A FATAL REHEARSAL

Waipa Post, Volume 42, Issue 3314, 25 June 1931, Page 7

A FATAL REHEARSAL

CHURCH PLAY HEROINE SLAIN

The joy that 15 young members of a church dramatic club at Quincy, Illinois, found in practising a play at their church was turned to sadness on 9th May (according to latest files to hand) as they mourned the death of their heroine, Mildred .Hughes, killed accidentally by Robert Randall, 19 years old, the " villain," during a rehearsal.

" I just didn't know the gun was loaded," Randall sobbed to the. ptfjfice as he explained how Miss Hughes was shot while waiting to begin rehearsal for " The Jade God," a mystery play.

The coroner ordered both Randall and Arthur Weisenberger, also 19 years old, under arrest for the inquest, although he said he was convinced the shooting was accidental. Weisenberger, a member of the cast, was the owner of the gun, which was one of two revolvers, each supposed to contain one blank cartridge, used regularly for the rehearsals. " They were broken and emptied after each practice," Randall told the coroner, but Weisenberger remembered that he had used the pistol for target practice between rehearsals, and left it loaded. As the young people talked and laughed, Randall casually picked up the gun and toyed with it. It was the one he was to use in enacting his part as the villain in the play. Suddenly the pistol was discharged, and Miss Hughes fell without uttering a word. The bullet had pierced her heart, gone through her Body, and struck Ralph Vincent, one of the actors, in the arm.