Parsons, Esle W.

Passed: 1941-03-10

Age: 36

Source:

Death Notice:

Obituary Date: 1941-03-19

Information: DOUBLE SHOTGUN CHARGE BROUGHT INSTANT DEATH Looping a shoestring over both triggers of a double barrel shotgun, 36-year old Eslie W. Parsons, son of Mr. and Mrs. Asbury Parsons, and formerly of Given, leaned over the muzzle of the gun, thrust his toe into the loop of the shoestring and put contents of both barrels through his heart at his home in Vienna about two o'clock Monday morning. The body was brought to Given Tuesday afternoon where the funeral services were held at the Parchment Chapel church at two-thirty o'clock with Rev. L. R. Mahoney of the Ripley United Brethren church in charge, and the burial was in the cemetery nearby. The explosion sent the charge through the victim's body with shot and blood spurting out from his back to hit the wall four feet back of where he had been sitting at the time he pulled the triggers.  The gun and victim toppled forward in a heap on the floor where Mr. Parsons died without uttering a word, his wife being the terrified witness to the end. Gerald Sinnett, the Vienna town sergeant, was called immediately and arrived with Dr. Orva Conley.  Hysterically, Mrs. Parsons described the scene which had preceded the shooting when her husband had ordered her from the room, threatening to shoot her, too, unless she left.  The tragedy was the culmination of three years of illness and unemployment, Mr. Sinnett said. Neighbors apprised of the shooting reported that on Sunday Mr. and Mrs. Parsons were seen walking in the snow and appeared to be enjoying themselves and he had called out to friends whom they met along the way and seemed to be in a jovial mood.  However, the officer said, that members of the family said that he had made threats of suicide on numerous occasions. Due to the fact it would have been impossible to have discharged the gun against his chest with his hand, because of the length of the barrels, the victim contrived to do it by the ingenious method of using a shoestring and setting off the blast with his toe, pulling off his shoes, but not his socks.  Mr. Sinnett described the preparation. Two children asleep upstairs were not disturbed, they being a son, Melvin Lee, 12; and a daughter, Alice Ellen, 15 years old. The weapon used was a 16 gauge shotgun, slightly smaller than the 12 gauge guns usually seen, the officer described it.  This resulted in a wound in the chest some two inches across and a smaller hole in the back where the charge came out.  The charge went through the heart, the mouth of the double-barrels having been placed directly over that organ.