The Newark star and Newark advertiser. [volume] (Newark, N.J.) 1909-1909, 1909-04-05
GIRL N|H|L|ST WHO
DIED Of POISON IS
CARRIED TO GRAVE
Helen Mandelstam, Crazed by
Pictured Horrors of Siberia,
Rejected All Help.

The funeral of Miss Helen Mandel-
stam, who drank nitric acid on Satur-
day died yesterday afternoon in
the City Hospital, was held this after
noon from the undertaking parlors OF
Philip Apter, 1903 Morton street, and in
terment was in the Fir Jacob Congre-
cation Cemetery in Grove street.
That Miss Mandelstam ended her life
because moving pictures in a theatre
she visited brought her mind back to
Russia where she and her sweetheart
had been imprisoned as Nihilists, is
the opinion of her brother, DR.. Max
Mandelstam, who is an assistant in the
dental offices of DR.. William Levine,
at 500 High street.
Miss Mandelstam was born at Pone-
visz, in the Province of Koyo, Russia,
twenty-five years ago. She came of
parents who were in comfortable cir
cumstances and was sent to the Uni
versity of Warsaw for her higher edu-
cation. 1t was in January, 1905, when
the country was seething with revolt,
that Miss Mandelstam, then a student
in the university, was arrested, with
her sweetheart, and other students.
They were accused of being involved in
political intrigue and were thrown into
prison.
Death of Sweetheart.
In September, 1907, Miss Mandelstam,
having been paroled and bailed, came
to this country and settled in New
York. In the following mont h re-
ceived a letter from her mother in
Russia in which she was informed that
her sweetheart had died. This so upset
her that her mind became deranged.
Her cousin, DIR. Jubin, of Philadelphia,
took charge of her and had her placed
in a sanatorium near that city, where
she remained for eight months.
on Thursday she came to Newark to
visit her brother, and on Friday, while
downtown with Mrs. Levine, dropped
into a nickelodrome, where she saw
pictures of convicts Shaving in the salt
mines of Siberia. She was deeply af-
fected by this and told Mrs. Levine OF
her own experience as a prisoner.
On Saturday afternoon Miss Mandel-
stan was left alone in the dental Of
fees while DIR. Levine, his wife and DR.,
Mandelstam sat down to lunch. The
meal mao udruly pcSuh WHcH Miss
Mandelstam called her brother aside
and gave him the slip of paper, on
which was written: II want to die
She had taken nitric acid, the deadly
work of which no emetic can prevent
Refused to BE Saved.
She spurned the efforts of DR.. Levine
and her brother to save her life, shut
ting her teeth tight and saying thai
she wished to die. even when physi-
clans were summoned she declined K
take any fluids that they thought
might possibly counterfeit the poison
And at the City Hospital, where she
was taken, she closed her teeth tight
murmuring hat she wished to die
Finally her cousin, DIR. Jubin, vas tel
egraphed for and he came to Newark
yesterday.
Miss Mandelstam smiled as she saw
her relative by Ter bedside but still
locked her teeth and finally died.
Only last Friday she wrote a long let
ter to her mother in which she told o
all the arrangements she a made TO
celebrating Passover, which begins a
j shutdown tonight. That day she hat
also done a piece of tapestry work
which caused her brother and the lie
vines to congratulate her on her skill.