The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1894-07-05
WONDERFUL PANTomIME.
A Deaf Mute Child Tells the Story Of
It's Mothers Murder.
From the New York Advertiser

Only one person saw Joseph Lochner
kill his young and pretty wife-their
5-year-old deaf and dumb daughter. Rosa.
LOchner was a baker in st. Louis. Not
long since he failed, and the loss of his
business made him moody and morose
Mrs. Lochner, like most pretty young
women, was not averse to iiattery, and
/ she was fond, too, of going out in her
| little circle of friends.
When Lochner grew sullen and refused
! to go out with her, preferrng to sulk al
/ home over his broken fortunes, Mrs
[ Lochner left him there at nights while
/ she went out among her neighbors and
| friends to en- oy herself as best she might.
! At last Lochner's jealousy was aroused
you can go out no more nights" he
said sullenly to her after a short but pep
| perry quarrel
oh! don't I, though2n she pertly re-
| torted
| And then she went out
Late that night she came back home.
Lochner had been nursing his wrath
in his own sulky way, and it broke out
again.
I'm going to leave you,'' he finally said
l won't stand this any longer
You can't go too quick, " Mrs Lochner
replied, and then she went TO sleep.
Lochner kept broOding over the quarrel
as he rocked the baby to sleep. He fell
into light dose in the chair. and then,
| awakening with start, he drew re
volver and shot his wife while she slept.
The bullet pierced the right temple and
she rolled to the floor a corpse. Lochner
placed the body on a bed, pulled the
rings from her fingers and fled. The po-
lice found him at the home of his brother
and he. is now in jail awaiting his
trial
The murdered woman was Abe Slup-
sky's stepsister, and, after the funeral,
Slupsky took the motherless little mute
to his home. One night while she was
sitting on the front steps with Mrs.
Slupsky she uttered peculiar cry, as if
to attract attention.
Then she cried out papa and "mam-
ma" and with her tiny hands and
arms described the murder so effectively
that it was pictured as distinctly to Mrs
Slupsky as if the poor little mute were
able to talk.
After a good deal of coaxing she re-
peated the pantomime in Mrs. Slupskys
parlor, and a St. Louis Post-D Dispatch
artist has portrayed her in the various
attitudes she assumed. They are so full
of expression that they tell the story
almost as plainly as words could tell it.
Sitting in chair, she rocked to and
fro as if soothing baby to sleep. Then
springing up in alright, and with an eX-
how her father aimed the revolver, points
with her finger to the hole where the
bullet crushed into the brain and then
falls PROSTATE with extended arms.
Next she describes in paptomme the
murderer lifting the body Of his victim
and placing it on the bed, the removal of
the rings from the fingers of the muir
dered woman and the fleeing form of the
murderer as he ran through the door and
into the street.
1t was a marvellous bit of pantomime,
singularly pathetic sight, intensely drama
tic in effect
Although born deaf, and being I'M
schOoled in talking, the little one is no
ticeably bright nature seeming to have
made up in mental quickness for robblng
her of speech and hearing. Her vOcabu-
larry is limited to four words-papa, mann
ma, baby, bye-bye.
These four words and the child'c pre-
cocity In sign talking made her silent
story of the murder of her mother by her
father SO intensely effective that if she is
allowed to tell that syoiceless accusa4 in
court there can be no question of the
jury's verdict.
But it may not be necessary for the
child to place the hangman's moose about
her fathers throat Lochner has confessed
the murder.