Bismarck daily tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1881-1916, 1914-01-09
Mrs. Ella Randall, Victim Of
Burning Accident Abed
for Year
Unless Fresh Skin Is GRATED
Woman Faces Lonely
DEATH @,&s
. y it@
Deserted by husband Toiled
Alone to Support
Babe
Pleads PlteOusIy to Get 0ul
and WOfki0 Have Child
Again

Will some person in Bismarck sacri
flee few shreds of their flesh thai
Mrs. Ella Randall, 81, may spend the
few years remaining to her in com
parative comfort?
For over a year the woman has
lain en- a cot in st. AleXius hospital
slowly recovering from horrible burns
received when during an attack OF
epilepsy she fell across a burning
gasoline stove. -'2
Physicians say she must remain
there for months more, perhaps until
the deadly epilepsy has completed its
work and left her lifeless. One wound
upon her body refuses to heal. Ply
sicians say. that ,switt her system ex
hausted from the ranges Of disease
and the long confinement at the hos,
pital that it will not do so unless new
vital flesh is grated upon the torn
surface, .
On other portions of her body sur
geons have grated from the unaffect-
ed surfaces with good results but Sc
worn has she become with the months
of illness at the hospital that he1
flesh no longer has enough vitality to
heal over the wound.
The skin grating operation is neith'
er dangerous nor painful. If two people
make the sacrifice for the stricken
woman her physicians declare she
could be out of the hospital and about
town again in a few weeks.
Mrs. Randall is we'll known in Bis
marck. A little over two years ago
she and her infant child were desert
ed by the husband and the invalid was
compelled to work in any way she
could to preserve home for the lit
tie one.
For nearly a year she did house
work and washing, tOiling ceaselessly
and battling bravely against the dread
ful disease that threatened that she
might keep her baby with her.
Then about Il year ago came the
accident that q dOomed her to long
months of pain in the hospital. Her
baby was taken from her. A kind
family in another part OF the state
took the child and agreed to provide
a good home fer it. Mrs. Randall
consented to the arrangement with
tears in her eyes. She had no other
course. Also she hoped that in few
weeks she would be recovered and
might work again and have her baby
with her.
But all through the hot summer she
lay in the hospital and her wounds
refused to heal Sometimes she would
lay for hours and tell the nurses OF
her child and plan aloud the things
that she would do and the dresses
that she would make for the baby
when she was we'll again. Even now,
sick and in pain as she is, she tries
with her crippled fingers to contrive
pretty things for the child.
Christmas day when other mothers
were happy with their babes she lay
and cried for sight of her child.
"If only could get out" she said,
II could work and see my baby. II
some one would only help me. I could
be we'll, and then could work and pay
them."
The months that she has been bed
ridden have made the other malady
worse. If she could get we'll and exer.
else again physicians say her life
might be prolonged for years. Un-
less some help is given her she must
lie for months more in miserable
,rieving for the child that she cannot
keep and long vainly for the open air
md sunshine that would mean to her
lew life and happiness.