Bridgeton pioneer., 1910-02-10
SICK MAN STABS
WIFE AND SELF
SIaShed Woman at Bedside
and Cut His Throat.
BOTH IN DANGEROUS CONDITION
Four-Year-oId Son Witnessed the At
tack and Called Help, Saving the
Couple From Bleeding to Death.
Husband Probably insane.

Philadelphia, Feb. Scaled to the
bedside of her husband, who lay ill,
Mrs. Mary Cras, of 1920 Jackson
street, this city, was attacked with a
knife. After she had fallen unconscious
across the bed, gashed about the
breast and throat, the husband crawl
ed into the next room and cut his
own throat.
Husband and wife are in st. Agnes
hospital, both in a dangerous condi-
tion. There is little or no hope for the
mans recovery, the doctors say. But
for the couples four-year-old son, who
saw the attack on his mother, hus-
band and wife would probably have
died in the house. He ran to a neigh
boris house with the alarm that Sc
cured aid
According to statement made by
the wife to the police, her husband
fancied that she had been neglectful
of him. The detectives believe, how
ever, that he made the attack and the
attempt on his own life in fit of in
sanity that has been developing for
days.
John Cras, the husband, is thirty
years old and the wife, twenty-four.
Mrs. Cras said her husband COM
planned of feeling i'll few days ago
and quit work. He did not stay in bed
all the time, but got up late mornings
and lay around the house, complaining
of his health. She thought nothing of
that at the time, she told the police,
but looking back over the last few
days she felt sure that he had gotten
the idea that she was not attending to
him as she should have done.
Decoyed to Bedside.
He stayed up in his room and Mrs.
Cras was at work in the kitchen, with
the little boy John, playing near her.
She heard her husband call her by
name twice. She went upstairs at
once, with the child toddling close be-
hind. Cras was lying in bed, and she
went to his side.
AS she bent over the man grasped
her suddenly and pulled her toward
him. Before the startled wife had
time to realize her danger he struck
at her with potato knife that he had
| kept concealed under the bed clothes.
The woman threw up her right hand
and the blade slashed across three of
her fingers, almost severing them. The
knife had been sharpened to a razor
like keenness. Then the wife began a
desperate struggle for her life, scream
ing as she fought.
For a few seconds she warded off
the attack, but the man proved the
stronger. Freeing his right hand, he
drove the knife into her breast four
times and gashed her throat. Then she
tainted. Satisfied that he had done
his work, Cras crawled into the ad-
joining room, ignoring the wide-eyed
child that stood, frightened and
breathless, near the bed, and cut his
throat.
Ten minutes later Mrs. Cras recov-
cred consciousness and staggered
downstairs, the child following her. At
the foot of the stairs she fell uncon-
scious again. The boy ran to the house
of Mrs. Adoline Mesherher next door,
and told her that his mother was lying
"all bloody in the hall.
Mrs. Mersherher rushed into the
Cras house and saw the wife bleeding
at the foot of the stairs. In the sit
tiLgroom, off the hall, she caught a
glimpse of the husbandfi sliding from
a Norris chair, with blood flowing
from deep cash in his throat. She
ran shrieking from the house.
Policemen answered the screams for
help. They called the patrol wagon,
and husband and wife, both uncon-
scious, We're hurried to the hospital.
The woman recovered consciousness in
fifteen minutes after she reached the
institution and told of the attack to
the SpCCioI rOlicen1an