SCARFACE

Campfire, MS> (as told by Hershel Howell) It was early in my deerhunting career and the truth is I did not know much about deerhunting.
In the late fifties and early sixties there was no real decent hunting gear to keep warm, but I already knew that I hated freezing to death on a deer stand. Bramlett Garrett and I hunted a lot together then and after much whiskey and deliberation we figured out how to stay warm on our deerstands. We put together a simple battery powered hand warmer to take to our stands. We bought the materials and a car
battery apiece, lugged the batteries in to our stands before the coldest part of the season and waited.
The day arrived and it was freezing cold. A light rain had fallen and turned to ice the day before and we trudged to our stands excited about a big buck and knowing we would stay warm. My stand was covered in a sheet of ice, but very carefully I broke the ice off my seat, moved the battery around, hooked it up and relaxed. In the middle of the morning,I was straining for any sound or movement and turned in my stand at the least little crack of a branch or sound when my foot slipped and hit the battery. The battery, sitting on the sheet of ice, shot out of the deerstand! In horror, I looked down just in time to see the battery land right between the antlers of a huge buck, knocking it to the ground as the battery stuck on the large Browtines.
Amazed, I watched as the deer lay still.
I could see acid running down the side of the deers’ face. There was no doubt in my mind that the deer was dead.
I carefully climbed down out of the tree.
Reaching the ground I prodded the big old buck with my gunbarrel to be sure it was dead. It did not move. I laughed, laid my gun down and reached out to grab it’s massive antlers. Just then the buck came alive and took off! The battery firmly stuck between its’ antlers.
That was the last time I saw him but for years people recognized him by the white scar from the acid down the side of his face. Other people said you could tell it was him if you saw the word DIEHARD coming at you through the woods.