The Fifth Chief

When young (28) Isachar Combs became police chief of Evarts, Ky. (pop. 2,100), he took on a pretty big job. Four other men had had the job since last summer. The first one just quit, the second one was shot to death, the third one quit after his assistant was shot and wounded, the fourth one quit after being arrested for drunkenness. Evarts, in bloody Harlan County, is a dry town in a coal-mining district and Evarts bootleggers do a good, steady business.

One day last week tall, skinny Isachar Combs and Patrolman Lewis Deaton locked up three men. One of them had a pint of moonshine which he said he had got from Bryan Middleton, 48, who ran a restaurant in Evarts. Combs and Deaton got a search warrant and walked over to Middleton's restaurant.

As Deaton later recalled it: "Middleton came out just as we got there. He drew two guns and shot. I threw one on him and the shooting really began. I shot eight shots, Combs ten shots. There were 33 in all." Middleton died with ten bullets in him. Deaton, wounded slightly in the hip, was taken to the hospital.

Chief Combs was arrested for murder. After that, he posted bond and went back to his duties.

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