diff --git a/src/scratchpad/src/org/apache/poi/hdf/extractor/WordDocument.java b/src/scratchpad/src/org/apache/poi/hdf/extractor/WordDocument.java
index c122d31c05..e8bc31643a 100644
--- a/src/scratchpad/src/org/apache/poi/hdf/extractor/WordDocument.java
+++ b/src/scratchpad/src/org/apache/poi/hdf/extractor/WordDocument.java
@@ -139,8 +139,8 @@ public final class WordDocument {
       {
           e.printStackTrace();
       }
-      System.exit(0);
   }
+
   /**
    * Spits out the document text
    *
diff --git a/src/scratchpad/testcases/org/apache/poi/hdf/extractor/TestWordDocument.java b/src/scratchpad/testcases/org/apache/poi/hdf/extractor/TestWordDocument.java
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..1cf29f4376
--- /dev/null
+++ b/src/scratchpad/testcases/org/apache/poi/hdf/extractor/TestWordDocument.java
@@ -0,0 +1,34 @@
+/* ====================================================================
+   Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one or more
+   contributor license agreements.  See the NOTICE file distributed with
+   this work for additional information regarding copyright ownership.
+   The ASF licenses this file to You under the Apache License, Version 2.0
+   (the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance with
+   the License.  You may obtain a copy of the License at
+
+       http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+
+   Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+   distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
+   WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+   See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
+   limitations under the License.
+==================================================================== */
+
+package org.apache.poi.hdf.extractor;
+
+import org.junit.Test;
+
+
+public class TestWordDocument {
+    @SuppressWarnings("deprecation")
+    @Test
+    public void testMain() {
+        // fails, but exception is caught and only printed
+        //WordDocument.main(new String[] {});
+        
+        //WordDocument.main(new String[] {"test-data/document/Word95.doc", "/tmp/test.doc"});
+        //WordDocument.main(new String[] {"test-data/document/Word6.doc", "/tmp/test.doc"});
+        WordDocument.main(new String[] {"test-data/document/53446.doc", "/tmp/test.doc"});
+    }
+}