Los Angeles herald., 1910-12-12
DISASTERS CROWD
FAN|LYs HISTORY
Remarkable List of Fatalities
Mars Lives of Residents
in New York

NEW YORK, Dec. Another is
likely to be added to the remarkable
list of fatalities in the family of Miss
Adelaide Cumming, 173 West Forty
fifth street. She was summoned from
Boston Friday night ION account of the
critical illness of her sister.
Last week Miss Jane Cumming, who
is 32 years of age, put on a new dress
of the hobble skirt variety, and as
she was going downstairs she slipped
and fell Her hip bone was broken
and various complications have set in,
which determined friends to send for
the sister.
Here is the list of misfortunes which
have happened to members of Miss
Cummings family:
Grandfather wrecked and drowned at
sea.
Father killed in a boiler explosion.
Sister killed by a SNOWFALL.
Another sister killed by poison from
wounds.
Third sister killed by a trunk lid
falling on her head.
Nephew went down in the Maine.
Nephew lost in the San Francisco
earthquake.
Sister loses her mind from shock and
is in insane hospital.
Last sister dangerously hurt by a
fall
Miss Cumming is still a young wo-
man, but her first bereavement hap
pened while she was a small child.
Her grandfather, John G.. Cumming, a
sailor of Salem, Mass, was ship
wrecked, and although the crew took
to the boats, the sea was so rough that
the boats were swamped and Cum
ming was not among the few survivors.
His son, James C. Cumming, was a
merchant of Salem, and the boiler eX-
plosion in which he and fifteen others
were blown to pieces is still historic
in that town.
Only two weeks after her fathers
death younger sister of Miss Cum
ming was breaking a stick of wood
over her knee, when she fractured her
kneecap and had to have her leg ampu-
tated. Gangrene developed, from
which she died.
Another sister was killed at the age
of ten, being struck on the forehead by
a SNOWFALL in which stone was i'm
bedded, and a still more unusual fate
overlook another sister, Mary, several
years ago. She was packing a trunk,
when the lid fell and crushed her skull.
She died instantly.
The unhappy fate of the family
seemed to descend to the branches, for
one of Miss Cummings nephews was
lost in the San Francisco earthquake
in one of the collapsed buildings which
took fire. A brother of this lad, En-
sign Matthews, had perished on the
Maine in Havana harbor. These trage-
dies so preyed upon the mind of the
mother, Miss Cummings sister, that
she became violently insane, and is
now in a Massachusetts asylum. Now
the last near relative of Miss Cum
ming is in a hospital, and it is i'm
possible to say whether she will escape
tho family fate or not.
A friend of Miss Cumming saw the
reporter who called at her boarding
house and said:
"When we heard of this last misfor-
tune we could hardly believe 1t was
true. Poor Adelaide has had so much
misfortune that it seems It must end
sometime. You would think she would
be the most superstitious and nervous
person. in the world, and have often
asked her If she did not expect from
day to day that something terrible
would happen to her She says, though,
that she doesn't; that she has learned
to be philosophical about It. She
is as merry and bright as can be, and
If she lives with the thought that
there is a sword hanging over her head
and that It might fall at any moment
you would never guess 1t from her
manner"