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Show CHICAGO, April 15. James H. Eckels, Eck-els, president of the Commercial National Na-tional bank of this city and formerly j comptroller of the currency, died here yesterday of heart disease. Mm Eckels i died while asleep an his bed. The fact that he -was dead was discovered dis-covered by the butler, who entered Mr. Eckels ' room after hearing telephone within ring continuously without receiving re-ceiving an answer. Other members of the family were summoned. Dr. Frank S. Churchill gave it as his opinion that Mr. Eckels liad been dead for some hours. Mrs. Eckels and her daughter Phoebe, eighteen years old, are in Paris, where the latter is attending a finishing school for girls. They have been abroad since last fall and planned to return to Chieago in a few weeks. They were at once communicated with by cable. It is understood they will sail from France for New York. The death of Mr. Eckels came on the . eve of a breakfast party which he had planned for a number of his friends and relatives. Judge K. M. Landis of the Federal District court, Mrs. Landis, Judge and Mrs. E. II. Garrv of New York, -Mr, and Mrs. George M. Eckels, brother and sister-in-law and others were to have been his guests. -.. James A. Eckels of Princeton, father of James H. Eckels, died two months ago. On tho morning of the death of the older Eckels, the son was a hos,t of "former President Cleveland The former for-mer President and Mr. Eckels were at breakfast when news of the father's death was received at the Eckels residence. resi-dence. Mr. Eckels was kept in ignorance ignor-ance of the fact for several hours, until Mr. Cleveland had left the city. It developed during the day that the person who was trying to communicate with Mr. Eckels over the telephone, the ringing of which led to the discovery dis-covery of the death, was George M. Eckels, a brother. Half an hour later he was called to his own telephone and notified of his brother's. death. A postmortem post-mortem examination waa held and a statement issued giving the cause of death as organic heart disease. A formal for-mal Coroner's inquest will be held tomorrow to-morrow morning. The funeral will be held Tuesday afternoon from the Fourth Presbyterian church. Mr. Eckels was born at. Princeton, Til., November 22, 1856, and most of his life had been spent in Illinois. lie received re-ceived an early education in the schools of, his native city, later taking up the study of law at Albany, N. Y.. graduating grad-uating from the Albany Law school in 1880. lie practiced law at Ottawa, HI., until appointed by President Cleveland to the post of comptroller of the currency cur-rency in 1893. Mr. Eckels, during the agitation of the currency question, became promi-. nent as an advocate of gold standard. Always a Democrat, he became affiliated affiliat-ed in 1896 with the Gold Standard Democrats. He retained the office of comptroller of the currency until the end of President Cleveland's term in 1897, when he became president of the Commercial National bank of this city. Mr. Eckels leaves only four near relatives. rel-atives. They are his wife and daughter, daugh-ter, his brother, George M. Eckels, and ' a sister, Mrs. Jane E. Palmer of Princeton, Prince-ton, 111. Georgo M. Eckels is an attorney at-torney of this city. |