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Case File: 2840 Kensington Ave arson (1888)
[External link to the original] – Page 2, Column 2
CHARGED WITH ARSON
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A Woman Almost Dying, But Suspected of
a Serious Crime.
Mrs. Margaret Hopkins, who is charged with arson, is lying in a critical condition in the Homeopathic Hospital, Camden, in consequence of peritenitis, said to have been due to malpractice. On Wednesday night a fire destroyed three dwellings, No. 2840 Kensington avenue, occupied by Mrs. Hopkins; No. 2838 by Philip Fitzpatrick, and No. 2842 by John Mauson. After the blaze Mrs. Hopkins and her young son were found at the house of Mrs. Miller, on Rohrer street, above Cambria. She said she had been aroused about 5 o’clock on Wednesday morning by a sensation of suffocation, and found the room filled with smoke. She awoke her son and together they stagged from the burning building. On reaching the street she fell in the snow and was picked up and carried to the house of Mrs. Miller. She also asserted that her face, upon which she had smeared some grease, had been badly burned. Dr. Rittenhouse, who attended the woman after her removal, made a microscopic examination of her face and failed to find any evidence of the skin having been burned.
On Friday morning Mrs. Hopkins and her son applied for admission at the Camden Hospital on the ground that she had fallen down stairs and had been internally injured. The boy subsequently mentioned the fire to one of the nurses, and when Mrs. Hopkins was questioned about it she said that her son was merely joking. Detective Geyer, who was working on the case, learned these facts, in addition that she had purchased $27 worth of furniture on the instalment plan, and had $600 worth of insurance placed on the different articles under the name of Smart. She said that she had buried beneath the coal in the cellar a check for $800, but when the pile was searched no trace of the paper could be found. The woman was in such a precarious condition Saturday that the physician refused to allow the detective to interview her, but a detainer has been lodged against her.
