The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1890-03-09
A FIGHT FOR LIFE.
A Woman is Attacked by a Mad
man, but Gains the Victory.
WHERE BENWELLWAs MURDERED
The Spot an Uncany Thicket in Swamp
1t is Desolate and Fearful in Its
Des0latiOn.

[SpecialtoTHE HERALD-Examiner Dispatch.1
CHICAGO, March Sit was a fight for
life. The combatants were Mrs. Mary
Petersen and a mailman who gives the
name of Albert Jensen and says he is from
Michigan. The fight occurred in Mrs.
Petersens kitchen last evening.
Weary from her days work, Mrs. Peter
sen sat down by her kitchen fire to await
the coming of her husband; the evening
meal was on the table. She had waited
perhaps half an hour when the front door
opened. Surprising it to be her husband
she got up to greet him. Before she reached
the hall door it was thrown violently open
and strange man with wild, feroeious
glare in his eyes confronted her. For
moment the two stood facing each other,
the woman almost paralyzed from fear, the
mailman gloating over his intended victim
with glittering eyes. Then he drew a re-
volver and leveled it at her head. With a
superhuman effort she sprang to one side,
and then, with bound like tiger, clutched
him by the throat. 1t was fight for life,
and even the mailman with mis- awful
strength could not loosen her grip. In vain
did he strike her with his revolver. He tried
to bring the muZZle in line with her head,
that he might blow her brains out, but she
Rugged him so closely that he could not,
and the weapon was again discharged into
the wall. She clinched her hands the
| tighter His eyes began to start from their
| sockets; his face changed from a red TO a
vivid purple, and his tongue rolled out as
he gasped for breath; the veins of his fore
| head sWelled almost to bursting, but the
woman held on. Her life depended on her
grip. Back and forth across the room
they struggled. Chairs were overturned
and the table, set for supper, was upset.
| The mailman had ceased to strike her, and
all his efforts were to break her grasp
| on his throat. He began to weaken. AT
last the blood began squirting from his nos
ills, and the sight OF this was more than
the poor woman could stand. She relaxed
her hold and fled to the nearest neighbors,
and the police were called. AS soon as he
was freed from Mrs Peterson's grasp the
mailman skunk to the attic OF the house.
In short time the Human street patrol
wagon arrived, and Officer Birmingham
went up to the top of the house to fetch
the maniac down. 1t was no easy matter
The fiend had partially recovered his
strength, from the frightful choking, and
was at bay in a dark corner of
the attic. Fortunately, in the strug-
gle the fellow had dropped his re-
: yolver. AS soon as the officer
entered the dimly lighted room the maniac
made rush for him. Then came another
fight, but the officer was fresh and the
mailman badly winded from the struggle
: he had had with Mrs. Peterson in the
: | kitchen. As he closed i'll on the officer the
maniac gave hoarse yell that sounded
more like the roar of wild beast than like
l a human cry.
: The officer finally threw tie fellow ans
c he was manacled and taken to the HinmaT
street police station. Here he became
: more quiet Nothing could be learned
from him, however, further than that hi
name was Albert Jensen and that he haC
escaped from a Michigan lunatic asylum
e After closely examining him he was takel
f to the detention house.