The Wheeling Daily Register

Horrible Tragedy.

Chicago, November 3.—A Sparta, Wis., dispatch says: News has just been received from Wilton of a horrible affair which occurred there Thursday night. Mrs. Wm. Van Voorhees, a woman with three children and about to become a mother again, had, after living unhappily with her husband in their home on the outskirts of the village, been deserted and left desolate. She frequently talked of committing suicide, and was prevented from purchasing poison by her neighbors. Thursday night, about 9 o'clock, her dwelling was discovered to be in flames. When the neighbors reached the house they proceeded to the bed room, where a sickening spectacle greeted their eyes. The mother nearly naked, face down in the bed with the two youngest children, in the same position, by her side. The hair, scalp and portions of the arms of each were burned off by the blazing rafters from above falling down upon them. The body of the eldest boy, aged ten years, was found behind the bed room door, burned to a crisp. Blood was found spattered on the bed clothes, and the appearance of the mother's garments indicated that the woman poisoned herself and children and that life was extinct before the flames reached them. No marks of violence could be discovered upon the bodies, but the matter is being rigidly investigated.