Norfolk City Virginia USGenWeb Archives Obituaries.....Meert, Julius C. November 14, 1909
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Robert Woolfitt http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00034.html#0008401 April 28, 2022, 11:20 am

Virginian-Pilot  November 16, 1909'
"UNLOADED" GUN KILLS BOY WHO ADMIRED IT

WILLIAM HINCHEY LAID WEAPON ON TABLE AND IT WAS ACCIDENTALLY DISCHARGED, KILLING 
HIS COMPANION IN ROOM

Another fatality from the gun that everyone thought was not loaded occurred at 
Lambert's Point Sunday afternoon.  Julius Meert, 15-year-old son of George H. 
Meert, was almost instantly killed at the residence of T. J. Ferguson, Forty-
fourth Street, when his friend and constant companion, William Hinchey, aged 14, 
accidentally discharged a shotgun which had been lying on a table where the boys 
were seated.

Young Hinchey had been admiring the weapon, which was the property of Mr. 
Ferguson, and in laying it down after examining its mechanism, caught the 
triggers, discharging both barrels.  Both loads lodged in Meert's body and death 
followed within an hour.

The lads were pupils at the Lambert's Point school and they had been inseparable 
companions.  For months they had shared the good times and misfortunes of boyhood 
together, and both were popular with the residents of the Lambert's Point section.

Sunday afternoon they went to Mr. Ferguson's house, and in the living room they 
saw two guns and other hunting paraphernalia layed out in readiness.  Young Meert 
sat down and Hinchey, standing opposite him, picked up one of the weapons and 
sighted down the barrels.

"I'd like to have a gun like that, " he said, and shoved it back on the table.  
The triggers caught in some way and both shells exploded with a roar that brought 
everyone in the house to the room.

Hinchey gave one agonized look as his friend pitched forward to the floor, and 
rushed out of the house, screaming that he had killed Julius.

Dr. Hammond reached the house within a few moments and rushed the wounded boy to 
the Protestant hospital, where he was at once placed upon the operating table.  
The skilled fingers of the surgeons raced with death, but while they were still 
fighting for his life, the boy breathed his last.

The funeral will be held this morning at 9:30 o'clock, from the St. Frances de 
Sales Roman Catholic Church, the Rev. Father Drake officiating.  Interment will be 
in St. Mary's Cemetery.

The pupils of the Lambert's Point school will march to the funeral of their 
schoolmate in a body, and yesterday each child, from the little tots in the lowest 
grades to the older pupils, subscribed to a floral offering.

A coroner's jury exonerated Hinchey from all blame, bringing in a verdict of 
accidental death.  The boy, who besides Dr. Hammond, was the only witness examined 
at the inquest, broke down when called upon to describe the shooting, and it took 
the jurors but five minutes to render their verdict, lifting the blame from his 
shoulders.

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