Week 5 of Amy Johnson Crow's "52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks" prompt is "Oops." Mistakes can be costly. They can also be deadly, and the summer of 1892 was a doubly tragic one for my family.
Shot Himself in the Side
Charles Herrick was received at the Allegheny Hospital yesterday afternoon severely wounded by a gun shot. He gave his address as No. 32 Cherry street. He said he was with a camping party down the Ohio River opposite Shousetown, and yesterday afternoon went with a companion to shoot at blackbirds among the reeds in the river. His rifle trigger was caught in some matted grass, the weapon was discharged and the ball entered Herrick's side at the fifth rib. It passed upward and caused a very serious wound, which seems likely to be fatal. The man was brought to Allegheny on a Ft. Wayne train, but at midnight the surgeons had not been able to find the ball.
— The Pittsburgh Dispatch, Tuesday, August 16, 1892
"The Shot Was Fatal" read the headline in the following day's Washington (Pa) Daily Reporter. That article gives the location as Leetsdale, on the Ohio River 17 miles below Pittsburgh. It states that Charles accidentally shot himself while climbing over a fence. Marshall Lytle, one of his companions, had him placed on the train and taken to the hospital. Lytle, and Charles's brother and sister, were with him when he died.
Charles was about 15 or 16 at the time of his death. His parents had divorced several years earlier and mother Rebecca had died four years before. His father Henry was living elsewhere, and Charles and his siblings were essentially reared by their sister Daisy, about five years Charles's senior, and their brother Frank, who was about three years older than Charles.
It's not known which siblings were at Charles's bedside when he died. The eldest brother, Harry, had gone to Texas sometime in 1892 or 1893 but returned before the summer of 1893, most likely due to the impending death of his grandmother, Jane (nee Wood) Herrick, who reared him and with whom he lived.
In 1899, Marshall Lytle would go on to marry Charles's sister, Katherine. Harry married Maggie Donley in 1893 and their only child, a son (who was my grandfather), was named Charles — likely in memory of the uncle he never knew.
__________
Jack Speed, a coal miner, about 55 years of age, was injured nigh unto death. He was employed at Vicary's mine, near Pottstown, and yesterday was engaged in firing a shot. It did not go off as quickly as he thought it should, and he went up to it to investigate. As he did so the powder exploded and a big mass of coal and slate fell on him, crushing him to the floor of the lead. His fellow workmen heard his cries of distress and hastened to his assistance. He was removed to his home, and a physician dressed his wounds. One of his collar-bones is broken, his chest is caved in, and his back is badly hurt. It is doubtful if he survives. The ambulance has been borrowed and he will be removed from Pottstown to St. Francis Hospital. His friends furnish their own team.
[Note: I have no direct proof that this John Speed is my great-great-grandfather; however I have not found another John Speed from England in Limestone Twp., Peoria County, Illinois during that time period.]
The 1893 Annual Coal Report of the Illinois Department of Mines and Minerals had a list of fatalities for the previous year. It listed John Speed as single. Coal mining was risky work but "Jack" had been doing it for more than 30 years. He was born in England. His wife Sarah (nee Welsh) had died sometime between 1866-1870, leaving him with two sons, William and George, and daughter, Lydia, all under the age of 10. William, age 11 (my great-grandfather), appears in the Peoria County Almshouse Register in 1871 as a "1/2 orphan," "poor and neglected." He was there for a period of two months.
In 1880 John and William are listed as boarding in the Crist Brost household; George is listed as the Brosts' adopted son. Lydia is not listed. I hypothesize that this Lydia was the same Lydia Speed enumerated in 1880 in the Illinois Industrial School for Girls in Evanston, Illinois; a newspaper notice from October 1881 states how Lydia Speed, of Peoria, and two other girls ran away from the home.
While the following is conjecture, from the available information it's not a stretch to imagine John working a dirty, dangerous job in the mines. William must work; the Brosts adopt young George (formally or informally; no records were located), and Lydia is sent away to school.
Unfortunately no death certificate has yet been found for John Speed, nor any record tying John Speed, the coal miner who died in 1892, to any of his children. I had wondered if there was no death certificate because his body hadn't been recovered. After finding the news article, that doesn't appear to be the case.
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