Newark evening star and Newark advertiser. [volume] (Newark, N.J.) 1909-1916, 1910-12-07
LONG QUEST FOR
MISSING WIFE IS
TO END At GRAVE
FrencII-Canadian Wants Re-
mains of Fire Victim
Disinterred.
FAITHFUL TO MEMORY FOR
OVER A QUARTER CENTURY
Tells of His Lies Romance and
How 1t Was Wrecked
Years Ago.

4 George La Pierre, the French Cana
dian. who has come here from Ottawa,
Canada, in the belief that Mary La
Pierre, a victim of the High street fac
tory horror. was his wife and that she
lies buried beside the body of a man
: whom her friends think was her first
husband, went to the Arlington Board
of Health today ands demanded per
! nit for the disinterment of the body.
The permit was granted by P NJ.
England, registrar of vital statistics,
and the body of Mrs. La Pierre will be
exhumed in the presence of the man
from Canada tomorrow.
Yesterday La Pierre called upon the
dead woman's sister in Bergen street.
where hs learned that the fire victim
had upon her body a mole n exactly
the same spot as had his wife, but he
also learned many things that seemed
to Indicate thai the dead Won an may
not be his wife after all. The con
flicting evidence sorely puzzled the lit
tie French Canadian, the more SO as
he speaks English very imperfectly
and READS it not at all, bu. finally after
Mrs. La Pierres sister ha,. given him
d :
tailed exactly with his wife. while
the mute daughter declared in the
sign language that her mothers first
husband was not La Pierre at all but
man named Henry, the old man
squared his jaws in determination and
said:
Determined to Take Body Back.
Il have come here from Canada to
End my wife to take her bones back
to our little daughter in an Ottawa
graveyard.
She was not good wife to me. She
run awsy with another man and leave
me alone in the world ever since, bus
just the same 1 have loved her always.
| have loved her so we'll that l shall
know If it is she who is buried there
beside that other man If l can see the
body. So / shall have the body taken
UP. | am not going to live the rest of
my life not knowing if it is possible to
find out whether she is alive or deadp
There is something infinitely pathetic
in the quest that this lonely old man
is making for the bones of the wife
whom he believes to have been false
to him more than quarter of CEN
tury ago He Is little weakened man
with iron gray hair and a mustache
also white Forty years at the solder
ing lamp of his tlnsmith's shop in OF
tawa have weakened his eyes so that
he has to wear giant goggles of smoked
glass. In all his life he had. never
been out of Canada until he came to
Newark with the picture he had seen
in the newspaper of the dead Mary La
Pierre.
IF that is my wife she had been
very pretty woman he said in the
unaccented patois of the French
Canadian Yes, m'sieur, L think she
was most beautiful girl in the world
You see yourself said the little old
man. and drew from worn pocket
book small tintype SCARED and faded
from twenty seven years of constant
carrying, but still showing dimly the
face and figure of q really beautiful
woman dressed IN the fashion of the
early eighties.
Proud of His Wife.
That was her." said La Pierre, that
was Mary McCrea when l marry her
back to Ottawa. tell you l am proud
man when l marry Mary McCrea. But
you cannot Judge me now for / am
bent over with many years and much
work So we start to keep the house.
1 am good tinsmith then. and all the