FIVE DEATHS CAUSED BY AN INSANE WOMAN.

Kumara Times, Issue 2879, 20 January 1886, Page 3

FIVE DEATHS CAUSED BY AN INSANE WOMAN.

A telegram from Olympia, on December 16, to the San Francisco Chronicle states:—

About seven o'clock this morning Mrs John Mineer took her own life and that of her four children, ranging in age from 3 to 10 years, br cremation. She was the wife of a farmer living on Beaver Creek, ten miles south of this city, and was unquestionably insane. It had been noticed that her mind was weak at times and that she was labouring under mental hallucinations, though this was not remarkably strange, as she was in a delicate condition. Siie was preparing breakfast in the kitchen, when she remarked to her husband that she intended, to destroy herself and her entire family. Her husband seized her, for the purpose of taking her to her bedroom, and on opening the door found the room in flames. The woman immediately ran into the fire. Only one of their five children, a boy aged 12, was up. The hnsband took him by the arm, and attempted to escape first by the back, then by the front door, but ground both locked and the keys withdrawn. The flames by this time filled the kitchen, but they made their escape through a window, though not without severe burns. When they reached the open air the entire house ■was iu flames, and there was no chance •whatever to vescue the four other childien, who were asleep upstairs. The demented woman had . evidently laid trains of kerosene and powder all over the house, except the kitchen, and set fire to them. The boy who was rescued remembers to have seen his mother saturate some paper with coal oil the night before.