A TALE OF BLOOD.
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    In his neat but unpretentious residence on the Fifth avenue extension near Frankstown avenue, in Torrens, between 12 and 1 o'clock yesterday, Peter Weinkauf slaughtered his wife (Caroline) and then killed himself with a butcher-knife, the blade of which was 18 inches in length and keen as a razer. The scene of the tragedy was the front bed-room in the second story of the building. Christ. Weinkauf, a boy of 15 years, and a son of the uxoricide was the first to discover the crime. Without spreading the alarm in the neighborhood he, with remarkable presence of mind, locked up the house and ran with the terrible story to his elder brother George, who was employed at the stock yards. The latter reported to the police of the Nineteenth ward station, and Lieutenant Gumbert and Officer Proctor at once took possession of the premises. The appearance of the officers was the first intimation the neighbors had of any trouble, but in a few moments the grassy knoll, on the edge of which the house stands, was alive with men, women and children, who seemed to realize intuitively that the closed and guarded dwelling concealed a murderer and his victim.
    Among the first to look upon the accumulated horrors of the room of death was a reporter of the DISPATCH. The hurrying footsteps of the terrified boy who discovered the murderous work of his father left their traces in blood on the steps of the stairs as he ran from the house. The splotches grew in size and number as the bed-room was approached. On the landing there was a great mass of thick, arterial blood. A step further and the open door of the bedroom revealed the fruits of

    Lying across the threshold, bent nearly double, with one leg drawn up and the other extended beyond her skirts to the knee, was the body of Mrs. Caroline Weinkauf. Her hair was matted with blood, and blood concealed her features. Against the wall at her back was a blood-spattered base ball bat. A stream of blood oozed out from under her head and crept lazily to a pool that had formed under the dressing case, about three feet from where she fell. On the left side of her neck, extending from behind the ear, was a horrible wound eight inches in length and about two inches in depth. It cut clean through the jugular vein and severed every artery in its passage. In front of her on the mat was a mass of veinous and arterial blood, thick and irregular in form, but which must have been at least two feet square. At the outer edge of this mass laid her

upon his face in a pool of blood, which flowed from a gaping wound in the neck. He had cut himself just above the Adam's apple. The wound was about four inches in length and extended down to and nearly through the windpipe. It was evident that it had been made by one savagely desperate cut. The escaping blood flowed at right angles from his head toward the centre of the mat, where, in their dying agonies, it met and massed with that of his butchered wife.
    Lieutenant Gumbert sprang to the window and raised a curtain to let the sunlight in upon this surfeit of horrors. There, near the hand of the murderer, and partly under his body, was the knife with which he had done such terrible execution. It was a butcher knife, with a blade an inch broad and about eighteen inches in length. It was covered with blood from point to hilt.
    There were no evidences of a struggle apparent in the room. The furniture, which was plain, but not common, had not been disturbed. The mat, even, upon which the murderer and his victim were prone, did not appear to have been moved an inch out of its usual position. The bed which stood in the centre had apparently been made up before the crime. The cover-lid was drawn back and rumpled. There was a small spot of blood on the sheet near the pillow. It was evident that the bed covering had been disarranged by a hasty pull from the footboard. Near the edge it had been drawn into a narrow fold, and on each side of this were blood stains. There the murderer had wiped

after giving his wife her death wound, and before he gave up his own life to the steel. At the outer edge of the fold was a tortoise shell comb worn by the murdered woman, and near this two shreds of flesh, which had evidently dropped from the knife while the fastidious murderer was cleansing it, preparatory to suicide.
    With the exception of two chromos, the walls were bare. One of these, which hung just above the mantel, was a scene in Venice. A lover and his lady in an attitude of affection, under a bright sun, and amid light and joyous coloring, are about to step into the waiting gondola. The contrast was striking, but even more so was the most conspicuous mantel ornament. In wax-work, artistically done, was a representation of the stable of Bethlehem. The infant Savior in his crib was holding out His arms to Mary, who was at His feet, while Joseph, the carpenter, stood at his head. In the background overlooking the scene was the ass, as natural as life. Fairly under this were the ensanguined corpses.

