf's.
She said the horses frequently trampled the vegetables. One of them wandered over from the Marten field yesterday to the Wildorf land and was locked up in the barn.
When Marten went to the Wilsdorf house to get his horse he was asked to pay a small amount of money for alleged damages. A dispute arose and Mrs. Wilsdorf said that Marten held aloft a potato digger and threatened to kill her.
She said she then ran into the house and got her husband's shotgun, and returned to the yard. When within five feet of Marten the gun was discharged and the contents of one barrel entered the left thigh of Marten. He fell to the ground and asked for a drink of water which was given to him by Mrs. Wilsdorf.
Her husband told her she had better go to town and give herself up to the police, which advice she took. when she first entered police headquarters she was a little excited, and, not being able to speak good English, was misunderstood. The patrolman she met believed her to say a man shot her in the leg, so he directed her to the Emergency hospital. At the hospital Dr. Ringle took her in charge, and, learning that she was the person who did the shooting, took her back to the police station. She was turned over to Chief Snow.
Mrs. Wilsdorf informed the police that the man was still lying in the yard at her home and needed medical attention. Dr. George Todd, 4638 Troost avenue, attended to the man's injuries. Dr. Todd called an ambulance from Freeman & Marshall's and had the man taken to the University hospital.
The woman told Captain Whitsett that she had never before handled a shotgun and did not know exactly how to use it. The one she got in the house was broken at the breech and as she was running with it toward Marten she was trying to replace it. Suddenly the gun snapped into place and was discharged. She said she really did not think it was loaded, but was only trying to scare Marten. She was locked up in the matron's room.
