A SUICIDE’S PRAYER.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXI, Issue 458, 15 May 1909, Page 4

A SUICIDE’S PRAYER.

The extraordinary suicide of Lewis Matthew Becker, a metal worker, 77 years of age, at Warwick Road, Hampton Wick, was inquired into by the deputy coroner at the scene of the tragedy recently. Mr Becker lived alone, a neighbour visiting him twice u day to do house work. On the morning of his death she called at the house and found a handkerchief run up half-mast high in the garden. A clock in the bedroom was stopped at 3.25. Mr Becker bad told her previously that he intended to commit suicide, and that when he did so the clock would be tound to have stopped at the time stated, which was the time of his birth. A piece of paper was pinned up on the bedroom door, on which was written “Dead.” Mr Becker was lying across the bed dead, having poisoned himself. To the pillow was pinned another piece of paper, upon which was written the following : “Good Lord, forgive me, and have mercy upon me. I render my soul to you, and hope in your mercy to meet my dear mother and wife.” In a letter addressed “To the Coroner,” he had written : “ Overwork and thought and bad health and insomnia have led me to this. I feel giving way daily. The troubles that I have, and the business disappointments, are more than my mind can withstand. I may be sane, but the despondency and melancholia (since my wife’s death) have overcome me, and I have a dread of a breakdown.” The coroner said there was another letter left by Mr Be;cker, in which he gave his family history, the gist of which was that he was son of Paul Becker, an artist and engraver, that his uncle was engraver and lib" ’.rian to the late Queen Victoria, a„J that he (the deceased) was a great-grandson of General Becker, who was a friend of Napoleon I. The jury returned a verdict of suicide whilst of unsound mind.