The Bamberg herald. [volume] (Bamberg, S.C.) 1891-1972, 1914-02-19
*.MY PATH LEADS TO MORGUE
THEN TO POTTER'S FIELD
Career of Famous Virginia Beauty Who Realized
Too Late the Folly of Her Course-She Dc
tates Statement Three Days Before Death.

Washington, Feb. 1T is only d
few days ago that Florence Schenck,
the gay, willful Virginia beauty,
whose escapades made her notorious
in two worlds, died the day after she
arrived at her old home.
Three days before her death she
dictated the article that appears on
this page. Florence Schenck thought
that she had at least year to live,
and she had determined to devote
every working hour to warning other
girls of the path she had taken-the
gay primrose path, whose end is the
unnamed grave of the potter's field.
This article was to have been her
first move in her fight.
The lesson she would have taught
in it has been vised by death, and it
is more important now perhaps than
it would have been with it's writer
still alive.
Miss Schenck, it will be remem-
bered, was the daughter Of DR.. Pow
hatan Schenck, a retired surgeon OF
the United States army and member
OF one of the first families of Vir-
ginia." She ran away with Charles
Wilson, a whip in the Alfred Wander
bilt stables. She had tired Of the
humdrum, respectable life in a mod
est home in the seaport town of Nor
folk, Va. She wanted to see the
world. She saw it. And what she
saw and experienced killed her.
She led the gayest of lives in New
York, in London, in Berlin.
Here follows her story, her warn
ing to other girls, who may tempt
ed to tread the path she. trod.
Beware the Path Trod."
When my father in answer to my
pleadings, came to see me in my lit
tie room at the hospital, 1 could not
see him through my tears. l could
not speak for the sob in my throat.
I clung to his >aand, thinking: Poor
father! He has seen many ship
wreck down home, but never one
more terrible than this of his daugh-
ter's life" I stared, up into his face
that was very stern and sad.
whispered, Kiss me, father
Then my lovely sister Ann came IN
and kissed me and cried. She went
out of the room and two doctors
came in and they and father looked
at my bruised side and the purple
cash where the surgeons had made
an incision, and all of them looked
very grave. Afterward 1 looked up
at father and he shook his head.
"You cannot live long, my daugh-
ter he said. "At best it will be but
a short time. If you seem to recover
it will only mean that your short life
Will be that of an invalid. You have
repented, have you not? Then spend
whatever time is left to you in warn
ing other girls against the path you
have followed
THE path that leads to the morgue
and then to potter's field,'' thought.
With my hand in his and our tears
mingling 1 promised. And this is the
way 1 shall do it.
I shall grow little better. That
they all expect for me. knowing
that it will only be short time and
that inevitably I shall grow worse
and then the end will be very near,
that time of being little better will
be my golden time. 1t is then that
will carry out my plan.
shall not go back to my old home
at Norfolk. That would be too Sc
we're a cross for my proud family,
though they have not refused me
shelter. But shall leave New York,
whose other name is temptation for
girls who have not great talents or
the greatest talent of all, which is the
ability to resist the lure of idleness
and gayety Even now with the
shadow of death upon me l fear 1t.
for it's fingers, though wreathed IN
flowers. are strong and cruel.
Rode in Private Car.
| should like to go to a small city,
for instance, Richmond, and there
live quietly and either lecture from
the platform or with my pen, until
the end comes. Always my sermon
: will be The wages of sin is death.
and always l will address myself 70
girls, weak, pleasure-loving girls
who know not what they say when
they utter those ominous words, i
want to see the wori6.'
Seven years ago slipped out OF my
quiet home on the outskirts OF Nor
folk and came to New York in Alfred
Vanderbilt's private car, the way
farer. The name of the car was all