The Butte inter mountain. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1901-1912, 1901-10-16
DEL|RIUM TREMENS
ATTEMPT AT SUICIDE RESULTS
FROM A BAD CASE.
MAN HAMMERS HIS HEAD
John Philbin, Plasterer, Tries to Kill
Himself With a Hatchet-Sca1p
Badly Lacerated-Saw Horrid
Visions

The woman's department at the county
Jail looked like a slaughter house this
morning. The floor was splashed with
blood, and the cots were occupied by
two men who were wrapped in bandages
and whose clothing and persons were
soiled with the sanguinary fluid.
One Of the men was John Philbin. a
plasterer who attempted to commit sui
eide this morning by hammering himself
on the head with = lather's Ratchet.
Philbin was brought into the Jail at
O'Clock, from the Silver Lake house, on
East Quartz street, where his attempt
at self-destruction was made. At the
Jail the wounds he had inflicted on his
head were dressed by Dr. Sheeran,
county physician. The man. lying on a
bunk. in his clothes, except for his shoes,
was able to talk an hour later.
Suffering From Delirium.
Philbin was suffering from an attack
of delirium tremens when he pounded
his head with the Ratchet. According to
his story, he had one of the most furious
cases of the "jims'' on record. and for
hours had been looking upon a great
parade of the widest character .imagin-
able, hearing sounds horrible and
strange. and dreaming fearful dreams.
This morning, he SAID. he imagined
that everything was burning up, and so
he determined to kill himself before he
too was burned. That was his reason
for the attempt to take his life. Every
thing was afire around him. and he tried
to crush his skull with the hatchet in a
desperate effort to escape the universal
conflagration.
He lay down upon his bed in the silver
Lake house at 9 o'clock last night. His
roommate, Jack Gill, occupied another
bed in the room. He lay upon the bed
all night, he said, and slept very little.
All night long men came through the
walls and asked him to eat. Beside him
on the bed there were bottles of arsenic,
oil. turpentine. strychnine. creosote and
other poisons, he thought.
Came Through Walls.
The men who came through the walls
invited him to eat of those things. Some
of them, he thought, wanted information
about a murder. Railroad trains thun-
dered through the room. the buildings
tunbled down and the city broke up in
chaos. Then he imagined that every
where there was fire and that he would
be cooked to crisp in a minute.
when I thought everything was
afire.' he said, II jumped off the bed.
thought I'd kill myself before burned.
The lathing hatchet was on the radiator.
and grabbed It and hit myself couple
Of blows on the head. Then my room
mate took the Ratchet away from me-"
He struck himself with the head Of the
Ratchet. The flesh was badly lacerated,
DR.. Sheeran said.
Had blows Of the same force been de-
livered with the blade of the hatchet.
the chances are Philbin would have
made a nick or two in his skull AMI
killed himself. He bled freely, and his
bare feet We're fecked with blood. He
said he tried to hit his temple. but missed
his aim. The cuts were nearly on top
of his head. on the right side.
Philbin has lived in Butte at intervals
since 1883, and has followed the trade of
plasterer He is a middle-aged man.
He had been drinking for several days,
and last night was his first night at the
Silver Lake house.
Alfred Ankcorn was the other wound
ed man at the Jail. He was concerned
in the shooting in Mahoney alley last
night.