Plentywood herald. [volume] (Plentywood, Mont.) 1908-current, 1929-02-07

Writes In farewell Letter
DIR. Charles 5. Whitford. 73-year-old
Butte physician, bid IAN everlasting
farewell to his friends In n long type
written note addressed TO the public,
and fired II bullet into his brain from
a pistol. The act took place I'm IA bed
o ut the home of DIR. Whitford and
his wife in Butte.
Approaching blindness and infirmity
impelled the aged Butte physician to END
his life. he declared in the note. He
did not wish, he said. to become q bur
den upon his friends and chose self
destruction while having means to de-
fray the expenses of such an act
DR.. Whitford died instantly. The re
port of the pistol shot brought his wife
from the next room and she found the
body lying upon the e The physician
had been respondent since suffering a
paralytic stroke several months ago and
had threatened suicide in notes written
TO members of his family.
Born in Illinois and a graduate of the
Bennett Medical college at Chicago, DR..
Whitford had practiced in Butte and
Lewiston. Idaho. He was a son of the
late DR.. o. B.. Whitford. pioneer Montana
physician, and the first Silver Bow county
coroner
The note left by DR.. Whitford reads:
To the Public: What l am about to
do Will be justly condemned as the act
of a coward, wholly unnecessary. when we
look around and about us at this beauti-
ful world of sunshine and glowing beau
ty, all ours to take and enjoy.
All! That's the rub. With health,
strength and the vigor of youth. one can
revel in the beauties of nature, but when
old age comes creeping on with mfr
mites and various misfortunes. the
whitening blight of time brushes our
powers of appreciation.
TO those h are blessed with sight,
the world is ever beautiful. and the star
OF hope is ever reckoning onward to bet
ter things, but to live in darkness after
having lived for years in the light OF
day is u situation too awful to contem-
plate.
This condition is inevitably coming to
me in the near future and as l am still
able to move and have my being and
having means to defray expenses of such
an act l think 1t just and fitting to
embrace 1T for, better be dead and out of
the way than a source OF misery TO my
self. my friends, and the community in
which I live.
"To my dear relatives l go with a burst
ing heart, knowing that they will sin
cerely mourn for me and regret to hurt
the feelings of the very few friends l
have.
Il desire my funeral TO be quiet and
inexpensive, as l do not believe in rob-
bling the living to give to the dead.
The dead can take care OF themselves,
while the living are forced to struggle
on till they are dead and then ~pauperize
the living to bury them.
1T is all pomp and hypocrisy boiled
down to dollars and cents to win the
admiration n applause of the living,
and now o forgotten by the little
community n never thought of by the
world at large.
Il desire Richards to conduct my flu
neral services and let the trappings of
the world be conspicuous by their abb
sence. And, now, my good friends and
fellow sympathizers, allow me to bid YOU
an everlasting farewell.
"(Signed) s. C. WHITFORD.'
DR.. Whitford also left letters addressed
TO his wife, daughter and sister.
Mrs. Whitford had left the bedroom
just before the not was fired. After
finding the body, she summoned Under
sheriff Angus Mcleod who called Cor
one Mike Salot.
Surviving are the widow, a sister, Mrs.
Charlotte Spencer Of Oakland, Calf, and
q daughter, Mrs. Nettie Comstock Of
Portland. Ore.