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Individuals desiring to use this material in their own research may do so. ============================================================================= Formatted by USGenNet Data Repository Chief Archivist, Linda Talbott All of the above information must remain when copied or downloaded. ============================================================================= Jackson Weekly Citizen Tuesday, 11 January, 1870 TERRIBLE TRAGEDY!! A Man Named DODGE Attempts To Murder His Wife! He Shoots Her Three Times - In the Face, Wrist and Head. The Frenzied Husband Shoots Himself, Cuts His Throat, and Dies by Strychnine. A Terrible and Determined Suicide The Most Horrible Tragedy Ever Enacted in This Section. A Bloody Affair FULL PARTICULARS Wednesday afternoon our usually quiet community was startled by the announcement that a terrible tragedy had been enacted in the town of Blackman, a short dis- tance from the northern limits of the city, the parti- culars of which are substantially as follows: - Some two years ago, MARION DODGE and Miss AUGUSTA HANDY, both of the town of Blackman, were married. The union proved in many respects to be an unhappy one, and last July MRS. DODGE refused to live any longer with her husband, and went back to her father's house. DODGE has several times importuned his wife to return to him, but she as often refused. Wednesday afternoon, about three o'clock, he met her in the road as she was going from her home to the house of a neighbor named MRS. EARL, living in the next house to Mr. R. W. CHAMBERLAIN. He here renewed his entreaties for her to live with him, and pressed her for a final answer. She not giving him any satisfactory reply, he walked to the house and entered with her. Here he asked her again for a final answer, and she at last told him that she could not and would not live with him. Upon this he drew a re- volver and fired at her, the ball taking effect in her right cheek, passed through, knocked out a tooth, and lodged in her mouth. She said not a word, but threw up her left arm to protect her face as he re-cocked the revolver. He immediately fired again, this time the ball passing through her wrist, and she dropped on her knees. The desperate man fired the third time, and she was struck in the back of the hand, the ball passed through and entering her skull near the centre of her forehead, passed downward and came out just above the right temple. The poor woman rose to her feet and with the help of MRS. EARL hurried from the house, and they had scarcely got outside the door when they heard another shot, and heard DODGE fall to the floor. The neighborhood being by this time aroused, some men went to the house to see the man, and found him lying on the floor, with a large butcher knife and an empty vial by his side, a pistol-shot in his scalp, a fearful gash in his throat, and strychnine scattered over his mouth and chest. The man had used bullet, knife and poison, with a desperate dertermination (sic) to destry himself rarely equalled; fully believing that he had taken the life of his wife he was resolved not to survive her. DODGE was conveyed at once to the hotel kept by his father, about a mile distant from the scene of the tragedy, and his wife was taken to her parents' resi- dence, but a short distance away. Dr. GORDON CHITTOCK, of this city, was immediately called to attend her, who dressed her numerous wounds, and left her in a condition far more comfortable than could possibly have been expected under the circumstances. With four severe bullet wounds, miraculously escaping death from any one of them; walking a considerable distance while bleeding profusely; and the tremendous excitement in- cident to the sad affair, whe bore all with the cool- ness of a veteran, and could talk rationally upon the subject of the murderous assault, or any other, for hours after the occurrence. The opinion of the physician and her friends is that she will recover. MR. DODGE lived about three-quarters of an hour after the affair, and died in terrible convulsions, from the effects of the poison. It is altogether probable that the wound in his throat was sufficient to have caused death, also; but there was no help for the unfortunate victim of this fearful tragedy at the time he was found; and, it is moreover the universal opinion - even of his own friends - that the termination of his fearful crime, though dreadful in the extreme, was the best that could be desired. MARION DODGE was about 23 years of age, and leaves a father, mother, brothers and sisters, besides his wife, to mourn his untimely end. MRS. DODGE is young, only 18, but this terrible tragedy will live in her mind as long as she retains the life that has been so provi- dentially preserved. The affair created the most intense excitement in our city, and is universally pronounced to be the most dreadful tragedy that has ever occurred in this county, although the intended victim's miraculous escape from death has in a measure reconciled all concerned to the fearful death of the would-be-murderer and suicide. ===============================================================================