Obituaries and Death Notices
The Weekly Cairo Bulletin
20 April Jan 1885
and
The Cairo Citizen
1 Oct. 1885 - 31 Dec.1885
Cairo, Alexander County, Illinois
Transcribed and annotated by Darrel Dexter
The Weekly Cairo Bulletin
Monday 20 Apr 1885:
(Agnes Harper is in the 1870 and 1880 censi in the
household of her brother, Edward Harper, in Mound City, Pulaski Co.,
Ill.
She was born about 1835 in Virginia.—Darrel Dexter)
(He was born about 1789 in
New Jersey, according to the 1880 census of Centralia, Clinton Co.,
Ill.—Darrel Dexter) Mr. William H. Morgan, a resident of Ballard County, Ky., called Tuesday night and gave us the details of a most fiendish affair that took place yesterday eight miles from Hinkleville, on the granite pike, the simple recital of which is enough to make one’s blood run cold. It appears that a white man named Jones Landerson resides on a small piece of land near there with his family, consisting of his wife, a daughter Lizzie, a beautiful girl of about 19 years of age, and little brother of 10. Landerson is a dissipated fellow and when in liquor, which is most of the time, is exceedingly abusive to his family. For the past week Mrs. Landerson has been confined to her bed with a severe attack of malarial fever, and in addition expected soon to be confined. Yesterday at noon Landerson entered the bed room of his sick wife, more in liquor than usual, and in consequence more abusive, and demanded amid the most horrible curses, why dinner was not ready. The poor weak wife, hardly able to lift her head from the pillow, replied in a weary voice that she supposed that Lizzie had attended to it.it. The brute replied that Lizzie had gone to a neighbor’s and had gotten no dinner, and that if she didn’t get up and attend to it right off, he would smash her g-d d—n head in with an axe. The poor woman begged and implored that she had not the strength to rise from the bed, let alone cooking dinner, even then making a feeble effort to rise, at once falling back in a dead faint. The crazy, devilish fiend in human shape, with a yell of anger mixed with the most horrible curses, seized the poor victim by the hair and jerked her into the middle of the floor, dragging her about the apartment several times, the poor worn weary body being dashed against articles of furniture and otherwise badly bruised and maltreated. Finding that she did not come to her senses, the ruffian began kicking her with his big cowhide boots, the breast, abdomen, head, face, back and limbs bearing the marks of the most outrageous treatment, finally terminating his diabolical work by picking the frail inanimate form from the floor and raising it above his head, cast it with all his might and main at his feet, a slight quiver, a gasp, a gross and perfect stillness, plainly showed that the spirit of the poor woman had fled to a better world. About this time the daughter Lizzie entered the room, and the awful discovery of her mother’s ghostly bloody upturned face, the maniac father standing over it with an uplifted chair, eyes bloodshot, hair disheveled, emitting the most terrible howls and curses which ever fell from human lips, was too much and with an agonizing scream: “O father, what have you done!” fell in a dead faint upon the floor. The noise of the disturbance alarmed a couple of filed hands near by who with their axes in hand, rushed into the room just in time to save the daughter, over whose inanimate form the now thoroughly liquor crazed father and husband was crouching with an uplifted hatchet. The demon was conquered after a desperate encounter, during which he was injured about the head by an axe in the hands of one of the men. He was placed in an improvised lockup and thoroughly secured with strong cords. During the whole of this terrible affair, the young son was under his poor mother’s bed, paralyzed with fear, and unable to render any interference. He witnessed the whole affair and told his story with the straightforward innocence of youth. The horrible affair soon became known throughout the neighborhood, and that the brute will be lynched in the next 24 hours there can be no possible doubt. The coroner’s jury developed the fact that the man had systematically abused every member of the family, the daughter and son both showing marks upon their limbs and body indicating the most frightful maltreatment. The murderer was removed to the Hinkleville jail for safe keeping. He seems to thoroughly realize his awful position, but does not appear to be especially moved by it—maintaining a dogged silence.
He is a man about six feet high, weighs 195 pounds, red hair,
overhanging shaggy eye brows, unclean, a bad wandering eye and evidently a
man of great strength. The Cairo Citizen
Thursday, 1 Oct 1885: The following dispatch received by Mr. Henry Winter, here explains itself:
SAN FRANCISCO, CAL., Sept.
28.—Brother William died last evening at 10:30. Letter by Mail.
William Winter was a
brother of our Henry and Thomas Winter, and was well known in Cairo,
Chicago, and Cincinnati. He was a very fine artist, photographer, and
portrait painter. He has been struggling with a disease of the lungs for
several years and was worn out with consumption. He was universally
esteemed by all who knew him. He leaves a widow, but no children.
