Virginian in 1910--Murder

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Bluefield Daily Telegraph
October 21, 1910

VIRGINIAN CONDUCTOR MURDERED AT ROANOKE
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Dead Body of M. M. Spence Found on River Bank With Evidence of Desperate Struggle
    Roanoke, Va.  October 20--M. M. Spence, a yard conductor for the Virginian railway, was murdered sometime between 11 and 12 o'clock today.  His dead body was found on the banks of the Roanoke river shortly after noon about 200 yards from where he had been seen little more than an hour earlier by other employes of the Virginian.  There was evidence of a desperate struggle.
    In triangular form, and about eight feet apart, were three distinct pools of blood.  The body was stripped of a shirt.  The hat, a black derby, with pipe and matches, were found lying near his head, and the yard conductor's book bearing a date of today, with the numbers of a train of forty-seven cars, was found by his side.
    There was evidence of knife wounds on both hands, three distinct gashes on the left side of his throat, a long gash along the lower part of the left side of his face and chin. On the right side a gash extending from below the ear to the front of the throat which severed the carotid artery and juglar [sic] vein.
    The upper part of the body was bear, with the exception of a small portion of his knit undershirt.  His face, upper part of the body and hands, were covered with blood.  A small portion of a black shirt, which he had worn was found nearby, and some sixty or seventy-five yards distant on the bank above the railroad track, another portion of the torn shirt was picked up, showing that the murderer had carried it is the direction of the Virginian station and there were evidences that he had wiped the blood from his hands on the torn garment.
    There is no clue to the identity of the murderer.
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Gordon Hamilton
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