The Weekly Gazette

MYSTERIES THE WORLD HAS NEVER SOLVED

KENT J. LOOMIS
What Evil Befell Him?
By MADOC OWENS

EARLY in 1904 the American government ratified an important treaty with King Menelik of Abyssinia, who also called himself emperor of Ethiopia and who boasted of being a descendant of the queen of Sheba, mentioned in the Scriptures.

The assistant secretary of state, F. B. Loomis, commissioned his brother, Kent J. Loomis, as his confidential representative to bear the treaty to the dusky monarch at his capital, Addis Ababa. The mission was one entailing little responsibility and much interesting travel, and Kent Loomis, being the editor of a newspaper at Parkersburg, W. Va., had the mental equipment to both enjoy and fulfill it. After delivering the treaty he expected to hunt big game in Abyssinia. Stating that he would be gone two months, he bade his wife and child good-by in their southern home, and on June 14 sailed for Cherbourg on the Kaiser Wilhelm II. But before the ship reached its destination he was missed, and no sooner had the cable flashed word of his disappearance than all sorts of puzzling rumors sprang up from various sources.

Last Seen on Deck.

Investigation showed that Loomis had been last seen an hour or two after midnight, June 19, when he had gone on deck following the usual captain's dinner, which had been given on the eve of the vessel's arrival at its destination. Shortly after that time the ship made a stop at Plymouth, England, where one passenger was positive he saw Mr. Loomis land with the crowd in which he was borne along in what was described as a sort of dazed condition.

But the Kaiser Wilhelm's captain and head steward, who both had stood at the gangway when the passengers alighted, were equally as sure Uncle Sam's confidential messenger did not leave the ship with the other passengers. Finally, when the vessel reached Cherbourg, whither he was booked, a vain search was made for the vanished passenger. A promoter, William H. Ellis, Loomis' cabin mate and traveling companion, and who claimed to be a Cuban, stated, when questioned, that the editor's absence from his berth had not alarmed him after the vessel touched Plymouth, late at night, since the young man had been up very late the several previous nights.

Ellis continued on the journey to Abyssinia, bearing the tin box containing the treaty, and a week went by without the appearance of a single clue to the mystery. Then followed reports that the lost man had turned up alive at Paris; that he had been found dead at Cherbourg; also that he had been placed in a sanitarium at Plymouth-there to be kept until he might recover from a fit of abstraction. This fit, according to the last-mentioned rumor, had seized him about 2 o'clock on the night of his disappearance, and while he was acting strangely in the company of a man and woman on deck.

Body Washed Ashore.

All sorts of contradictory statements as to Loomis' fate continued until July 16 when-four weeks after his disappearance - his body was found washed up at Warren point, some 15 miles from Plymouth. Under his right ear was a circular wound, which appeared to have been inflicted before death, and, based upon a post-mortem examination of the lungs, the verdict of the coroner's jury stated that death had been caused by a blow rather than by drowning. Against the theory that the young man had lost his balance and accidentally fallen overboard was advanced the argument that the sea on the night of his disappearance was unusually calm and that the rails of the two main decks of the Kaiser Wilhelm II were high.

The circumstances of Loomis' disappearance from the ship will probably remain a mystery of the sea until all watery graves yield up their uncanny secrets.

©-WNU Service.