Boy killed on Hantsport street Oct. 31, 1903.

Young Nova Scotians in the early 1900s  knew nothing about Hallowe'en. Trick-or-treating began in the 1900s in the western USA. It spread after the end of sugar rationing in 1947. Children's magazines, TV programs, and a Walt Disney movie rapidly spread the idea from coast to coast. (LINK). 

In Hantsport, young boys collected rotten produce and then strolled through town throwing the items at people's house. Boys in New England did the same thing.


On October 31, 1902, several such boys were acting out this tradition in Hantsport. .They walked down Main Street, crossed Willow Bridge and into Hants Border, and continued to throw the rotten produce. Tomatoes were probably most popular because they made a great mess. And they threw the produce at a house owned by Truman Trefry. Huge mistake!

Trefry was furious. The next morning he went to the town constable and demanded action against the boys. The constable probably said that boys will be boys and that they would grow out of it.

On  October 31, 1903, a group of boys gathered, collected the rotten produce, walked down Hantsport's Main Street, over Willow Bridge, and into Hants Border. Same as last year. Another big mistake!

This year Truman Trefry was waiting behind his fence with his gun loaded with No. 4 shot.

When the boys threw the produce, Truman pulled the trigger. And he shot one of the boys in the back.

The wording on Percy Corkum's tombstone states, "Erected by Percy's supporters." It stands today in Hantsport's Riverbank Cemetery. If you walk right when you enter between the second set of pillars, walk around the loop, you will come to it immediately before the Churchill Family plot.

Trefry was tried by in court, found not guilty, and continued to live in his house for a few years before moving away.