Editorially speaking...
Two weeks ago I told you the sad story of a German man, ‘Albert Ehmann,’ who committed suicide in a Victoria hotel room in 1909.
All these years later, the Queen’s Hotel is still in business. Do you suppose they still have Albert Ehmann’s Room 44? —www.tripadvisor.com
He’d signed in with a fictitious name, burned his identity papers in an ashtray and blacked out his real name in his stetson and a notebook. He left three photographs, one of them of a young woman he identified as “the only girl for me,” and a suicide note in which he told police that it would be useless to try to learn his true identity.
And there I had to leave you, hanging.
I’d originally researched this story while I still wrote for the Victoria Colonist but had never been able to give it the time to continue through the microfilmed pages for 1909 to see if, in fact, there was a follow-up to the story.
That’s all of 40 years ago.
Well, as it turns out, there was a follow-up, three months later.
On impulse, I emailed John Adams, Victoria’s ghost tours extraordinaire to ask if ‘Albert Ehmann,’ who’d spent his last cent before taking a fatal dose of carbolic acid, would have been buried by the City of Victoria in Ross Bay Cemetery.
He agreed that that likely would have been the case but could find no Albert Ehmann in the RBC register. So he went online to the Victoria Daily Times back issues website and, lo and behold, found this article in the Mar. 30th edition.
So, in place of an editorial this week, I give you the sad conclusion to this long-ago tragedy:
IDENTITY OF SUICIDE ESTABLISHED BY POLICE
Man Who Took His Life in Hotel is Traced Back to Germany.
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Through following up the clues left behind by the suicide who signed himself Albert Ehmann when he registered at a local hotel three days before taking his life life on January 31st last, the police have identified him as Heinrich Gottschilk, of Neurode, Germany.
From photographs left in his room the police obtained the name of the photographer and sent the originals to the German police with information on the manner in which the deceased came by his death. They asked that an inquiry be made and the man’s identity be established if possible.
From the photographs the German police discovered a brother of Gottschilk named Armand, who positively identified the man who committed suicide here as his brother.
From Armand Gottschlick’s statement the suicide had been residing in America for some time, but returned home to Germany about October last to obtain his inheritance from his father, amounting to 9,000 marks. It was after having secured the legacy that he met the woman whose photograph was found in his room, on the back of which was written, “The only girl for me,” and which was one of the three sent to Germany by the Victoria police.
The brother’s story is that the deceased became infatuated with the girl and together they left Nurode.
Early this year the mother received a post card from her son saying this card would be the last she would hear of him. What became of the girl or the brother the German police were unable to say. The name by which he registered at the hotel on arrival here is that of a brother-in-law now residing in Neurode and further establishes his identity.
One of the other photographs is said by the brother in Germany to be that of Helen Makros, whom the suicide jilted for the woman with whom he left Germany.
When the suicide was discovered a note was found that it would be useless to trace him. The local police, however, found several clues and communicated with the police in other cities as well as in Germany. There is now no shadow of doubt as to who the man who signed himself Albert Ehmann before taking his life really was.