Popular.com

Bennington, Vermont, August 14th, 1902.

A supposed murder was discovered today when the body of Marcus Rogers was found in the stream below

Cooper's Mill. The body was lying face down in about six inches of water and bore a severe

wound on the back of the head. Early last evening, Pace and Hathaway discovered Rogers'

hat hung on a tree back of the

Raymond Ovey's house with a note penned on it. The note said that the writer was tired of life

and was about to do what he had often threatened and was signed by Rogers. The hat was this morning turned over to Constable Godfrey and Deputy Nash,

but they and others thought it some hoax. S. L. Jewett decided to do a little investigating on his own

account, and searching the stream near the O.V.'s house, he found about nine o'clock this forenoon, the body, A.K. Richie,

chairman of the board of selectmen, and deputies Godfrey and Nash were called, and the body was

removed. The suspicious circumstances in the case are these. The note is thought not to be Rogers' handwriting. It is written in ink and looks as if written by a

woman. A wound was found on the man's head which does not appear to have been caused by stones,

as the head was in the sand and not on the stones. The extent of this wound can only be shown by an autopsy.

Rogers and his wife did not live happily together, though the facts as to their differences

have not been fully investigated. Rogers' home was in Wollum-Sack, but he had spent much time here, and it is said that his wife has been living here for some time in a house with a shady reputation.

The note found on the hat is not at all the kind that would voluntarily be written by a man out in the field preparing to kill himself.

It gives evidence of having been carefully prepared at

home with pen and ink and is written on a piece of note paper. Rogers was about 32 years old,

and his wife is seven or eight years younger. An inquest was begun this afternoon before Justice

Shirtleff. Doctors Potter and Daly testified

that they had made a partial autopsy and found the man was not drowned but dead before he touched the water.

...