The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1896-05-14
FOUND DEAD IN A CREEK.
MRs. sCoFIELD MT Ar FIRST
TO NAVE BEEN WURD ED.

EHoiternent-W Was Tht- Caused by Mes
ftghttnE over Her when she Etravsd
Into mn Up.tovvn Wood While Insane =
The finding OF the body Of woman who was
supposed to have been murdered. but who
proved 20 have died of natural causes, has got
the Park and kinRsbridge police In a mix that
will take n Philadelphia lawyer to straigh,en
out. They have discovered n spot in the woods
where It appears n murder was committed, but
they have got neither victim nor murderer.
To begin at the beginning: About q o'clock
Tuesday evening. n hotel keeper named Druse
went driving with his wife In Jerome avenue.
Their ooachman was n man named Sinclair.
They had just passed Mosholu Parkway, which
is the connecting road recently laid out between
Bronx and Van Cortlandt parks. when all
three at the same instant saw a woman standing
on the edge Of the wood that lies between Jerome
avenue aud the Parkway. She was ten feet from
the roadway. Mrs. Drusc exclaimed:
THAT must be a ghost"
well, II it's a ghost" said her husband.
TITS q black one. I never heard OF q black
ghost" He laughed and his wife laughed. The
coachman remarked that 1t was n pretty dan
Rerous place for q woman to be at that time
alone. 1t was Just dusk. The coachman's re-
mark was due to the fact that the place the wo-
man was was less than n quarter of n mile from
the Jerome Park aqucduct. where there are
nearly q thousand laborers of all nationalities.
many of them capable of committing any
crime. Tn woman, when these three persons
saw her, was arranging her hair, which appeared
to have fallen down.
AT 63 o'clock yesterday morning. ten hours
after the woman was seen in Jerome avenue, she
was found dead In a little creek In the parkway.
The spot where she was found Is directly
across the woods from jerome avenue. The
creek is about two feet wide. 1t turns and runs
under the road twenty feet from where the
- t!t -. NH
woman was lying on her stomach and side, her
face turned toward the street. The water in
the crock, which was three inches deep. did not
come up to her mouth. On the side of her head
there was q wound.
Park Policeman Langfeld. who found the
body. made UP his mind that her head had been
crushed in by a blow. There appeared to be no
doubt but that she had been killed.
The woman held a pocketbook in her hand.
1t contained a fve-dollar bill. n two and a one
dollar bill, a dime. and three cents. She had
q gold brooch on her dress at the tn roat. so that
II seemed plain that robbery was not the motive
for the crime. Lnngtield SUMMONED his side
partner. and the woman was lifted out OF the
creek. Word was sent to the vnn Cortlandt
Park police station. and Sergeant ENGLAND. with
a couple OF men hurried around. They notified
the Kingsbridge police. and Capt, Donohue sent
some men to the scene, They also notified the
headquarters of the Park Police In the Arsenal,
and Secretary William Lenrv of the Park Board
told Capt. Collins to go to the place. In an
houI hoi "cio housh pUiec"Oh "'ouhu w
The woman's body was taken to the park
dressed. Her hands Indicated that she had
goo pounds. The police all agreed that she had
been murdered; They set out with, energy to
near where she, was found. and were quickly
rewarded. Back from the road, 200 yards from
jagged 5ns edeeF THIS Hs' Jagged side H'' was " stained ed0 With WITH
blood; On the ground, just at the foot Of 1t. was
would come from a human body. There wasa
broken bottle and u number OF sticks Of kind
away was a piece OF stone that was long and
thin. and weighed perhaps two pounds; II
wse 'G made w thu 0 hSd p ssrsian AROUND anslAq ia
the dried leaves near the stone and he
u was sosFed q VITA mpn's Slo llaen rh nnndk s sFshiG not 1t a
white spot on IT, He also found a gutta percha
pair alrpitnn. s p nhe women cnnaInda had and been the m bnay Ssd
been dragged to the creek, but why. was a mys-
tssy; md nsw Careful sas "l sow e myI ss,yee nh This se st9os
and the road was a drop Of blood. There was
p ped thro 10 in the Wood shat T 4 e0p pSli eea ste ee e d in 20
question every man, woman. and child In the
In the meantime the romans body was taken
to the Arsenal.and examined. She was as yet
unknown. Besides the money and the brooch
At the Arsenal her body was Identified as that
Of a Mrs: .O'Brien. who was alive and we'll at her
home. From the arsenal the body was taken to
the Morgue. where an autopsy was made by Or.
O'Hanlon. He found that, she suffered from
fatty degeneration Of the heart. and that her
death was due to, paralysis OF that organ.
brought on probably by intense excitement.
deep. The skull was not fractured, and to all
appearances the wound had been made after
death. though that was not certain. 1t wasiust
such a wound as would have been made by the
heel of a boot. Besides this wound, there was a
cut on the woman's foot and another on tho
right ankle bone. The doctor said there was no
possibility that the wOman's death was due to
any OF the wounds, and that paralysis was GER
some time after the autopsy the body, was
years old. OF Armonk. Westchester county. The
idensihcation was made BY John hi9gst9n Of
i Ss9 ana naSt then neai the body. lie i said he thought Dug I" the
woman was out of her head. She had lived
called Site on . Mrs Kingston 81" She 1ihS"T remaainsd there
until Tuesday morning. when she left without
explanation before Mr; IN, Kipg,on as family wA' up
Kingston said. and Tuesday night the author
tiles ass W W ,ea notified aimS1n that na snS was "a IN, m,S SINAI ne Sa mao
found dead, and had suspected at once that it
The finding OF the blood on the stone In the
WOOD was compatible with the death by paraIy-
sis-of-the-heart diagnosis of the deputy coroner.
The woman, while going through the wood,
may have stumbled lust as she reached the
stone. and fallen on Its Jagged edge, thus caus-
herself, she wandered on until she fell dead in
The creek; pr. 0,HSnion added, howeyer; to his
bleh much. because 1t was probably inflicted
One OF the things the police have got to de-
eide about Mrs. Scofeld's case islwhat caused
the excitement that led TO the paralysis OF the
heart The Doctor said II may have been caused
by an assault. The autopsy revealed
no evidence of an attempted assault. TO have
reached the spot where she was found from tho
spot where she was seen alive on Tuesday
evening she would have had To walk n
long distance by road, IL she went through
thu woods thedistance was about 400 wards. The
stone and the pool of blood arc midway between
the two spots. and a path, runs through the
wood passing Immediately beside the stone. H.
is used by workmen who go from Bedford Park
To- Van Cortlandt. The amount OF blood which
was around the stone makes II certain that II
did not all come from the woman. II any OF it
did, Beside the stone there were two smaller
square stones, and between Thesis there were
ashes OF a recent fire.
1t is suggested. with the idea OF helping the
police out OF their difficulty. that erhaps the
woman, being out OF her head. was enticed into
the woods by some man. perhaps one of the
gang OF acqueduct workmen, who stopped her
near the stone. Another man came along, or
perhaps there were two OF them together in the
it.st place. These men quarrGlled and fought