    The murderer wore a hickory shirt, a pair of black pantaloons, and dark woolen stockings. A part of one foot had been cut off in an accident some years ago. He was about five feet eight inches in height, and 46 years of age. He was sharp-visaged, with high cheek bones and a clean shaven face, except a closely-trimmed dark mustache. His hair was black and short.
    His wife and victim was in life a comely woman of nearly 31 years of age. When struck down she wore a neat black grenadine dress, of elegant fit. Her boots were fine and small, and the exposed red and black checked stocking indicated that she was of graceful form.

    There is no living witness of the tragedy. Young Christ. Weinkauf, the self-possessed boy who discovered the bodies, said that when his father and step-mother arose, early yesterday morning, they were, apparently, on good terms. After breakfast his father did not leave the house. "They had agreed," said the boy "that they would get a divorce without any bad feeling. I had been running around, and pap was sitting at the window (in the kitchen), while mother was sitting at the table making a cross and a wreath for a funeral. A man came over and gave her the order last night. Then she got dinner ready, and when I came back they were both eating, my pap sitting at the head of the table and my mother at the side. I went out again and when I came back, my mother was not in the room. My father was again sitting at the window with his shoes on, and he told me to get him a bottle of whisky, that he was going to take his last drink. I took my dinner first, and then I went down to Miller's saloon, on Frankstown avenue, and got the whisky. When I came back I hid the whisky in the carpenter shop, so that mother wouldn't know that pap had any. I played around for a while and then a peddling woman named Mrs. Gold came to see mother, and I went into the house to tell her. Neither of them were down stairs and I went up into the bed-room and found them. I didn't want to tell Mrs. Gold, and so I said they were out. She went away, and I locked up the house and went and told my brother George. I think pap killed her while I was out after I brought the paper, and he sent me away so that he could kill himself without letting me know it."

    The materials for the manufacture of the artificial flowers were still on the kitchen table where the murdered woman left them when she prepared her last dinner on earth. On the floor under the window were the murderer's shoes. There was not a speck of blood on them, and it was clear that he crept up stairs to kill in his stocking feet. He carried the base-ball bat with him. His son Christ. said that it was in the hennery yesterday morning. A bruise on Mrs. Weinkauf's head and the blood on the bat point to the conclution [sic] that she was first knocked down with the club and then finished with the knife. From the fact that her comb was found on the bed, it is presumed that she was struck on the head, and as she staggered and fell across the doorway, the knife was plunged into her throat. There was no blood on Weinkauf's stockings, and this fact would seem to indicate that he never left the room after killing his wife. The evidences upon the quilt that the bloody knife had been wiped upon it are taken to show that the murderer retreated to the bed, and, after cleaning the knife, laid himself down within a couple of feet of his dying wife and, with one slash, put an end to his existence.

    Until within the past two weeks, during which Weinkauf has been on a continuous spree, his friends and confidants have had no reason to believe that he was jealous, or that he had any reasons to be jealous of his wife. At 11 o'clock yesterday, while he was being shaved by Henry Snell, his barber, he told him that he had reason to believe that his wife was unfaithful to him. He did not go into details, and though the rumor was repeated in the crowd yesterday it was equally indefinite in character. On the other hand, the neighbors of Mrs. Weinkauf, who have known her during the three years of her residence in the house where she met her untimely death, all agree that she had always been unexceptionable in deportment, quiet and retiring, and, in every respect, a lady-like little woman.

    Another phase of Weinkauf's domestic history supplies a much more plausible motive. The woman whom he murdered was his second wife. In his early manhood he married Barbara Falkenstein, a daughter of Christ. Falkenstein, in Allegheny, and soon after moved to Dravosburg, where they opened a general country store. The issue of this marriage were Cassie, aged 23 years; Maggie, aged 21 years, and now married to Charles Wisser, a coal dealer in Dravosburg; George, aged 23 years; Henry, 17 years; Christ, aged 15 years, and Peter, aged 9 years. The mother of these children died about nine years ago in Dravosburg after the couple had accumulated enough to purchase and pay for a house in that place, one in Bloomfield and two in Torrens. Before her death her father died and bequeathed her $800, and her son Christ, who was named after him, $300. With this money two lots on Frankstown avenue were purchased and a two-story brick house built, the title to which reposed in Mrs. Weinkauf. At her death she bequeathed this property absolutely to her children and made their father the administrator. The eldest child was then a girl of 14, and since that time until February last the father managed the property and controlled its revenues.

