Evening Republican, Volume 18, Number 119, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 20 May 1914 — EXPLOSION CAUSE OF WILSONS DEATH [ARTICLE]

EXPLOSION CAUSE OF WILSONS DEATH

Young Man Well Known Here Met Violent Death at Moline, Where He Was in Business. The following account of the accident that caused the death of Roscoe Wilson, well known in this city, to taken from the MoMne, 111, paper, where his death occurred last Sunday.

With* his body a flaming torch, Roscoe Wilson, tailor at 418% Fifteenth street, rushed to the street last night at 8:45 o’clock, screaming in pain. The streets were crowded, and the flames were soon beaten out after the man had suffered injuries from which he is not expected to live through today. He was at once rushed to the City hospital, where he remains in a conscious condition. Dr. A. H. Arp ana Dr. E. H. Sargent, state that the man is suffering intensely, . . . r Mr. Wilson was alone at the time of the accident. It Is supposed that the tailor was in the process of cleaning some clothing with gasoline, and the oil 'became ignited. While suffering intense agony, Wilson had presence-of mind enough to run for an assistant to save the building and many valuable suits of clothing which were hanging near the spot where the accident occurred. ■ Wilson descended the flight of

to run south through the crowd and crying in agony so that he was beard for several blocks. David R. Thomas, a close friend of Wilson’s, and Axel Gustafson, had Just alighted from a Watertown ear. They were walking north on Fifteenth street, when they met Wilson in front of Carlson Brothers’ book ktore. Both men took off their eoats and wrapped the suffering man with them. The flames were extinguished before Dr. A. H. Arp, Who had been summoned, arrived. On examination by the physicians at the hospital it was learned that Wilson’s body was badly seared all over. His left side from the foot to the shoulder was burned to a crisp. It is almost an impossibility for a person to survive with such injuries, according to Dr. Arp.

On making an inventory of the effects which the tailor had in his pockets this morning a pocketbook which contlaned S9O was missing. A hole had been burned through the pocket and it is expected that some person picked up the waDet