A Polish Tragedy

Horowhenua Chronicle, 27 December 1913, Page 4

A Polish Tragedy

Berlin, December 22. Details of the tragedy in which the noted Polish aristocrat, Count Meilczynski, shot his wife and nephew, Count Alfred, on finding the latter in his wife's bedroom, show that Meilczyiiski was returning from his club, and on going to his own bedroom he heard noises. Attributing them to burglars he took a gun downstairs. The tragedy followed. His wife's lady companion was seriously injured by rushing between the husband and wife. The husband roused the servants, retired to his room, wrote a report of the murder and informed the authorities. Count Meliczynski Avas formerly dubbed the Red Count because he was a fierce opponent of Prussian rule in Poland. Later he joined the moderate Right Wing Party. Although fined in 1909 for an incendiary speech accusing the Germans of treating the Poles like wild beasts a crowd at Posen in 1913 mobbed him for attending a banquet of the Kaiser. His carriage was bombarded with stones and the occupants drenched with water. Count Meilczynski in 1895 was a suitor for the hand of Count Potocki's beautiful daughter. He shot himself in the breast because the Count opposed the marriage and never entirely recovered from the effect of the wound. Moved by the incident Count Potocki yielded to the marriage. For some time they were happy. Two daughters and a son were born. Subsequently Meilczynski confided in his friends that his wife was under an undesirable influence. He subsequently sold his estate and took the Countess to Dresden. The Countess and her son quitted the new home iind stiiyed with relations of the husband, whose absorbing passions, politics and landscape paintings divided his time between the ljeiehstag and the studio. He lived alone in Berlin, his residence being a perfect museum of paintings and art objects collectedw in various countries. His wife, who received from her husband a regular allowance, succeeded in 1912 to her brother's large fortune, also to Dakowymokre Castle, the scene of the tragedy. Her relatives, fearing she would fall under former influences, effected a reconciliation. The Count joined her at Dakowymokre but the renewed union was soon clouded. The Countess, then 38, formed a friendship with 24-year-old Count Mianc/ynski, whose mother was her half sister. The friendship became the talk of the neighbourhood. LADY COMPANION'S STORY. BERLIN, December 23. The Countess Mcilczynski's lady companion states that the young Count came to the castle with the purpose of borrowing money from his uncle. Ho knocked at the countess's door at 3 o'clock in the morning, and asked her to order her motor-car to enable him to leave. She said: "You arc drunk--.sleep it off first" The young Count forced his his way into I lie room and aJ: the same moment her husband appeared and fired.