Lance, Fanny - who is poppa? - Montgomery InGenWeb Project

Ladoga, Ind., June 23—The people of this community were excited over the sudden death of an infant yesterday. It appears that a few months ago the character of Miss Fannie Lance was assailed and her virtue was at stake and in order to alleviate her wrongs and bring other innocent parties into the ring, she was going to place the burden of her unborn child upon one of the well-to-do farmers of this community, whose name we will not mention. Suffice it to say that we believe he was innocent, but who was to be made the dupe of a clear case of blackmail. But be he guilty or not as the case may be, he knew the penalty and come to the conclusion that the best way out of the difficulty would be to have the affair shifted upon some other person’s shoulders and get the lady married if he had to pay a bonus. In this way the affair rested for sometime, when Bob Young, the son of the man who committed suicide in New Ross about two years ago, steps forward and takes upon himself the matrimonial yoke and vows to protect his wife’s character. Matters rested in this state until the child was born. The parents concluded to rid themselves of it by starving it to death. Under this treatment the child became fretful and the parents in order to cover up their work, called in Dr. J. F. Southerlin. Upon examination he found that the child had been neglected with criminal intent. He berated the parents unmercifully and told them that all the child needed was nourishment and warmth and if they persisted in this conduct and succeeded in destroying the little fellow, they might know what to expect, for said the doctor, there were men in town that had declared to him that if the child died suddenly they would have the case investigated and that there would be no quarter shown them. After that the child improved for a time as everyone supposed until yesterday when the little fellow died very suddenly, whereupon Tom Rose took it upon himself to have the case looked into. He telephoned to Coroner Coppage at Crawfordsville. Failing, he telegraphed to Coroner Bronaugh at New Ross, who came over in the evening. He had a talk with Dr. Southerlin after which he returned home to return today and held an inquest. There will be no postmortem examination as that would reveal nothing, but if it turns out as the citizens predict, it is a clear case of criminal neglect and should be punished severely. Some think that a hemp neck tie would be the best thing that could be administered to the parties. We await further developments.