Show GI WEST 5 PLAY I 1 I 1 EVER SAW AS TOLD TO IM BY DARE DEVIL DAVE ALTIZER outfielder cincinnati red Stoc stockings kingst and who Is considered one of the most dangerous hitters and base runners the greatest play I 1 ever saw was made by a man of whom none of you fellows ever heard his ills name was hanton he was a private soldier in the united states army and Is now a first sergeant I 1 believe attached to a regiment at manila he made the play on a ball field at a all lage about twenty miles from hollo iloilo there was an expedition sent up to quiet down that part of the coun try and I 1 happened to be a mem her of it quieting down that section of the country was like quieting down bromo seltzer it fizzed up again as soon as the pressure was off we successful in finding trouble when we were looking for it but a whole lot successful in finding it when we t after a lot of bar hard d marching and sniping at night and chasing after that bunch of ansur rectos we uncovered a bunch of them had a good little scrap and thought it was all over so BO we WO settled down in camp at to rest a few days of course the filipinos who were our servants and best friends in daytime used to crawl out through the lines at night and take p pot ot shots at us then creep back and cook our breakfasts but we expecting any real scrapping we had plenty of time so we organized ed two baseball teams and played out on a little level bit of pasture land near the jungle not over a hundred yards from the edge of the village I 1 think my team had won two and lost two games and we decided to play off for the championship sunday after noon hanton was our left fielder and when he was in position he was within fifty yards of the edge of the thicket the outposts were on the other bide side of the ticket a hundred yards or so beyond the ball park in the eighth inning of that game the score was 4 to 3 in our favor with one out and runners on second and third for the other team we were so interested in the game that we didn dian t notice that a crowd of the natives who had been watching us commenced to sneak away most of bev DAVE ALTIZER them into the thicket the batter hit a a long fly to left field just as rifles began to crack in the thicket and bullets began to whistle past us our first baseman went down then jumped up and limped away with a bullet through his leg A corporal watching the game was bowled over the thicket began to spit fire and lead tor for a hundred yards and the alarm was raised la in the camp hanton saw the tall going over his head and turn ing be he chased after it it looked like a home run into the thicket but hanton kept right on as bard hard as he could go rifles cracked in front of him and we expected to see him drop but he grabbed that ball and turn ing made as pretty a v throw to the plate as ever you saw he might have caught the runner but there gasn wasn t any runner and carrol carroll our center fielder caught the ball on hia his way in ran and tou lied third base and nd claimed the double play because the runner left the bag before the ball was caught the umpire wasn gasn t there to give the decision but it went and we won the game hanton came s sprinting printing in unhurt and within ten minutes we had swept that bunch of Insurrect os out of the thicket and killed or captured most of them it seems they had been plit planning tor for three days to sneak through the picket line and attack us while the whole bunch was at the ball game and the thing that pre rented vented the success of it was that catch of hanton a I 1 we learned from some of the captives that when they saw hanton sprinting toward them with his arms up in the air and hie his face ace turned upward they thought he w was as leading a charge of gods or devils that he was calling out of the air to kill them and when they saw the ball coming they were sure it was leading the host of other balls and so many of them ran that it gave ua us time to get our arms and save th the day copyright cop right 1911 by W G chadman Chapman I 1 |