    When Weinkauf married the woman he murdered, the older children were dissatisfied, and as her influence grew upon him they blamed her for any ill temper he exhibited toward them. The division in the family grew steadily, and the trouble culminated last fall, when Cassie, the oldest girl, demanded an account of her father's administration of the estate. Her brother Henry sided with her, and they were both driven from home by their father, Cassie taking refuge with her married sister in Dravosburg, and Henry finding employment in this city. In February Cassie did apply for a new administrator and for an accounting. The Court appointed a new administrator. While this proceeding was pending, Weinkauf became alarmed lest his children should get a judgment against him that would involve his other property. To defeat that he transferred it to his second wife. After that, being independent, she submitted less gracefully to his abuse when he was in his cups, and frequently threatened to leave him. Though he is said to have frequently tried to have her reconvey the property to him she steadfastly refused, and when drunk he has told a number of people that he would one day kill her. Two weeks ago last Sunday he became exasperated at her because she would not give him money and drove her out on the porch. In trying to catch her he drove his hand through a window pane and cut his wrist severely. She fled to her sister, Mrs. Gross, on Spring avenue, and on the succeeding Tuesday she had him arrested for surety of the peace. He gave bonds to Alderman Porter that he would not again abuse her, and signed a pledge not to drink. Upon Thursday following he choked her until his finger marks were plainly visible on her throat, and then locked her in a room while he went to get a drink. In his absence she escaped through a window and again took refuge with her sister. On Sunday last he visited her, and induced her to return and care for him while his wounded wrist was healing, promising that he would treat her kindly. From that time until yesterday they lived as man and wife, in apparent harmony. There was, however, this point of difference: she would not promise to live with him permanently. His young son Christ heard fragments of their conversation, and the best his father could do, he said yesterday, was to get his step-mother to agree to have a divorce obtained amicably and without public scandal. That agreement was arrived at during the dinner yesterday. The effect of this course would be to leave Weinkauf without a shred of his property. What was left to him by his children would be taken by his wife, who was determined to leave him. In despair at this condition of affairs, he determined that if he could not have the property he worked a life for, then it should not pass to a woman who was settled in her purpose to leave him. This theory is supported by the stories of friends and neighbors who had the confidence of one or the other of the unfortunate couple.

    Lieutenant of Police Gumbert, of the Nineteenth ward station, who knew Weinkauf very well, said yesterday: "About three days ago Weinkauf told me that he gave his wife $395 to keep for him, and that soon after he wanted some money, and asked her for it. She said she had put it in the bank and could not draw. Then he struck at her, missed her, and driving his hand through a pane of glass, cut his wrist badly. He sent for Dr. Perchment, who charged him $10. Then, he said, he sent his boy up stairs to get $50 that he had put away, and he found that his wife had taken that money also. When he was drunk the thought that seemed uppermost in his mind was that his wife was beating him out of all his money, and that after she had succeeded she would leave him.
    Mrs. S. A. Donnelly, who occupies the brick cottage on Frankstown avenue owned by the children of Weinkauf, says that she has expected to hear any time during the last six months that Weinkauf had killed his wife. Within that period Mrs. Weinkauf left him four or five times for fear that he would kill her.
    Mrs. Philopena Moss, who has been intimate with the family for nearly five years, and who gave Mrs. Weinkauf refuge several times, made a similar statement, and Mr. Reibert, proprietor of the Central Hotel in Torrance, said he heard Weinkauf declare several months ago that he would kill his wife. In fact, throughout the entire neighborhood there seemed to be no surprise at the horror; the feeling was rather that the quarrels of the couple had ended just as had been anticipated.
    The murdered woman leaves no children, there having been no issue of the marriage.
    All the children of Weinkauf were at the house last night, and their heart-rending anguish made the scene most pitiable and affecting.
    Weinkauf was a carpenter by trade, and until about six months ago he was regularly employed at the stock yards. During this latter period, however, he has not been regularly employed, but devoted a large share of his time to improving the dwelling which was the scene of his crime.
    Alderman Hyndman has been deputized to hold the inquest, which will proceed to-day.

Source:

Unknown, "A Tale of Blood," The Pittsburg Dispatch, Pittsburg, Pa., Wednesday, 21 June, 1882, page 2.