untitled

Lyon County, Kansas

WHERE IS COLLINS?

An Americus Man Missing Since Wednesday

Had Money With Him and His Wife Thinks He May Have Been Murdered

Emporia, Kan., Aug. 20---J. M. Collins, of Americus, a town fifteen miles north of here, has mysteriously disappeared. His wife was here today hunting for him.

Collins started for this city last Wednesday evening with the intention of seeing a doctor and getting some medicine as he was sick. He was to have returned home the same evening, but up to this time he has not done so, and what is stranger, no evidence can be found that he ever reached this city; so it is evident that he disappeared between here and Americus.

Mrs. Collins thinks the he has been murdered. He had some money with him when he left home and this may have been an inducement for some one to have committed the crime. There is a possibility that Collins became insane and wondered away.

His dsiappearance is shrouded in a dense mystery.
(Kansas Semi-Weekly Capital ~ 23 Aug 1898)

EMPORIA MAN STABBED

Santa Fe Brakeman Charged With Attempted Murder

Emporia, Kan., Aug. 7---J. A. Downey was stabbed last night and today A. H. Elliott, a Santa Fe brakeman, was arrested on a complaint of Downey, charging him with assault with intent to kill. Elliott is out on bond. The preliminary will not be heard for a week or more, in order to allow Downey time to recover enough to be at the trial. He is now in bed with a wound that is serious and one that might result in his death if it should work open. Elliott, the arrested man, is also in bad shape. His lower jaw is broken. He says that Downey struck him with a billy club or some similar weapon.

It is the outcome of a fight at Downey's place about 10 o'clock last night.
(Kansas Semi-Weekly Capital ~ 10 Aug 1900)

GUNMAN KILLS 1 AND WOUNDS 4 IN KANSAS CHURCH SHOOTING

A heavily armed man walked into a crowded church Sunday and opened fire, killing one person and injuring four others before he was subdued by church members, authorities said.

The gunman entered through the side door of the Calvary Baptist Church during services shortly after 11 a.m. and fired several rounds from a semiautomatic handgun at the 100 people inside, police Chief Larry Blomenkamp said.

"He had no particular target. He just entered and started firing random shots," Blomenkamp said.

One witness told Emporia radio station KVOE that the gunman shouted "White supremacists!" before firing at parishioners in the predominantly white congregation. But Blomenkamp disputed this.

"He said absolutely nothing. He just walked in and began shooting," the police chief said.

The gunman was not a member of the church, and no motive was known, Blomenkamp said. The man was taken to the Lyon County Jail, but no formal charges were filed.

Police said they were trying to confirm the name of the man, decribed as about 30 and of Oriental descent. Police believe the man drove a car with California license plates.

Police found a duffel bag filled with additional handguns and ammunition in the church, Blomenkamp said.

A young woman who said her father was killed in the shooting said the gunman entered the rear of the church, shouted at the congregation and began firing.

"I thought it was a joke," she said. The woman declined to give her name.

Emporia, a college community of 25,000 is about 110 miles southwest of Kansas City, Mo.
(Augusta Chronicle ~ March 7, 1988)

HERTZ AND BRIDE NO. 2

Douglas Hertz whose wife was killed in the wreck of their motor car at Saffordville, May 11, and who was married a second time eight weeks later is, with his second wife, furnishing much good copy for the newspapers at a particularly dull season. Saturday night Hertz shot himself, presumably becaue the second Mrs. Hertz had deserted him. Sunday's Kansas City Star says:

"The honeymoon troubles of Douglas G. Hertz, who has lost two brides in ten weeks, may end in death for himself. He shot himself just above the heart last night in E. E. Clapp's saloon, 320 East Ninth Street. He was taken to the Emergency Hospital, where it was said he probably would not live until morning.

"Hertz, graduate of Cambridge University, world traveler, prize fight promoter and son of a member of the British Parliament, married Miss Madeline Lawless, of Strong City, Kan., in Kansas city ten weeks ago. He had met her on a business trip to Topeka. For a honeymoon trip they started out in a motor car to visit her relatives in several Kansas towns. At Saffordville a Santa Fe train struck the machine and she was killed. He was injured so severely that for several days he was expected to die.

"By July 7, however, he had recovered sufficiently to marry again. This time the bride was Miss Maymie Roy, 24 years old, who worked in the millinery department of the Jones store. He had known her only two weeks. Her stepfather is William J. Holloway, a building custodian in Topeka. Friday came the news from St. Louis that Mrs. Hertz had disappeared.

"Hertz came here yesterday to look for his wife. He rented a motor car yesterday afternoon and after he got into it flourished a revolver so fearfully that Lee Thomas, the driver, took it away from him. He went immediately to a pawn shop and got another.

"A reporter for the Star met him about 9 o'clock last night in the lobby of the Broadmoor Hotel, 916 Oak Street, where he was stopping. He had just came in from a ride with a friend in the motor car. He apologized to the reporter for being partly under the influence of liquor and invited him to his room. His suitcase was open in the room, garments and letters were scattered everywhere.

" 'I'm all to pieces,' he said as he sat on the edge of a chair, 'and I've been drinking pretty heavily. I've had so much trouble lately.'

Two or three persons called him on the telephone. He swore as he answered it and exhibited great nervousness.

" 'Where is Mrs. Hertz?' " the reported asked him presently.

" 'It wouldn't do any good to tell you,' he said, 'Come with me and I'll show you where she is. And I'll show you what I'll do to her. I'm going to kill her, and it will all be in the paper in the morning.'

