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Show FATAL ACCIDENT. It becomes our painful duty to record the particulars of an accidental death that, when first reported in this city created a profound sensation, and, when the report was confirmed, awakened feelings of the deepest sympathy for the afflicted family. During last summer Brother John B. Thatcher, one of the early settlers of Logan, who for many years has been engaged in mercantile business in Logan, concluded that it would agree with his health better to live on a ranch. With this view he became one of the purchasers of a large and valuable ranch in Gentile Valley, some 50 miles from Logan, and moved his wife Rachel here, where she and her children have since resided. The house they purchased is of logs, but is large, roomy and commodious. On Tuesday morning last soon after breakfast, Sister Thatcher heard a cracking sound in the kitchen, which is a large room. Hastening into the room she saw that one of the timbers of the roof was about to fall. Several of her children were in the room and she told them to run out of it, which they did. At this juncture, it seems, one of the long beams or stringers of the roof fell prostrate on the floor, with her head on the fallen timber, being borne down by falling debris. Before she could recover herself, another heavy, long timber fell parallel with the first and fairly on top of it. Sister Thatcher's head thus received the weight of the second timber and was pinioned between the two. Death was almost if not quite instantaneous. Three men tried to lift the upper log but could not, and it had to be cut in two before the remains could be released. From the ranch to Oxford, the nearest railroad station is about 23 miles. A messenger was at once dispatched with a telegram to some of the relatives of the deceased in Logan, who upon the receipt at once started for Gentile Valley. A despatch was sent to Apostle Moses Thatcher and President Wm. B. Preston, who are brothers-in-law of the deceased. They at once repaired to Logan, where the remains arrived on Wednesday. On Thursday at 11 a. m. the funeral services were held in the basement of Logan Tabernacle. The congregation was very large. The speakers were President Wm. B. Preston and Apostle Moses Thatcher. Deceased was a woman whom to know was indeed to respect and love, and the profound sorrow at her death, shown not only by her numerous relatives but by hundreds of our citizens whose relations with her were only those of esteem and love, testified the high estimation in which she was held in Logan, a city which she helped to form. She was the daughter of Brother Nathan Davis of Salt Lake, and leaves a husband and eight children. Her oldest son, Elder John B. Thatcher, Jr., a young man is now doing a noble work, in the mission field in the state of Ohio, exemplifying the training he received from his mother. |