Friday, Aug. 17, 1923

Leaving the dinner table after a quarrel with his wife at 7:30 last night Edward Hart (sic), 45 years old, killed his wife Jennie, 35 years old, by shooting her three times with a revolver and then turned the weapon against his own chest and shot again, dying instantly. The tragedy occurred in a house on Red Arrow-st, near the Atherton-rd, where the Harts occupied an upstairs apartment.

Relatives of Hart today ascribed the fatal shootings as the outcome of a brooding jealousy on the part of the husband, extending over a period years.

Henry D. Daly, a brother-in-law of the Harts, and his wife, who occupy the lower apartment of the house, first heard the shots.

Mrs. Daly ran to the foot of the stairway leading to the upstairs just as the first three shots were fired in time to see her sister, Jennie Hart, leap from over the banister and fall dead on the porch at the bottom, just outside of the house.

A moment later the fourth shot rang out. Neighbors who had heard the shots sent in an ambulance call to police headquarters. Detectives who rushed to the scene discovered the woman lying on the porch.

Breaking through a door at the head of the stairs they discovered Hart lying stretched on the floor, his shirt still smouldering near a bullet wound in the chest.

Three bullet wounds in the body of the wife showed that she had been shot once through the left arm, once through the breast and once in the back.

A note in a pocket of the husband's clothing, giving his clock number at the Fisher Body Co. plant where he was employed and asking that his son Eldon be given all his pay led police to believe today that Hart may have planned the shooting.

Hart, according to relatives' statements today, had always been of a jealous disposition which had resulted in frequent quarrels with his wife. At times, it is said, he would quarrel with her when she would seek the companionship of other women at the noon hour when both husband and wife worked together in the Fisher body plant.

Some time ago Mrs. Royal Hart, mother of the dead man, purchased a farm for him and gave it to the family for their use. The farming enterprise did not turn out a success, relatives say, and since that time Hart's jealousies and brooding had been accentuated.

Last night's quarrel is said to have arisen over the fact that Mrs. Hart spent part of the day at the house of Mr. and Mrs. Emil Palmer, who live nearby.

From the appearance of the table it is believed that the meal had hardly begun when the quarrel culminating in the tragedy occurred. On Hart's place at the table was a freshly poured cup of tea and on his wife's plate a partly eaten slice of bread. The remainder of the food was untouched.

Eldon Hart the 14-year-old son and only other member of the family left home shortly before the shooting to go down the road and bring home the family automobile which had been stalled there a short time before.

After a time he succeeded in getting the engine started and the car headed for home. On his way home he passed the police ambulance which was bearing the bodies of his father and mother to the Jennings-Algoe morgue on the order of the coroner.

Curious, he inquired of the police what the trouble was. They, not knowing he was the son did not answer him. When he reached home neighbors broke the news to him.

The Harts were both former residents of Flushing and came to Flint but a short time ago. Both were natives of Genesee-co and had lived in this county all their lives.

Hart is survived by his mother, Mrs. Royal Hart of Flushing, a brother, Charles Hart, 516 Wilcox-st, Flint, and a sister.

Mrs. Hart leaves her mother, Mrs. D. Wright of Montrose, three sisters, Mrs. David Smith, New Lothrop, Mrs. Nettie Hicks, Clio, and Mrs. Henry Daly, Flint.

Funeral arrangements had not been completed late today.

The Fisher Body Co. informed the Journal at noon that Hart was employed there under the name of B.A. Mann. It was reported that the reason for his using the assumed name was because he had become despondent over his wife's extravagance and had contemplated disappearing. By using some name other than his own, he figured that it would be easier to disappear, fellow workmen claim he told them.

As he was leaving work in the afternoon, the watchman reported that Hart remarked to him about have "a nice wife but she spends too much money," adding that she had spent $2,200 he had saved.