Yet Another Horse Thief Story

This time the victim was John F. Dorman, whose land lay between Hobart and Ainsworth where the Indian Ridge Golf Course is now. John was then about 50 years old, well known and respected in the area. What makes this event interesting is that the Gazette printed John's own detailed account of the crime and the investigation. He and two of his sons, all civilians, worked side-by-side with law enforcement personnel and also conducted some independent inquiries. But perhaps we should let John speak for himself:

Saturday morning [March 5, 1910] about 1 o'clock a man opened a window with an ax, stood on a box and got into my storm shed and then into my house. He stole a razor, a pocket knife, shoes and overshoes. Then took the lantern, went out into the granary and put on my boy's shoes, got a bridle and a saddle from the granary, and then took a white horse out and fled.

Next morning I notified Sheriff Grant and Inspector Dorman, my brother in Chicago. Grant came over with Fred Furman in his auto and started out. We made a round of about one hundred miles that day, took in every town within his reach, visited the gypsy camp at Thornton, saw some three hundred horses at that place and offered a reward of 50 dollars for the capture of the thief. Inspector Dorman sent word to all out stations to be on guard for a white horse with saddle.

Sunday Grant and Furman met my brother at the yards and a force was put on in the city.* Every sale barn was searched. My brother sent a man with me and we took in all the lodging houses that night till 11 o'clock, and Monday we went to work again and took in the auction sales. Monday night Sheriff Wood from Porter county got word that a man had been seen near Hebron, Ind., riding a horse Saturday morning, going east.

Sunday Clarence and Carlisle [John's sons] went to South Bend, Laporte and Niles, Mich., and found that some horses had been stolen the same night that my horse had been stolen, so Monday afternoon Sheriff Wood went east. Monday night Wood phoned Grant that a horse had been found between Boone Grove and Hulburt station — a white horse. Grant and Furman got me the same night and we went to Valpo, got Sheriff Wood and arrived at the place at midnight. We found the horse in a farmer's barn and the saddle and bridle and blanket about a mile from there in another man's barn. The horse had been left on a lonely road and the man had fled, but I am satisfied that Grant will get him.

If Grant got him, the paper didn't report it.

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*He may have meant Chicago — it was often referred to simply as "the city" in the newspapers of this era.

Source: "Horse Thief at Work." Hobart Gazette 11 Mar. 1910 [paragraph breaks added].