Alderman Mark Fortenbery was admittedly gun shy while on the campaign trail — and with good reason.

When Fortenbery was campaigning for the position of Ward 5 alderman for the City of Natchez, he got a surprise he never could have anticipated.

As he was going from door to door near Adams County Christian School one homeowner pulled a gun on him.

“It was one of the biggest pistols I’ve ever seen in my life, because it was right there in my nose,” Fortenbery said. “He opened the door and he had it fully drawn right up to my face.”

Fortenbery put his hands up in surrender and told the resident he was only campaigning.

“(The resident) said, ‘You can’t trust anyone these days,’” Fortenbery said.

Fortenbery simply gave the man a push card to prove he was campaigning and then the man put the gun aside.

For the next couple of seconds Fortenbery kept talking to the man, who continued to clutch the gun.

“It wasn’t like he had just made a mistake. He never did say ‘sorry,’” Fortenbery said. “He did say he’d vote for me.”

Not only was Fortenbery new to campaigning, it was only his third day pounding the pavement.

“I’ve never had a gun pulled on me all my life,” he said. “It scared me to death.”

The biggest thing Fortenbery worried about as he started the campaign trail was getting bit by a dog, he said.

After the gun incident, he said he wasn’t going to quit campaigning, but he treaded a little more lightly.

“You could say I was a little bit gun shy,” he said.

Bob Pollard

Bob Pollard was campaigning for Ward 4 alderman when he and his daughter discovered someone who wouldn’t be voting for him.

Pollard said he had enlisted family help on the campaign trail and they were going door-to-door.

His 20-year-old daughter had knocked on a door, taken a step back and seen a man’s foot in the flowerbed.

“She ran to the front yard and collapsed and started squalling,” Pollard said.

The Pollards called 911 and later learned the elderly man died of natural causes.

“That’s the most odd thing to happen to anybody,” Pollard said.

“One thing’s for sure, you never know what’s behind that door,” he said. “I never dreamed of anything like that happening.”

Donnie Holloway

Natchez City Clerk Donnie Holloway has been around the block a few times when it comes to campaigning, but in 2007 when he ran for circuit clerk, he got a bit of a surprise.

“I was knocking on people’s doors, and I came to this house — I didn’t even knock on the door — and the dog came charging out at me,”

Holloway said.

The owner of the house reprimanded the dog, which kept it from attacking Holloway, but as soon as he stopped paying attention the dog took advantage.

“I turned around after I gave her my push card, and the dog was latched onto my leg,” he said.

The dog, which clamped on to the back of Holloway’s upper leg, was a mixed breed with what looked like some pit bull in it, Holloway said.

“I moved on quickly,” he said.

He said on the campaign trail, you never know what you’re going to find behind closed doors.

Holloway said he also knocked on the door of a different house, and he was invited in only to find a couple in bed together.

“They thought I was a relative,” Holloway said.