Dr. Collins - Shot Himself

On last Monday, the 24th, instant, at about 6 o-clock a.m., Dr. T. J. Collins accidentally shot himself in the face with a double barrel breach loading shot gun. It seems, according to the statement of his wife, that some of the family hid been handling the gun and had set it down in a rather dangerous place and Dr. Collin, seeing it there, said something about it to his wife and she told him that he had better moved it to another place more safe, and he picked it up and was placing it in another place when it someway, the gun fired. The load taking off almost the entire right cheek and making a very ghastly and perhaps a very dangerous wound in his face.
The report has gone out, through some misunderstanding, that one of his sons (little Dock) had shot him, but this is a mistake, as Mrs. Collins stated to me as above written and also little Dock stated that he was out in the yard when the gun fired, and we hope that no one will think otherwise than that it is really an accident, which it is. Seeing such things occur along through life we should be very careful how we handle loaded guns.

(Jackson Argus - Butts County - Week of April 28, 1899)

Submitted by Don Bankston