Manchester Democrat. [volume] (Manchester, Iowa) 1875-1930, 1907-03-06
SAW CRIME m DREAM.

= =.
Girl CuriousIy Forewarned of the
Murder of Her Own Chum.
Less than half an hour before Miss
Josephine Rummelhart, of this city
was attacked and murdered, by an un-
known colored man, her intimate friend
and roommate, Miss Mary Liphardt
foresaw the tragedy In dream, says
an Omaha correspondent ofsthsEYash-
ington Post. - -:
Sprlnging from her bed aboutsfo 80
o'clock on the night of thesmurd& her
face as pale as death, a leok OF. terror
in her wide-open eyes, Miss LiplMrdt
cried:
Josephine Rummelhart is being muir
dered! Help! Help! oh, can, no one
save herr"
Several women, attracted by her
cries, ran to Miss Llphardt's room, find-
Ing her excltedly pacing the floor,
wringing her hands and declaring that
her friend and roommate had been
killed.
Il saw a colored man knock her
down, drag her into an alley, and
there cut her throat she cried. "Oh,
1t Is awful, awful, awful!'
You have been dreaming, Mary"
said one of her friends. Miss Rum
melhart has gone out to spend the
evening with Miss Anderson. but she
is all right and will return to her room
soon"
Yes; l have been dreaming" said
Miss Liphardt, "but the dream was so
vivid and saw 1t all so plainly that
1t seems true to me yet"
The yonng woman was persuaded to
return to her bed on the assurance that
Miss Rummelhart would soon return
TO her room, and by and by she fell
asleep.
When she awoke in the morning she
Instantly recalled her dream of the
night before, and. glanclng at Miss
Rummelhart's bed across the room from
f.cr own, she was startled to see that
1t had not been occupied.
Dressing hastily she went downstairs
and picked up the morning paper. The
first words that caught her eye were
those In a scare head" telling of the
co!d-blooded murder of Miss Rumrael-
hart the night before.
The murder had been committed less
than half IN hour after Miss Liphardt
had awaken the household by springlng
from her bed crying thnt her friend
and roommate was being murdered.
Only two blocks from the boarding
house and seven blocks from tile heart
Of the business district of Omaha the
young woman, on her way home from
the house Of a neighbor, had been
knocked down by negro, dragged,
bleeding and unconscious, to dark
spot in the rear of one OF the houses in
the neighborhood. The negro cut her
throat with q razor and then made his
escape.
Two young men, W. B. Hughes and
Paul Lowe, lodging in the house in the
rear of which Miss Rnnimelhart was
LETT by her slayer, attracted by the
dying woman's means, discovered l.er n
few minutes after the negro fled. They
promptly notified the police of the dis
eovery and the young woman was ta-
ken to hospital, where she died a
few hours later without regaining con-
seriousness.
A curious case of mistaken identity
occurred the morning after the muir
der. Hundreds of people went to the
morgue to see the body of the murdered
woman. Among those who went there
was Charles Ward, veteran street-car
conductor of the city. The moment
Ward glanced at the face, of the, dead
woman he grew deadly pale, staggered
back as If he had been shot and cried
that the body was that of his daughter,
Miss Wilkes Ward.
Bowed with grief Ward set out for
his home to break the dreadful news
to his wife. On opening the door to
his house the first person to greet him
was the daughter whom he had be.
lieved to be dead. She had gone to the
theater with young woman friend the
night berore and, missing the last car
for her home, had spent the night with
her friend, arriving home a few min.
utes before her father arrived there to
break to his wife the news of her death.