Patrick Corcoran, an
old citizen of Cairo, died Sept. 29th. His wife died of yellow fever in
1878. He has been a hard working man and a good citizen. He has been
suffering from the effects of sunstroke and has finally yielded to the
inevitable. He leaves four children. A man
from Ullin was killed at East Cape Girardeau a day or two since from the
kick of a mule.
After long months; yes, I might say years of anxiety and fear, the telegram brought to the many friends of Mr. and Mrs. William Winter the sad intelligence of his death Sept. 27th, last. Mr. Winter was a native of England, having been born in Portsmouth. He was the third son of a family of six brothers, and was about 11 years old when the family came to America. His mother was a charming and beautiful woman of noble birth, “Lady Hilliard.” His father was a fine connoisseur in, and lover of art and something of an artist himself, having painted a large panorama, with which he traveled with success in this country assisted by his oldest sons, Charles, Robert, and William. William cultivated and developed his inherited talents as an artist from his father and uncle, who were noted artists, until he became one of the finest water color painters in America, and three of his beautiful paintings which his friends in Cairo will well remember, were accepted in the N.Y. Academy of Art, and received the first premiums in all the large cities, where they were exhibited in competition with many of the first artists of the country. Mr. Winter was offered several times very late sums for those beautiful children of his brain, but like many others gifted with the divine fire, he could not part with them, or set a monied value on them. Before the War, Mr. Winter went to South America and was very successful in his profession, making a large fortune in a short time. During his sojourn there he had the yellow fever, after which he returned to Chicago. The writer well remembers seeing him in Cairo during the three months service in 1861, when the top of his head was entirely denuded of hair, the effects of the fever. At that time Mr. Winter became interested in Cairo and its future and he opened a large and very stylish restaurant, on the Levee and did a lucrative business, he also built what was at that time the finest and best finished block in Cairo, known as Winter’s Block. In 1863 he married Miss Jennie Hills, of Chicago, bringing her to Cairo and taking up residence in the spacious suite of rooms in is new block. At that time Mr. Winter possessed a large fortune and being very public spirited and having great faith in the future of the Delta City he expended largely of his ample means, not only for the city, but for his friends, none ever coming to him and being turned away unaided. In 1868 he removed to Cincinnati and opened an artist’s studio in that city, unfortunately leaving his large business interests in Cairo in other hands. Having built the long row of brick cottages known as the “Winter’s Row,” near the Ridge, in the sudden and complete depression of business which followed the close of the war Mr. Winter lost heavily. In 1873 his health began to fail, he returned to Cairo and opened a fine art and photograph gallery, where he remained till he became convinced that he must seek a mountain climate to heal and restore his lungs; when he removed to Denver in 1881 where still growing weaker he worked with a will, painting wonderfully beautiful pictures, when anyone else would have given up sick and helpless. After remaining there for two years and not receiving the benefit he hoped to derive from a change of climate, he joined his brother Robert, in San Francisco, Cal., who during his sickness and death did all that a loving and kind brother could for him and his bereaved wife. While there William Winter made as brave and determined a fight with the fell destroyer as ever our lamented old Commander did, working steadily on, never complaining, never giving up, cheerful amid pain suffering and weakness until within a few short hours, when death claimed his own. Attended lovingly, tenderly, and oh how faithfully, none but she and her God can know, by his devoted wife. No man ever made a braver fight with the inevitable and only at last, when the poor tired brain gave away, did he succumb to the grim messenger who at last overcame the splendid physique, and indomitable will; when he passed to the other side smilingly recognizing those loved ones gone before.
Mr. Winter was a
noble, upright, conscientious man, possessing a truly artistic soul. He was
a tender loving husband, a devoted brother; a true and faithful friend; a
public-spirited unselfish citizen, and one to whom Cairo owes much. May he
rest in peace.
(William Winter
married Jennie S. Hills on 23 Apr 1864, in Cook Co., Ill.—Darrel
Dexter)
The papers announce the death of Hon. John M. Gregg, of Harrisburg, Ills. A Dispatch to the St. Louis Republican from Harrisburg says:
“John M. Gregg, an
ex-member of the Illinois House of Representatives and a prominent young
attorney of this place, died this morning. He had been under the influence
of stimulants for several days, and was found near home this morning
apparently crazy and very weak. Two friends lifted him up, and while
assisting him home he sank to the ground and died without a struggle. He
will be buried by the Masonic fraternity tomorrow. He leaves a wife and two
bright children to mourn his departure.”
Mr. Peyton L. Harrison,
a native of Rockingham Co., Va., for 63 years a resident of Sangamon Co.,
Ills., died at his residence near Pleasant Plain, in that county, Nov. 15th,
at the age of 81 years. He marred a daughter of Peter Cartwright.
The funeral took place Nov. 17th.
(Walton W. Wright
married Mattie Williamson on 18 Nov 1875, in Alexander Co.,
Ill.—Darrel Dexter)
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