She Chose Her Sister's Grave

A nervy attempt at suicide occurred at Lake View Cemetery at 8:40 last evening. A young married woman who gave her name as Rosa Whitney, but whose name was formerly Clara Hempel, fired a shot from a .32-caliber revolver into her right side about four inches below the nipple. The cause of the rash act is not positively known, but is supposed to be domestic troubles.

The woman went to the cemetery on a Broadway car and requested to be let off there. With the assistance of George Smith, a laborer at the cemetery, she found the grave of her dead sister, Ella, and Smith had hardly left her when he heard a shot, and on turning saw her holding the pistol against her side and soon after heard a second shot. She told him she had killed herself and guessed she had better take off her corset. This she did, and then she fell on the grave of her sister.

To Mrs. Smith, who was called to her assistance, she said: 'I've got friends, but the one I want to love me won't do it. I'm young in years, but have suffered enough for a woman of 70.'

She was taken to Providence Hospital, where Drs. Horton and James Shannon found the bullet near the ribs on the right side of the back. It entered the right side and lodged in the region of the back, injuring the pleura, or lining of the lungs. The woman is about 20 years old, and is the daughter of Charles M. Hempel, who at one time ran a cigar factory on Front Street, North Seattle, and with her sisters worked for him. She left here last fall with the Spider and Fly Company, but left it at Portland and returned to this city, afterwards joining the Carlson Opera Company.