HELBLING, SPRINGSTEEN Family (Click for Family Tree)
An old newspaper adage is “If it bleeds, let it lead” and that was the case her for the poor Mithen family- the above headline was on the front page of the city newspaper.
We know this is “our” John Mithen, as the paper describes him as a tailor living at 18 Greer St., and that he had a little shop on Illinois Street.
John became “madly insane” on Saturday afternoon, 21 Jul 1889. Mary had left their home to make arrangements for the insanity commission to examine him, but while she was gone, he “secured a butcher-knife and made an effort to commit suicide by cutting his throat.”
The story continued:
John was brought back to Indianapolis, and the next morning was examined and committed to the asylum.
What a sad story- the suicide attempt, his trek to the cemetery where his two children were buried, and then his wandering and eventual return home to sleep and then be committed to an asylum in the morning.
This article also does suggest (without naming her) that Mary E. I., daughter of “Mr. J. Mithen”, who died at age six (see previous post), could have been one of the children he had buried at St. Mary’s Cemetery. We have evidence that all his other children survived into adulthood.
As discussed in our previous post, we curiously found John listed as a tailor in the 1900 directory for Indianapolis, not in the asylum. He lived at a different address than Mary, so they must have been more officially separated by that date. Apparently the treatment at the asylum was adequate to help John get back into his occupation and live a ‘normal’ life, although a single one.
We have not found information for the intervening 10 years, until 24 May 1899, when John filed suit for a divorce from Mary A. Mythen. The case was tried in Superior Court on 17 Jun 1899, and the case had some “queer features” per the newspaper article. John was described as a “ruddy-faced Scotchman” who claimed Mary had “abandoned” him. His tailoring business had been doing well, John stated, “his wife was saving,” and they had $2,000 or $3,000 put away. Ten years ago, he continued, Mary took most of the savings and their children, and “deliberately” left him. She started her millinery store on Virginia Avenue, and was successful. Mary was not in court to provide any defense so we do not know her side of the story. The judge must have asked how the children were doing, and John replied that she was “raising them properly and dresses them well.” His only complaint against Mary was that she did not want to live with him. John lamented that they were happy together but when she left, she told him the reason was that she was tired of living with him. She “had no use for a husband” but did say that she “liked him as well as she could like any man.” “Grew Tired of a Husband” was the headline, and thus the judge granted the divorce to John. Mary, however, was required to pay court costs.
Perhaps John’s “madly insane” episode was triggered by Mary leaving him?
Coming up: the last of the story as we know it (right now).
Notes, Sources, and References:
- GenealogyBank.com and Hoosier State Chronicles (https://newspapers.library.in.gov) have the source newspaper articles. A search on the websites will help with finding the articles.
- Indianapolis, Indiana city directories on Ancestry.com and InternetArcive.org.
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