The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1888-03-25
POVERTY'S CRUEL PINCH
a MOTHER POISONS HER CHILL
DREN AND TWO DIE.

The Life OF Third Still Hanging by a
Thread - The HalfCrazed Woman
Watched Their Torturous Deaths
With the Heartlessness of a Fiend-
Self-Surrendered to the Police
NEW YORK, March 24-Minnie Leb-
knechner, a German widow, crazed by want
and fear of being separated from her three
children or seeing them starve, administered
poison to them at her home, No. 1874 West
Twenty-eighth street.. Two died-An-
th ny, aged 8, and Charles, aged
T. The third, a boy 81 years old, named
Christopher is still alive, and was removed
to the New York Hospital. She herself re-
ported her act at the police station at q
o'clock this morning.
KEPT THEIR PHOTOGRAPHS.
The mother was taken to the Jefferspu
Market police station to-day and thence
sent to the Coroners office, where she was
committed TO the Tombs. Before being
taken to prison she drew photographs of her
children from her pocket and asked II she
would be permitted to keep them. When
told that she could retain them she shouted
excitedly: "They wanted to take my chill
dren from me, but they can't do it now"
DR.. CONWAY, Deputy Coroner, conversed
with Mrs. Lebknechner for some time and
expresses the opinion that she is suffering
from acute mania.
THE STORY OF HER LIFE.
When the woman told her story at the
police station roundsman was sent with
her to verify it. To him she related her re-
cent history in listlesss mechanical way,
as though 1t was a worn out theme that
long since had lost all interest to her. Her
husband was dead, she said. He died four
years ago. She had ,truggled to keep the
children together, but failed. They were
taken from her and sent to the Juvenile
Asylum. Only recently she had got them
back with infinite trouble opposed by
poverty on one side and the persecution of
her husbands relatives on the other, but
she could not keep them. Work was fall
ing, and food getting scarce.
DEATH PREFERRED TO SEPARATION.
She foresaw that she must lose them soon.
Rather than that she decided to kill them.
She thought it over, and by Wednesday
had made up her mind fully. She sent
Anthony the eldest of the boys, to the drug
store with quarter 10 buy rat
poison. The child brought back
l0c. worth of trough on rats.
Mrs. Lebknechner stirred it in tea, and
dividing the draught into three equal parts,
gave to the boys to drink, each cup. This
was on Wednesday morning. Very soon
| afterward all three were taken i'll. Watch
ing their sufferings steadily, the mother
| stayed with them all that dav. getting about
the house without exciting the attention OF
the tenants by unusual concern or any sign
| of alarm.
MERCILEss CRUELTY.
Wednesday night and all Thursday the
little sufferers lay in their dying agonies,
with the mother lowering about seeing their
little lives ebbing out slowly and surely.
They begged for water, and with the merci-
less cruelty of a fiend, the mother gave
them whisky to drink. The two
eldest drank and cried that
they were on fire. They begged to be taken
out in the back yard and have the dydrant
turned on them, as they were burning up.
But their feeble cries found deaf ear with
the mother and did not reach the outer
world. Unmoyed she went about finishing
her work.
THE FIRST DEATH
At o'clock Thursday afternoon Charles
died. Three hours later his eldest brother
breathed his last. Still the youngest baby
OF the three was left. With { two victims
Of her awful crime lying dead the mother
night she sat by her dying child, Friday,
and until Saturday morning, when the
little ones grip on life still
refused to yield did she weary of waiting
and went ont to tell the police. By this
time the woman and officer had reached
the door Of her house and she opened it to
the officer A glance inside told him that
her story was true. In their bed lay
the two boys long dead, and
the little one gasping family
on the sofa. The room was meanly fur
nished, but clean. The mother stood un-
moved looking on. The officer put her
under arrest and alarmed the neighbors.
He took the woman to the station and a
hurried call was sent for an ambulance.
The little one was driven rapidly to a hos
pital and everything was done there to save