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Show a foul murder. Topeea, Kas., Dec. 20. At 3:30 this afternoon a horrible murder was discovered dis-covered in this city. Mrs. A. D. Matson was found dead on the floor of the rooms of her houses Fifteenth and Monroe streets. The body had evidently lain there for at least ten day a as it was stiff and cald and there had been no life about the house for ten days. A boy who delivers milk at her house had noticed that the can he left about ten days ago had stayed on the back door step and he gaye the alarm to the police. Mrs. Matbon lived alone, her husband being in Calfornia. She jived in a good deal of seclusion as regards her neighbors, who are mostly coiored people, and it is not known whether theiewasany money in the house or not. She lay in a little back room on her back and in a pool of her own blood, which had dried. It appeals she bad beea criminally assaulted. The body was covered with clothing and rags, and a couple of sacks of polatoea had been placed on her head. She lay in an easy position on her back with her arms at her side, her head turned to the right, her right limb straight out and her other drawn up a little. Her clothes were throwa up over her head and clotted blood held them to the floor. The entire top of her head was crushed in as though she bad been struck with one fearful blow. The neiahbors in the vicinity are all colored, and they Bay they have not seen Mrs. Matson for two weeks. Mrs. Robinson, who lives acrobs the street, says that she saw Mrs. Matson last about two weeks ago and she was then com::ng from the directum of her house and she had evidently been collecting rent. She saw no one around the house at any time and never heard any noise or disturbance of any kiud there. Mrs. Matson was for several years a member of the city board of education from the Fifth ward, and took -.n rc- tive interest in the city schools. She was at one time a city teacher, and was veiy well known locally. She was generally supposed to haye considerable considera-ble money, and owned five or six houses on the east side. Her husband left her four or five years ago and took up a homestead in California, where he has since lived. The only person who seems to know anything about the case is a deaf and dumb colored man named George Knight, who saw two men, probably on the evening of the 11th, enter the window of the murdered woman's wo-man's house and afterwards saw th6m run away. No intelligible account can be arrived at from Mr. Knight, ex -cept through his brother, who is the only pereon who can andersrJi him. The two will be Drought together to-o to-o orrow at the corner's inquiry. Mrs. Matson was a member of the Topeka Equal Suffrage association and a prominent prom-inent suffrage worker. |