SERGEANT MURDERED. First Bloodshed in Croton Landing Strike. SOLDIER SHOT BY ASSASSIN.

Member of Mount Vernon Militia, While Relieving Guard, Suddenly Falls, Pierced With Bullet Fired By Unknown--Excitement Runs Wild Over Affair. CROTON LANDING, N. Y., April 17.--The first bloodshed as the outcome of the strike at the Cornell dam was the life's blood of Sergeant Robert Douglass of the Eleventh Separate company of Mount Vernon, who was shot dead by an unknown assassin while he was relieving guard at 9:50 o'clock last night.

The wildest excitement prevailed throughout the camp as soon as the news of the assassination spread to the different tents and the soldiers are frantic over the cowardly crime. The point where the sergeant fell is situated on top of the hill near Little Italy, where armed strikers were seen drilling or marching about early in the morning, brandishing rifles and shotguns. The spot is high over the huge pile of masonry, which when finished will reach as high as that point and from it one can command a view of the country for miles on each side up and down the Croton valley.

Douglass was talking to Corporal McDowell and other members of the guard when he suddenly slapped his hands to his stomach and said; "Load, boys, I'm shot," and then fell to the ground. It was pitch dark at the time, but McDowell and the others fired a volley into a clump of bushes nearby without hitting anyone. No one saw the flash or heard the sound of the shot which killed Douglass, and it was a most mysterious affair.

Meanwhile the men picked up the fallen sergeant and carried him down the hill on a stretcher, but as soon as they reached Douglass' tent the poor fellow died without saying a word other than what he said as he fell.