At that he took the revolver and flourished it. The reporter cautioned him and he put it back in his pocket.

" 'Sher worked on my sympathies or I never would have married her,' he said, 'But I want her, and I'll get her. I'm going to shoot her and then shoot myself. If I don't shoot myself, my father will come over here and defend me. He's worth a million dollars and he'll spend plenty to help me.'

"Then Hertz said he was going down to a saloon to meet friends. The reported tried to call police headquarters, but he hadn't time before Hertz was in the motor car insisting on starting. In front of Clapp's saloon he ordered the driver to stop. Inside he ordered champagne for the five members of the party and then went into the office of the saloon to telephone. The office was in semi-darkness.

"While the reporter was calling police headquarters on another telephone he heard a shot. He ran into the saloon office and saw Hertz falling forward on the floor.

" 'Oh my wife!' he cried. 'I want my wife. She's ruined me and I want her.'

"Before he shot himself Hertz spoke of 'another man,' someone in Olathe, who, he said, 'had the jinx on her.'

Mrs. Maymie Roy Hertz, the wife, was notified of her husband's attempt at suicide. Mrs. Hertz was staying at the home of Mrs. Bessie Sullivan, 1322 Euclid Avenue.

" 'Where did they take him?' she asked.

"That was her only comment. When she asked why she had left her husband in St. Louis, she replied: 'I haven't anything at all to say. I don't way to say anything about it.' "

This morning's Kansas City Times says:

"When Mrs. Maymie Roy Hertz, the bride, approached for her husband's bed at St. Joseph's Hospital yesterday morning, it was their first meeting since she left him in St. Louis last Friday. He had been calling for her almost continuously since he first the shot into his breast Saturday night. At the meeting neither spoke for several minutes. He held her hand and great tears rolled down o the pillow. The bride displayed no great amount of feeling.

Soon she spoke:

" 'Doug, why-------.'

" 'I'm so sorry, Roy,' interrupted the voice of the crying man on the bed. Again there was a long silence during which Hertz rested easier than at any time before.

" 'Sorry I made trouble and publicity for you, Roy,' he said. 'But I do want to die. Get them to let me die.'

For an hour and a half--a short time for the husband--the bride sat beside his bed. When she left, his eyes followed her to the door and it appeared to take some time for him to realize that she was leaving. But when he did his calls for her began again and they continued throughout the day. But, with the exception of a few visits to the hospital, the bride will not return to him.

" 'When he is drinking he is insane and I am afraid of him,' she said yesterday afternoon. When asked why she left Hertz after living with him only two weeks, she did not hesitate.

" 'I left him because he lied to me. He told me when he asked me to marry him that he had plenty of moey and could give me a good home and everything I wanted. When I found out that he had mispresented his financial affairs to me, and that he did not have the money to give me a good home, I left him. I didn't tell him I was going, because--well, I didn't want to have any trouble or argument.

" 'I understand that he has said that he spent more than $2,000 on me while in St. Louis. He had just $100 when he left Kansas City for St. Louis, and he did not get any more. While there he bought me two waists--that's all he spent on me. I had to get money on my trunks to come back to Kansas City. He was awfully good to me and kind-hearted and I liked him. But I could not stay because he could not give me what he had promised. He told me little about his family. He said his father was a member of the British parliament and well known in London. Also that he had $35,000 coming to him sometime."

" 'Parties have been the ruination of Hertz, his wife believes. Hertz is known among his friends as a good spender and fond of champagne and motor cars.

" 'Just for instance,' she said, to prove her contention that Hertz was insane when drinking, 'take that part of the story he said last night that he met me at a wine garden and that I wanted him to marry me. I was introduced to him on a downtown street the day after he got out of the hospital, where he had been after his first wife's death. We were introduced by a friend. A few days later he visited me and we became friends. Almost from the first he pleaded with me to marry him. When he promised to take care of me and give me a good home I consented.'

Mrs. Hertz is at the home of a friend, Mrs. Bessie Sullivan, 1322 Euclid Avenue. Her home is in Topeka.

" 'But I am ashamed to go there after all this,' she said.

Nothing has been heard from Hertz's family in England. His brother, A. A. Hertz of Seattle, Wash., started for Kansas City as soon as he heard of his brother's trouble.
(Emporia Gazette ~ July 28, 1913)

BOY SLAIN PLAYING ROBBER

A Brother Shot Griffith Hughes of Emporia By Mistake

NOISE IN A CELLAR ATTRACTED THE FAMILY---THE BOY STEPPED BEHIND A DOOR IN JEST---THEN A BULLET GAVE HIM A FATAL WOUND

Emporia, Kas., April 16---Griffith Hughes, 18 years old, was shot as a burglar by his brother at his home here last night and died this morning in the hospital.

The boy and his sister, who is a teacher in the city schools, were singing and playing in the parlor, when they heard a noise in the cellar. Believing a burglar was in the cellar young Hughes went to the back of the house and found the cellar door open. He went back and told the other members of the family and they armed themselves and went into the collar by the house stairway.

Griffith, to play a prank on them, entered the cellar by the outside entrance. His younger brother, Owen, who had been upstairs studying, armed himself with a revolver, and, when he heard a noise in the back room of the basement fired.

The bullet struck his brother, who was hiding behind the door, above the knee.

Doctors were called and Griffith was removed to the hospital, but the shock and loss of blood caused his death a few hours later. The boy attended college here and was a member of the athletic teams.

Walter Hughes, a brother, is employed by the Jones Commission company in Kansas City.
(Kansas City Star ~ April 16, 1909 ~ Submitted by Lori DeWinkler)