COWARD OR BRAVE?

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XXXIII, Issue 9127, 23 April 1908, Page 7

COWARD OR BRAVE?

ROMANCE TRAGEDIES,

Captain von Goehen, who murdered his fellow officer. Major Sohoeneheck, at Ailenstein, on Christmas Eve, committed suicide recently in his cell in ;tho military prison J|at Ailenstein, the town in which the murder took place. Captain von Goebeu cut open the veins in the back of his neck and his wrists with a knife, which was brought in with his dinner. The circumstances surrounding the suicide point to the conclusion that the opportunity was deliberately offered Captain von Goehen to escape the gallows by ending his own life, partly out of consideration for him and partly to avoid the disgrace to the officer’s regiment caused by the sentence of death which would have been passed on him. Not only has Captain von Goeben escaped the gallows, hut ail the scandalous revelations which, owing to the circumstnaces of the crime, would have been inevitable at the trial, are now avoided. Captain von Goeben, it _ will be remembered, shot Major von Schoenebeck dead on the stairs of the former’s house on Christmas Eve. The captain, who was a friend of the major, had, earlier in the evening, dressed himself as Santa Claus and given toys to the major’s children. He had pretended to leave the house at II o’clock, but had remanied in ‘the hall and then hid in Frau von Schoenebeck’s bedroom. Later the major heard footsteps on the stairs, and on going to investigate was shot dead by Captain von Goeben. The murderer subsequently confessed that he committed the crime because he was in love with Frau von Schoenebeck.

On Captain von Goeben’s person were found two letters, in which he made full confession of his guilt and expressed terrible remorse, at the same time declaring that he committed the crime under the influence of Frau von Schoenebeck. He believed that he must have been mentally deranged at the time, hut as the brain specialists had found that he was mentally normal he saw that he was a real criminal and was no longer fit to live after bringing such disgrace on the Prussian Officers’ Corps. Captain von Goehen had also made a most dramatic confession to one of the specialists who examined him. He stated that in November last he bought for 'Frau von Schoenebeck enough arsenic to kill 200 people, hue when it came to taking her husband’s life the woman’s courage failed her.

Finally, on Christmas Eve Frau von Schoenebeck made Captain von Goeben swear to her under the Christmas tree at her house that he would kill her husband, and that night Captain von Goehen got into the house. He met Major von Schoenebeck, who was armed with a revolver, *in the dining-room, and he tried to explain his presence, but the major, without waiting to hear what he had to say, pointed his weapon at him. Captain von Goeben, however, shot first, killing him on the spot.