Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 37, Number 19, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 March 1905 — MRS. STANFORD DEAD. [ARTICLE]

MRS. STANFORD DEAD.

Woman Philanthropist Taken Strangely 11l at Honolulu and Dies in Agony. The tragic death of Mrs. Jane Leland Stanford in convulsions at Honlulu Tuesday night, crying, “I am poisoned,” is expected to develop a most remarkable mystery. Fleeing from poisoning which almost took her life Mrs. Stanford, among the wealthiest women in the world, famed philanthropist and benefactor of education, expired in her apartments in the Moana hotel after drinking soda water. Not one motive can be a'scribed for the supposed murder of Mrs. Stanford, but her sudden death came after she had appeared in perfect health and following an equally mysterious poisoning of the I hilanthrppi’st in her San Francisco palace. Physicians first called diagnosed her sudden fatal attack as “tetanus of the respiratory organs.” An examination after her death confirmed this diagnosis, but the scientists confessed themselves unable to furnish any reason for the suddenness of such an attack. An inquest was held, and an autopsy reported the discovery of tetanus. Mrs. Stanford was found moaning in her death agonies, but conscious and intelligent. She died in less than an hour after she drank the medicine, though she had been in active health ami high spirits all day. She told her servants and the persons who had rushed to her bedside of tlie medicine she had taken, and then, as tlie convulsions grew worse, she seemed to come to a full realization that she was about to die and exclaimed: "I have been poisoned! This is a horrible death to die!” Her own physician. Dr. F. 11. Humphreys. jmd. another in the hotel. Dr. 11. V. Marray, did all jn their power, but in vain, to alleviate her piteous convulsions. Site died within forty minutes. Two months before in her boudoir in her San Francisco mansion she had been stricken with similar convulsions after drinking a bottle of imported mineral water found to contain strychnine, which resulted in her flight toward the Orient for an extended tour. Miss Berner, the seClM'tary. who was with her mistress at each poisoning, almost swooned as Mrs. Stanford was dying. The secretary said she had purchased tlie bottle of bicarbonate of soda in Adelaide, Australia, nearly a year before. No motive is conceivable for the murder of Mrs. Stanford, a philanthropist who has given $38,000,000 to free education and a woman noted and beloved for her unselfish solicitude for others.