Ionia County MI Archives Obituaries.....Rhine, Samuel W. 1875
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Marilyn Ransom mlnransom@chartermi.net May 21, 2011, 5:18 pm

The Portland Observer, Tuesday, April 20, 1875

On Wednesday last Dr. Samuel Rhine, of Danby, came to this village for the 
purpose of purchasing some medicine.  He produced, at the City Drug Store, 
among other things, two ounces of brandy two ounces of laudanum, which were 
put in a four-ounce vial.  Afterwards, during the afternoon, he made frequent 
visits to the saloons, as was his want whenever he came to town, and when the 
time came for him to return home whiskey had got the better of him and he not 
only refused to go home but became so noisy that Marshal VanHorn was obliged 
to put him on a dray and take him to the jail.  The Marshal laid him upon a 
straw bed in a warm cell in the jail, covering him up with three or four 
blankets, and before the Marshal left the jail the Doctor was apparently in a 
sound sleep, in which condition he was left for the night, the Marshal having 
previously taken from his pocket a bottle of alcohol.  

Upon going to the jail early the next morning the Marshal found his prisoner 
still sleeping and tried to awaken him, but as he did not awaken easily he was 
allowed to sleep on and the Marshal went home and got his breakfast.  After 
breakfast he visited the jail again and found the doctor still sleeping and 
did not succeed in waking him.  He visited the jail once or twice more in the 
forenoon and again at one o’clock, when he noticed a change in the prisoner’s 
appearance which alarmed him and he at once procured medical assistance.  
Before taking him from the jail some members of the Village Board searched his 
person and found in his pockets a case of medicines, a pocket-book containing 
$17.25, an empty morphine bottle and the four-ounce bottle of laudanum and 
brandy above mentioned, the contents about two-thirds gone.  

He was then taken to the Union House, where everything was done for him that 
our physicians could do, but to no effect, and at about six o’clock Thursday 
evening he breathed his last. 

Word had previously been sent to his relatives in Danby, and before he died, 
Mr. Reader, his son-in-law, arrived.  A. J. Southard, Justice of the Peace, 
summoned a jury composed of the following persons: I. S. Perrigo, E. W. 
Blanchard, J. H. Churchill, Everett Orvis, Samuel Fuller and Sidney Hinman.  
They proceeded to enquire into the case and elicited the facts substantially 
as stated above, and returned a verdict to the following effect: “That the 
deceased came to his death by the excessive use of intoxicating liquors and 
laudanum administered by his own hand.”


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