Daily inter mountain. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1881-1901, 1900-11-27
AN AUTOPSY
NECESSARY
70 DETEkm THE CAUSE OF
DEATH Or LEON LEMIEUX
SATURDAY.
THE CORONER'S JURY
WAS IN DOUBT.
Witnesses Claim That the Electric
Current Was Not Strong Enough
to Cause Death.

IIeFe are, perhaps only tWo HieH III
the city Of Butte who can answer that
question with any degree of certainty.
and professional etiquette requires their
lips to be sealed on the subject. until to-
morrow evening.
Leon Lemieux died suddenly in an
ash-pit at the M. O.. P. smelter last Sat
urday night, and when. an inquest was
held yesterday by Coroner Brown over
the remains the jury was unable to de-
termine the cause of death; some
thought heart disease the cause, ana
others electricity. By order of the jury,
Drs. Norcross and Cowperthwaite held
an autopsy last night, but the inquest
was postponed until tomorrow evening,
and until that time nobody but the two
physicians in question will know the
true cause of death.
At the inquest, held in. Richards UNI
dertaking parlors, the testimony showed
that Lemieux died with his feet on an
iron ash-pit door, one hand clasping d
wire cable and the left arm resting
across a wire which fed an incandescenr
light. There was a slight abrasion in
the insulation of this wire. While all the
witnesses called testified that the wiring
of the building is perfect, there were
lone Of them who could account for the
marks resembling burns on the right
side of the deceased.
Edwin j. Matthews, a laborer at the
smelter, said hat he was working near
the ash-pit on the night of the Oath In
slant. There was a weight on the door
of the ash-pit n it was necessary for
two or three men to stand on it to hold
it down. Three men, including Lemieux.
We're standing on the door when two of
them jumped off and left the deceased
standing there alone. When the witness
looked toward him again, attracted by
his groans, Lemieux was standing with
his right hand on the wire cable rope
and his left arm on an insulated wire
used in feeding the incandescent bulb
which lights the furnace.
When Matthews removed Lemieux's
arm from the wire and laid him gently
down. the unfortunate man was dead
The witness had never known deceased
to complain of hear disease. Prior to
his death he had been Laying off, WORK
for a week.
Matthews declared that there vas no
live wire near where Lemieux was at
work, and yet was forced to admit that
when he took the lifeless body off the in
candescent Eight wire he himself re-
ceived a slight shock of electricity.
John Christian Slater, the next wiz
ness. who holds the position of foreman
at the Smelter, said he saw the deceased
about 20 feet away from the ash-pit. He
could not conceive how electricity could
have killed him. because he himself hac
taken hold of the wire after Lemieux's
death and had received no shock. All
the wires near the ash-pit were insu-
lated. The marks resembling burns on
the body he was unable to account for.
job Peterson n Joseph Zunick, the
two men who stood on the asn-p.t door
with Lemieux just before he lost his life.
We're called to the stand. Both described
the mode of death in the same manner
as had Matthews. Lemieux had died at
about the time the door slipped into po-
sition.
Zunick had on several occasions re-
ceived slight electric shocks while work.
ing near the ash-pit. The incandescent
wire on which Lemieux's arm lay, how
ever, was we'll insulated.
DIR. I. d. Freund testified that he knew
little about the case, but that it is not
a difficult matter for a physician to de-
termine a burn caused by electricity.
\ L tANC SlDJSSt WV pCl AlSOif a
very slight shock might cause death.
The physician thought that the wires
at the smelter carried about $50 volts OF
electricity. Under extraordinary condi-
tions this voltage would cause instanta-
neous death. Slater had testified that
at the time of death the, deceased was
perspiring freely.
William knight, an undertaken in
Richards establishment, undressed the
remains, and the marks on the body
We're revealed. One mark was under the
left armpit and there We're two others
above it, o a half inch apart. There
We're small scales on the last two, show
ing them to be old burns. The clothing
was not burned, n witness could not
tell what had caused the last mark, as
electricity usually burned the clothing
when it left a mark on the body of a
man.
w. L.. Deimlig, chief electrician at the
smelter, testified that the Butte current
lighted the building: that the wires car
ried 1900 volts up to a point about 80
feet distant from the smelter, when the
| current was transferred into one of 1O4
volts. AS the high pressure current does
not enter the building, n the wires are
all insulated, he was satisfied that the
deceased was not killed by electricity.
His observation had been that when Il
current of electricity strong enough to
kill had entered a human body the cloth.
ing was always burned.
Charles Lorentz, the craneman, said
that 104 volts are carried IN the crane
wires, but he did not know how many
were carried on the incandescent light
wires. He had examined the wire on
which Lemieux's arm had rested shortly
after his death n had found it prop
erly insulated.
Perhaps the most important witnes.
in favor of death from natural causes
was Henry B. Fletcher, a m%achinist, who
said that 1T would be impossible for a
man standing on the ash-pit door to
reach the main feeder. which is % feet
overheard. Last Sunday morning he
examined the ash-pit wire and found il
to be in proper condition. If, by any