Jasper County Democrat, Volume 14, Number 51, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 September 1911 — FIVE BURN TO DEATH [ARTICLE]

FIVE BURN TO DEATH

Mother Is Heroine of Fire Started by Kerosene. She Loses Own Life in Saving Boy When House Is Raging Furnace. Mitchell, 111.. Sept. 29. —Mrs. Virgil Vandever and four of her children were burned to death when a can of kerosene, used to accelerate a fire started by the husband and father in the kitchen stove, exploded. The dead are Mrs. Virgil Vandever. thirty-four years old; Gertrude, thirteen years old; Bessie, ten; Earl, 6; Wanda, three. The injured are Virgil Vandever, burned on the face and bands; Theirl Vandever, bruised, face and legs burned; Arthur Langford, face scorched. Mrs. Vandevers last act was a supreme expression of maternal love. She snatched her seven-year-old boy, Theirl. hugged him tightly to her breast, and with a final effort pushed him out the screen of a window an/ dropped him to safety. Then onlookers saw her throw up her hands and sink back into the flames. The husband and Arthur Langford, Mrs. Vandever’s eig'nteen-year-dld son by a former marriage, saved themselves by jumping from a second story window after their efforts to rescue remaining members of the family were futile.