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 Submitted by Glenda Hogg, transcribed from The Haralson Co. Tribune, Jan. 17, 1929

The newspaper account below refers to Elizabeth Speights Stephens Pitts. She was born in December 1850 according

to census records. Her death certificate states that her father was R. T. Speights. She married Young J. Stephens in

Haralson County on 27 March 1898. He was about 30 years her senior. They had no children. She married Julius Caesar

 Pitts in Haralson County on 18 September 1919. She was his third wife (at least). Her death certificate says she is buried at
Pleasant Hill but the cemetery book does not show a tombstone for her. 

"Fears of illness causes suicide of woman by fire"
Carefully preparing a funeral pyre in the midst of which she seated herself and applied the flame, Mrs. Julius Pitts, aged

Tallapoosa resident, was so badly burned last Thursday morning that her death followed shortly thereafter.
Before lapsing into unconsciousness, Mrs. Pitts cried out to her husband and neighbors who were attempting to alleviate

 her pain, that “she had tried to end it all.”

Mr. Pitts the woman’s half-blind and 70 year old husband, said he was attracted to his wife’s bedroom by sound of a

crackling fire followed by her screams. He said he found her surrounded by flaming rubbish her night garments ablaze.

Mr. Pitts was burned about the arms as he pulled his mate from the burning circle and extinguished her clothing.
Miss J. E. Landers, a neighbor, called by Mr. Pitts to assist him in administering to his wife, said Mrs. Pitts told her of

igniting them in an effort to end her life. The rubbish had apparently been saturated with gasoline.
Mr. Pitts stated that for the past several weeks his wife had been despondent over the condition of her health, and was

 in constant fear of being bedridden.

Two days prior to her death she asked him to buy her a poison so she might kill herself which, of course, he refused to do.
Mrs. Pitts is survived by her husband, two sisters: Mrs. Nancy Stanford of Bremen, and Mrs.  Sallie Griffin of Mineola,

Texas and one brother Mr. Allen Speight of near Buchanan.

Funeral services were conducted at Pleasant Hill church, six miles north of Tallapoosa on Friday morning."
p. 1, The Haralson Co Tribune, Jan 17, 1929

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