Suicide of Two Lads.

Auckland Star, Volume XVIII, Issue 143, 18 June 1887, Page 3 (Supplement)

Suicide of Two Lads.

On Monday last two lads, each 14 years of age, committed suicide in the neighbourhood of Vienna., by blowing their brains out with a revolver. Their bodies were found in a vineyard, .each of them-holding a revolver in his right hand. One of tho ill-fated boys was not quite dead, but he expired soon after he was found. Each of them had a note in his pocket. One ran thus: ''My name is Frank Geist; lam 14 years of age : my father is a grocer. Dear parents, forgive me my faults and my sins. I cannot help it; I must die." The note found on the other boy was as follows : "My name is Franz Heimle. lam 14 years old and was a compositor's apprentice r in the Augustiner strasse, I have shot myself and Franz also, because I led him astray." This double suicide of two mere children has caused a most painful impression in Vienna. The lad Geist seems to have played truant from school for a whole year without his parents finding it out. Both he and his companion had been reading unwholesome literature, which is supposed to have worked upon their imaginations. They had neither of them the slightest cause for worry or complaint, and were well treated at 'home. Curiously enough, a short time ago a playmate_ of theirs also committed suicide by throwing himself from the tower of St. Augustine,s church.