August 25, 1908
DOMESTIC LIFE MADE
AN UNHAPPY WOMAN.
MRS. JOHNSON TOLD NEIGHBORS
OF HER FEARS.
Physician to Operate Today, Fears
Slugger's Victim Will Die.
No Clew to Identity
of Assailant.
The attending physician reported in Buckner, Mo., last night that Mrs. W. A. Johnson, who was slugged in her bed Thursday morning by an unknown hand, was brighter than she had been since she received the wound which may cause her death. The physician held out no intimation that Mrs. Johnson would recover -- simply saying she appeared to be better.
Detectives employed by a public subscription committee at Buckner did not report any findings of importance yesterday, and relatives and friends of the injured woman had no information to make public regarding the investigation which is being prosecuted to discover her assailant. The county prosecutor did not visit the farm house yesterday, and stated last night that he would not return until called.
Many additional stories of unhappy domestic relations were in circulation in Buckner yesterday. One story, which caused comment, was of an illness some years ago when Mrs. Johnson believed an attempt had been made to put her out of the way. A physician prescribed a remedy when Mrs. Johnson decided she needed a tonic. One morning after her regular dose of the tonic she became seriously ill. She took no more of the medicine. She feared, so she told a neighbor, that somebody had tampered with the bottle.
Then there was another story going yesterday about a pistol duel some years ago in the streets of Buckner between men employed as laborers on the Johnson farm, and many persons tried to connect this shooting affair with the supposed unhappy life of Mrs. Johnson. One of the men who participated in the shooting in the streets of Buckner is said to have left the county and the other is reported living here now.
The county prosecutor, I. B. Kimbrell, expects to find the weapon with which Mrs. Johnson was injured as she lay in bed beside her husband in the early morning. If a man was employed to murder Mrs. Johnson he surely did not carry away his weapon, the prosecutor thinks. The well on the Johnson farm is to be searched.
Today the physicians will remove the packing from Mrs. Johnson's skull and fear she will not survive the operation.
Labels: Buckner, crime, detectives, doctors, Johnson assault case, marriage, Prosecutor Kimbrell, violence, women
