Unexpected Encounter with a Bear near Laatsch
Report on the woodcutter Franz Thoma, who successfully defended himself against an attacking female bear near Laatsch in the Glurns district using an axe and a tree branch. A summoned hunter eventually dispatched the animal.
Full transcription
On the 12th of this month, Franz Thoma, half an hour from the village of Laatsch, judicial district of Glurns, while cutting wood, was suddenly surprised by the sight of an 8- to 9-year-old female bear and forced into self-defence by her life-threatening approach. A blow with a wood axe stunned the roaring predator, which was probably debilitated by hunger; several strikes with a tree branch knocked it to the ground, while the 15-year-old Paulmichl — who, along with two women, watched the rare duel from some distance — fetched a hunter whose shot extinguished the last remains of life. The courageous Thoma is anything but of Herculean build, being rather of small and slender stature; nor will it be easy to find a similar example of such an overpowering of a full-grown bear accomplished without actual weapons.
1836 at a glance
The year 1836 in and around Merano was marked by extreme weather fluctuations in February, featuring storms, heavy snowfall, and rapid shifts in temperature and barometric pressure. Additionally, a bear attack in the Glurns judicial district in March—in which a lumberjack successfully defended himself—attracted notable attention. These events document the environmental and climatic conditions of the region during that period. →
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"Unexpected Encounter with a Bear near Laatsch." Der Bote für Tirol, 21 March 1836. https://digital.tessmann.it/tessmannDigital/Zeitungsarchiv/Seite/Zeitung/47/1/21.03.1836/151278/3. https://www.meran-archive.com/en/artikel/1836-03-21-unerwartete-baerenbegegnung-bei-laatsch