Rensselaer Republican, Volume 22, Number 21, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 January 1890 — A FATAL INITIATION. [ARTICLE]

A FATAL INITIATION.

»«a Ih of a Clergyman While Taking a Muionlo Degree. A funeral party passed through Cincinnati on the way to Hannibal, Mo., Tuesday, bearing the body of the Rev. J. W. Johnson, pastor of the Methodist Episcopal Church, south, of Huntington, W. Va. The deceased was passing through tho ceremony of initiation into the Royal Arch chapter of Masonry, on Friday night last, at Huntington, when an accident happened which cost him his life. He was about to be lowered into a thirteen-feet deep vault, symbolical of the search in the ruins of the temple, when the rope upon which his weight was suspended suddenly unvound from the tackle and he fell to the floor below. Ho was extricated by means of a ladder, and no outward mark of injury could be found. He had struck on his left hip, and suffered intense agony. He was conscious, aud absolved the brethren from all blame. He died on Sunday morning. Another candidate had just pussed safely through the same ordeal. Mr. Johnson’! Juneral services of Sunday night were attended by an immense throng. A sad feature was that he was to be married Feb. 1 o a young lady in Catlettsburg. He had seen in Huntington one year, having corns from Hannibal, Mo., whore his relatives ■ive. No attempt to conceal the nature o) the accident was made. —————— A Charleston, S. C., special says: J crate of strawberries was shipped hence t< New York Monday night They wen jrown in a field in the suburbs, and in ths open air. Should the warm weather con '•inue a week or more the annual straw >crry crop will be ready for marketing The strawberry reason here opens gener ally about March or April. But the, frufc is now ripening rapidly, and the entin srop, which aggregates about a millfoi quarts, will be harvested before the Ist o March, unless a blisxard comas along. *