Norfolk City Virginia USGenWeb Archives Obituaries.....Fenchel, Nellie Herbert Cowan  September 25, 1918
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Dorothy Strawhand https://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00034.html#0008405 April 14, 2020, 6:15 pm

Virginian Pilot and The Norfolk Landmark Friday, September 27, 1918

                  MRS. FENCHEL ENDS LIFE WITH BULLET

         Relatives Say She Had No Reason For Taking Own Life

No reason whatever can be suggested by her relatives and friends why Mrs. 
Nellie H. Fenchel, 35 years old, wife of William Fenchel, who was found dead 
in her room on the fifth floor of the Hotel Norfolk, Granby street, early 
yesterday, with a pistol clasped in her hand and a bullet wound over her 
right ear, would wish to kill herself.  Dr. E.T. Hargraves, acting coroner, 
who investigated, found that Mrs. Fenchel had been dead several hours when 
discovered, and that her death was almost sure to have been instantaneous 
and self inflicted.
When her husband left her at 7:45 o'clock Wednesday night to report for duty 
at the navy yard in Portsmouth, where he serves on a night shift, he 
declared that Mrs. Fenchel was in the best of spirits, did not appear to 
have a care and waved good-bye to him from her window after he had reached 
the street. 
When found at 8 o'clock yesterday morning Mrs. Fenchel was seated at a small 
table with her head resting in her left hand.  Her right hand holding a 
small automatic pistol, was lying in her lap.  It was evident she had shot 
herself before retiring for the night. None of the hotel attaches heard the 
pistol when it was fired.
Mrs. Fenchel was a native of Berkley, being a daughter of F.S. Cowan, of 
Clifton street.  Besides her husband she leaves her father and two brothers, 
William and Frank Cowan, of Berkley.
Detective T.L. Petty, who investigated for the Norfolk police department 
advanced but one theory, and that was, that it was a case of suicide.
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FENCHEL - Suddenly, at Hotel Norfolk, Norfolk, Va., Wednesday night, 
September 25, 1918, at 11:30 o'clock, Mrs. NELLIE HERBERT FENCHEL, wife of 
William Fenchel and daughter of F.S. and Mrs. Lillie Hathaway Cowan, aged 34 
years, 9 months and 10 days.
Notice of funeral later.
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The funeral of Mrs. Nellie Herbert Fenchel, wife of William Fenchel, was 
conducted at the residence of her father, Fletcher S. Cowan, 36 Clifton 
street, yesterday afternoon at 2 o'clock, by Rev. W.H. Osborne, D.D., rector 
of St. Thomas Episcopal Church.  The interment in Magnolia Cemetery and the 
following gentlemen acted as pallbearers:  Messrs. Eugene Bell, J. 
Underwood, Dr. J.A. Proctor, B.J. Thompson, Jesse J. Parkerson, John W. 
Nash, James Dowdy and H.G. Barton.

Virginian Pilot and The Norfolk Landmark September 29, 1918

Additional Comments:
Magnolia

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