James(1846-1910),Mary(Emery)(1851-1910)&Earl Hardy(1880-1910

HARDY, EMERY

Posted By: Dorian Myhre (email)
Date: 2/4/2017 at 16:59:14

From Nevada Representative June 7, 1910 (front page)

TRIPLE MURDER IN MARSHALL COUNTY

Father, Mother and Grown Son Killed at Melbourne

A murder mystery which has greatly shocked the people of Marshall county has resulted from the finding of the bodies of Mr. and Mrs. James Hardy and their son Earl in their home near Jasper county line at a late hour Sunday night. The discovery was made and the alarm given by another son who returned home toward one o'clock after spending the evening with his girl about three miles away. He then found his mother and brother dead in the house and later his father was found in the cow stable. All three had had their heads crushed with blows from a piece of gas pipe, which belonged on the place and was found near the father's body. The murders had evidently been done about the time the evening chores were being finished, the mother being killed first, then the son and finally the father. Bureau drawers had been ransacked, and the most reasonable motive is robbery, although that hardly seems adequate. Suspicion has been directed to some degree to the son Raymond who returned late and found the bodies; but the reports indicate that the suspicion has only very flimsy foundation and is in fact without warrant. It appears that the Hardys were in the habit of doing their chores late, that the murders did not occur until the chores were substantially done, that the son in question was at the home of his sweetheart nearly three miles away by half-past eight, staid there until half-past twelve and gave the alarm over the telephone as soon as he could have gotten home and put his horse away. The first appearance is that the murder will be added to the list of mysteries, of which there have been several in Marshall county, at least three murders being readily recalled there, for which no one was punished. There were the murders of the two Great Western brakeman, of the young man south of State Center who was killed by a burglar and of the girl near Green Mountain, who was found dead in the road, near her home.