A Miner, a Revolver and a Pair of Suspenders
John Purse had lived in the coal town of Wilkeson for eighteen years. In one drunken night he shot his eldest son, was locked in the town jail, and hanged himself before anyone could stop him.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Crazed with excessive drinking and enraged because his eldest son, Frank, 21 years old, had dared remonstrate with him, John Purse, a Bohemian coal miner of Wilkeson, a small mining town 30 miles east of Tacoma, last evening shot his son in the forearm with a 38-caliber revolver, and later hanged himself with a pair of suspenders while locked in a cell of the Wilkeson jail.
Purse, who was 45 years old, had lived in Wilkeson for 18 years. He had a wife and eight children.
For some time he had been drinking heavily and last night was in the condition known as "fighting drunk." He went to his little home and commenced abusing his wife and children in a cruel manner. His son Frank stepped forward and quietly interceded in his mother's behalf. Yelling in rage, the father rushed at his son, brandishing his revolver. The young man will recover.
After Purse had been locked in the city jail of Wilkeson by Deputy Sheriff Charles B. Hunt, he was found hanging lifeless from the ceiling, his head caught in a loop, and hung there until strangled to death. When found, his body was doubled up as though he had died suffering from cramps.
Coroner Shaver will leave for the scene of the tragedy this afternoon. He would have gone last night but for the inquest over the body of Frank Morzin, which was called for this morning.
“He went to his little home and commenced abusing his wife and children in a cruel manner. His son Frank stepped forward and quietly interceded in his mother's behalf.”
Wilkeson was a company coal town, and its men worked one of the most dangerous jobs in the state; drink, crowding and violence inside the home went unrecorded until a night like this one. With no crisis line, no shelter and no intervention available, a family's worst night became a two-inch newspaper item — and the pattern of domestic violence ending in suicide is one Pierce County still records.
From readers
No comments yet. If you know something about this story — a correction, a family memory, a source — it belongs here.