The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1898-06-12
Little Girl Assaulted and Strangled
to Death.
SUSPECT UNDER ARREST
WILL BE A LYNCHING IF GUILT
Is PROVEN.
Victim Was Beautiful Child, Nine
Years of Age, and the Body Was
Horribly Mutilated = Suspected
Man Put Through the Sweating
Process-Ordeal at Undertaker's.

Butte, Mont, June 11.-Ethel Gill
aged 9 years, disappeared from heI
home on South Ohio street on Thurs
day evening. This morning her dead
body was found in an clubhouse several
blocks from the residence of her par
ents. The condition of the body showed
plainly she had been outraged, and the
marks about her neck indicated that
she had been strangled to death.
Mr. and Mrs Edward Gill, parents of
the child. arrived here about two
months ago from Oakland, Cal. They
rented a cabin in the rear of 1923 South
Ohio street. On Thursday evening the
child was playing with some other
little ones near the Northern Pacific de-
pot, not far from the child's home.
Since then nothing was seen of her I'M
til this morning, when female neigh
Dor went into the clubhouse, and saw
what seemed to her TO be a body. She
notified some men in an adjoining lum-
Der yard, who went in and secured the
body. 1t was that OF the missing child.
The clothing was torn and disarranged,
and there were other evidences that an
outrage had been Derpetrated. Discol-
crationS on the neck indicated stran-
gUlatiOn, and there was a mark on the
left temple, as il made by some blunt
instrument.
The police think they have the man
who committed the crime. He was ar
rested about an hour after the girls alb
sence was noted. The police wanted him
on suspicion of burglary. They found
him in the lumber yard, not 80 feet
fICm the outraged girl. There We're
blood stai2s on his clothes, and when
questioned about them, he could give
no satisfactory answer. When today S
discovery was made, the police thought
of this circumstance. Since then wit
LesseS have been found who will swear
they saw the man and the child to-
gether on the evening of her disappear
ance and shortly before his arrival. The
man gives his name as Charles Smith,
but is also known to the police as Hig-
gins.
The man uader arrest was in the
county Jail at the time. He had been
watching a cache of goods stolen from
a hardware store on Wednesday night.
When the girls body was found today
and he was suspected of that crime.
too, the police started to put him
through the sweating process. They
made him account for his actions and
movements on the evening OF the girls
disappearance and his own arrest. He
DID not do this in a very SATISFACTORY
way. Then he was taken to the under
takers place, where the body was be-
ing prepared for burial, and made to
lcok upon the body. He stood the test
manfully. He is a man about % years
of age. The theory of the police is that
the girl had gone into the clubhouse,
and the man followed her and accom-
plished his purpose. 1t is said she was
seen talking TO a man answering the
description of the prisoner a short time
before 9 o'clock on Thursday night.
The girl was OF slender build and
very beautiful. She was an only child
She was horribly mutilated.
The inquest will take place on Tues
day. Should the absolute proof of any
ones guilt be obtained, there will
doubtless be a lynching.