Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-04-06
ESPECIAL TELEGRAM TO THE DISPATCH

ESPECIAL TELEGRAM TO THE DIsPArcgt
CHICAGO, April 5.-Late on Thursday
night, slender girl with a pallid face and
brown curly hair, came to the Anchorage
Mission on Third avenue, and asked that
she might remain there until she could find
work. She was accompanied by Charles
Wallace, member of the editorial staff of
the Arkdnsdw TraUeIer, who told Matron
Snyder that he had found the
girl wandering aimlessly about the
streets. The homeless stranger remained at
the mission one night. She said her name
was Emma Stark, and that her home was in
Lafayette, Ind, where her father, mother.
brother and uncle had died suddenly Of
quick consumption. She seemed so intelli-
gent and sincere that Matron Snyder gladly
accepted the girl as a charge.
1t was evident however, that the stranger
was bewildered or laboring under sup
pressed excitement. She talked coherently
but queerly about a mysterious woman who
had been watching her, and irving to get
her to enter one of the disreputable houses
in the south division.
PLACE SECURED FOR HER.
When morning came nickel was given
to the girl for transportation on a cable train,
who was the wife of a wealthy retired real
estate dealer, and who had applied at the
mission for good servant. Emma reached
the home of the Newlands about noon. She
did not prepare the dinner. While she was
cooking the supper she complained of ter
rible toothache, and borrowed some money
from Miss Grace Newland to get bottle of
oil of cloves. She threw shawl over her head,
ran across the street to a drugstore, and
bought a package of rat poison. Then she
returned to the kitchen and resumed her
cooking. 1t is probable that the girl
dumped the poison into the canned corn
which was to De served, for within an hour
after the dishes were removed from the table
the entire family was seized with excruciat-
ing pains.
DR.. Crutcher who was summoned, said
the sufferers had been poisoned. Mr.. New
land died in awful agony at 8 o'clock this
morning. His wife died few hours later.
Miss Newland and her brother will pro5a-
bly, recover. When Mr.. Newland fell upon
the floor in his first paroxysm of pain the
new servant girl fled in the tennis cap and
dingy ulster she had worn to the house.
She could not be found until 4 o'clock this
afternoon, when detectives Mcdonald and
Tichorn saw her staring blankly at the stage
in the Park Theater.
One of the officers walked down the center
aisle and escorted the girl out of the play
house. She made no resistance. She de-
MED that her name was Emma Stark or that
she had ever visited the Anchorage Mission.
THE SAME STRANGE STORY.
Then speaking rapidly, with a musical
voice, she ratified off her story about the
mysterious woman who had been following
her and the sudden death of her relatives.
When she reached the steps of the
Anchorage Mission she asked the
officers whv she should enter a
strange house. Matron Snyder came to the
door and extended her hand, exclaiming as
she did so: Poor Emma, you remember
me, don't you.' The girl stared at the
woman with blank amazement. Then she
extended her hand in a mechanical way,
and asked if there was any work for her to
do in the house.
Mrs. Snyder and three other women in
the mission identified the prisoner as Emma
Stark. During this ordeal the girl smiled
pleasantly and obeyed all the commands.
-Four women searched her clothing, but no
poison was found. The prisoner is in a cell
AT the Central station. She is 18 years old.
1t is believed that she is insane. The most
skillful questioning could not refresh her
mind as to the events of yesterday. The
girl even denies that she ever saw Mr.. New
lands house.