[Newspaper]
Publication: The San Francisco Chronicle
San Francisco, CA, United States
vol. 76, no. 138, p. 15, col. 4-5
SUICIDE OF A
YOUNG WIFE
Shoots Herself in Her
Rooms at the
Knickerbocker
Hotel
HER HUSBAND IS THE
OWNER OF RACE HORSES.
LETTER LEFT BY THE WOMAN
INDICATES THAT SHE WAS
ILL-TREATED.
She Had Recently Come From the
East, and Her Former Home
Was In Cincinnati,
Ohio.
A young woman known as Charlotta Hemingray, wife of Robert Hemingray, a race horse owner, committed suicide in her rooms at the Knickerbocker apartments, 1340 Pine street, shortly after 8 o’clock last night by shooting herself through the head with a 38-caliber pistol. According to a letter which she wrote and addressed to Robert Hemingray, the cause of the woman's suicide was ill-treatment by Hemingray and his threat to leave her.
It appears that the only persons in the building who heard the shot that ended the woman's life were her husband and his brother, C. T. Hemingray, who lives in the same house. As told by Josiah E. Locke, the proprietor of the house, he was sitting in his office when he saw Robert Hemingray and his brother enter from the street and pass around the hall toward their rooms, which were on the office floor.
Within two minutes they returned, and Robert Hemingray nervously said that as they had neared the door to their rooms they had heard a shot and he feared that his wife had shot herself. He said that he was very nervous and afflicted with heart trouble and was afraid to enter the rooms. He asked Locke to send some one to the rooms to investigate. There upon Locke went to the rooms himself. There was a light burning in the parlor. but the folding doors separating that room from the sleeping room were closed. Locke opened the doors, and by the light shed from the parlor he saw something lying on the bed. He then entered the bedroom and lit the gas, and saw that Mrs. Hemingray was lying across the bed with a bullet hole in her head. He felt her pulse and thought that life was extinct, but sent out for a physician. The physician was not at home, and Locke then returned to the room and again felt for the woman's pulse.
FOUND SHE WAS DEAD.
This time he was satisfied that the woman was dead, so he notified the Coroner and summoned Policeman Maurice Beehan from the street. Locke says that when he told Robert Hemingray what had happened, he exclaimed: "My God, my God!" Locke says also that Hemingray would not approach the room, and that his brother would not go farther than the door. Robert Hemingray complained of feeling sick, and said that he could not stay in the house. To Policeman Beehan Hemingray said that he knew of no cause for his wife’s suicide. He claimed that they had always been happy together, and had never had any trouble beyond the usual trifling quarrels of married persons. Soon thereafter Hemingray and his brother left the house and went down town to the Palace Hotel, and had not returned up to the time the Coroner removed the body of the woman to the Morgue.
Policeman Beehan says that when he arrived at the house the body of the woman was lying across the bed, her head lay on a pillow, her right forearm was extended upward, her left hand clasped the photograph of her mother to her breast, and the pistol was lying across her left breast. On the bed was a sealed note addressed "Bob Hemingray, personal," and on the bureau was an open note addressed to "Rose," who is the wife of C. T. Hemingray. The woman’s body was fully clothed, her clothing was not disarranged, and there was a bandage tied about her head. She had worn half shoes, and one of these was off, while the lacing of the other was loosened.
LEFT A PITIFUL NOTE.
The sealed note addressed "Bob Hemingray, personal," reads as follows:
Dear Bob: Don't curse me when I am gone please, but I am heartbroken and cannot live without you, as I love you with all my soul. You’ll bury me, won't you. Bob? Just a little dirt over the body of the girl who would not live without you, I am sorry I did such a wicked thing as gossip, but I am so young. Only remember, Bob, and you have trifled with my heart forgive me, dear, I beg of you. When you told me you did not care to talk with me. I Just longed to kiss you — throw my arms around your neck, but you would have knocked me down. So I die without one kiss, but I had one long look at your dear face. Ask Con and Rose to forgive me, for I can never do it again. Good-by, sweetheart. Again I say you will never know how you had gained the love of your little girl. CARLOTTA.
Mothers address is 636 West Fourth street, Cincinnati. Please mail a letter there.
The open note to "Rose" reads as follows: "Rose — Please forgive me if I have done anything wrong. Kindly send all my clothes to my mother. Mrs. P F. Campiglio, 636 W. Fourth street, Cincinnati, Ohio."
COULD ASSIGN NO CAUSE.
When seen at his apartments at the Palace the husband of the dead woman made the following statement:
"I can think of no reason why my wife should have killed herself, never had any trouble other than the usual little tiffs which most married people experience. Accompanied by my brother, I left our apartments last night shortly after 7 o’clock. We strolled down town, procured a couple of form charts, purchased some magazines and returned some. We entered the narrow hallway approaching the room my wife and I occupy. My brother was in the lead and had just turned the knob of the door when we heard a shot and a groan. I have been ill and I could not summon courage to enter, knowing that something was wrong. I asked my brother to do so, but he refused. He notified Mr. Locke of the house, however, and we saw him go in and come out with my revolver. I always kept it in the top drawer of the bureau, and my wife had evidently taken it from there to kill herself. At the time of her death my wife was not quite 18 years of age."
C. T. Hemingray, the brother, corroborated this statement in every particular. He further said that his brother came to this city from New York three weeks ago and that he met the woman in New York, but married her in Chicago a little over three months ago.