Benedik, Mike – Died 1901

BENEDIK

Posted By: Joy Moore (email)
Date: 5/22/2024 at 16:07:20

Source: Twice-A-Week Plain Dealer Feb. 8, 1901, FP, C5

Attempted Murder and Suicide.
About ten o’lock{sic} Tuesday night, Mike Benedik, living two miles north of Lourdes, attempted to murder his wife, by shooting. He had a shotgun which he discharged at her without taking effect, upon which she attempted to run out of the house, when he fired at her a second shot which took effect in the right arm near the shoulder, fracturing the bone to such an extent the arm had to be unjointed at the shoulder, which was done by Drs. Gillespie and Torpey of Elma. Benedik then shot himself in the head with a revolver, the ball entering at the right side and coming out on the opposite side, but whether it passed through or followed around the skull, had not been determined. The sheriff was telephoned for but being absent deputy Sawyer and county attorney Converse went to the scene, returning in the afternoon without bringing Benedik in, who up to that time had remained unconscious. Immediately upon the return Sheriff Campbell went over to see what could be done, the telephone message calling him intimating that a lynching affair might take place unless attention was given to the matter. Mrs. Benedik is the third wife of this man who is perhaps one of the most thoroughly dangerous men of the county. During the past two or three years he has had large barn twice burned, heavily insured, our Protivin corespondent{sic} last summer giving the particulars in regard to it, and the refusal of the company to re-insure his property. He was in jail for a long time for some threatened abuse of his family, a letter whitten{sic} in Bohemian, coming into the Sheriff’s possession during the time which the Sheriff had translated by Mrs. Pecinovsky, in which threats were made of just what has been done. To this letter no name was signed, and Benedik strongly denied having written it, and the family likewise questioned its authorship being attributed to Benedik, Mrs. Benedik and the family coming to plead for his release from custody. At this writing the situation at the Benedik place unchanged. Mrs. Benedik rallied nicely from the shock, but Benedik is reported to be unconscious still.

Source: Twice-A-Week Plain Dealer Feb. 15, 1901, FP, C3

Mike Benedik died Wednesday morning. Before his death he recovered consciousness.