A Tragedy Close to Home

Walter E. Bonsall, courtesy of FindaGrave.com.

I do not claim to be psychic AT ALL, but there have been a handful of times in my life when a weird thought has crystalized inside my head, like someone came up behind me and spoke silently into my ear. It's the kind of thing that makes you sound crazy if you try to talk about it. And it happened to me when we bought our house.

I had two distinct impressions on the day we first set foot inside. One, an old man died here after a long illness. Two, someone else who lived here was very troubled. I kept these thoughts to myself, but I never forgot about them. Years later, I proved myself right.

J. F. Wood, a tombstone maker, died in this house of natural causes. His widow then sold the property and moved away. A man named Walter Bonsall had been boarding with them. He had never married, and census records seem to indicate a spotty, on-and-off work history of civil service and labor-related positions. At the time of his death, he was serving as an administrator for the local borough. After Mrs. Wood moved, he resided for a short time with the widower husband of the Woods' daughter, who lived across the street. Then, one day, he went into his neighbor's garage and ended it all.

Chester Times, Jan. 23,1927.

I have tried to piece together fragments of this man's life to speculate about how he came to this grim decision, but I always come up short. I hope I'm not doing his memory a disservice by posting about him on Halloween, especially because I think a part of him is still here. His death certificate alone is fascinating and worthy of sharing because it had been his job to sign death certificates in the borough -- but being deceased, he could not sign his own certificate. A note in the upper margin reads, "...Bonsall, registrar for E. Lansdowne is deceased and has no deputy."

Death certificate of Walter E. Bonsall, courtesy of Ancestry.com.