The Times News

2nd U. S. War Correspondent Is Dead In Spain
Edward Neil's Health Had Been Undermined in Ethiopian War

SARAGOZZA, Spain, Jan. 3.—(UP).—Edward J. Neil, American war correspondent who covered the Spanish and Ethiopian wars for the Associated Press, died Sunday from wounds received when a shell hit the car in which he and other correspondents were touring the Teruel front.

The 37-year-old journalist died at 12:15 p. m. in the military hospital here from effects of the same artillery shell that killed another American correspondent, Bradish Johnson of the Magazine "Spur" and "News Week," and E. R. S. Sheepshanks, correspondent of Reuters (British) agency.

Neil and Johnson were the first American newspaper correspondents killed in the 18-months-old civil war, although at least seven other correspondents have been killed.

Neil died after several blood transfusions failed to make up for the loss of blood from his 34 wounds and shattered hip.
He died peacefully with Nationalist press officers, a Catholic priest and the Salamanca delegate of Generalissimo Francisco Franco at his bedside.
The priest himself had given a half liter (about one pint) of blood in an effort to save Neil's life.

The bodies of Neil, Johnson and Sheepshanks, whose car was blasted by the artillery shell near Caude close to the Teruel front, the Franco-Spanish frontier by automobile caravan under military escort will be embalmed and taken to...
(Continued on page three)
2ND U. S. NEWS WRITER KILLED IN SPAIN'S WAR
(Continued from page one)

...tary escort.

Neil, born in Methuen, Mass. January 17, 1900, formerly was a sports writer for the Associated Press and five years ago received honorable mention for the Pulitzer prize for his reporting of an experience riding down the dangerous Mount Van Hoevenberg bobsled run at Lake Placid. The 1932 Olympic races were held there.

In 1935 he was sent to Ethiopia, and followed the Italian-invasion, entering Addis Ababa with Premier Mussolini's armies.

The hardships of the Ethiopian campaign told on his health-and he was seriously ill for several weeks. He returned to the United States and later went to London where he covered the coronation of George VI. From London he proceeded to Spain and covered among other war stories, the siege and capture of Bilbao and Santander.

Neil attended Phillips-Andover academy and Bowdoin college.

After working for the Associated Press in Boston and Baltimore he joined the sports staff in 1926.

He is survived by his widow, the former Helen Nolan, Albany and New York newspaper woman, a son, Edward III, five years old; his parents, of Methuen, Mass., a brother, Dr. Richard J. Neil, and two sisters, Miss Mabel Reardon of Methuen, and Mrs. Dorothy Traynor, Havana, Cuba. His wife and son are in New York city.