The Legality Around a Remarkably Painful Societal Issue

On November 21, 1910, Roxie Annie Bauers (née Bumgarner) lost her life in a tragic murder-suicide at the Lewis Hotel in Detroit (now known as Detroit Lakes), Minnesota. She was 20 years old. Her estranged husband, 25-year-old Henry Bauers, pulled the trigger.  The case made headlines in the Detroit Herald, and the coverage and witness testimony proved crucial to a subsequent chancery cause in the circuit court of Grayson County, Virginia. The topic of survivorship played a major role in the estate suit, styled A.E. Parsons, guardian vs. James C. Bumgarner, etc., 1911-025.

Roxie Annie’s parents, James C. Bumgarner and Julia McNiel Bumgarner (married 1888), had divorced prior to 1900. Having moved from Wilkes County, North Carolina, sometime after 1900, Julia Bumgarner and her children set up household in Grayson County, Virginia. Sometime between then and 1908, the court appointed Roxie Annie a guardian named A. E. Parsons. Her parents’ divorce may have necessitated this guardianship in order to protect Roxie’s interests, as she was a legal minor (under age 21).

Roxie Bumgarner left home to go to “the western country” around 1909. She married Henry Bauer in Grand Forks or Wahpeton that same year and lived with his family near Pelican Lake in Otter Tail County, Minnesota. Later accounts characterized the marriage as rocky. Roxie Annie left her husband once, but returned, only to be forced to leave for a second time by his abusive behavior. This time, she decided to file a divorce suit.

Roxie Annie traveled 15 miles to the city of Detroit to find work. Mrs. Lewis, the proprietress of the Lewis Hotel, employed her as a cook. Approximately three weeks after she began work there, Henry Bauer arrived asking to see her. He told Mrs. Lewis, “I have come to pay for that divorce.” Unbeknownst to the hotelier, Henry had borrowed five dollars from his brother Charlie, allegedly for legal fees, but instead purchased a pistol at the hardware store.

With almost no preamble, Henry entered the kitchen and shot Roxie Annie Bauer. Mrs. Lewis rushed into the kitchen as Roxie was falling. She attempted to wrestle the gun from Henry Bauer, but he slipped free and used it to take his own life, dying instantly. Roxie was carried to Nunn’s Undertaking establishment, but succumbed before Dr. George Fraiser could render aid.

In filing the Grayson County chancery suit, A. E. Parsons asked the court to enter a decree directing him “to whom he should pay over said funds in his hands as Roxie’s guardian.” The defendants in the suit were the couple’s surviving relatives–Roxie’s father, Henry’s mother, his two brothers, and his sister. Which Bauer survived the other would determine who received the funds.

As explained by A. E. Parsons in the bill: “Under the law of the state of Minnesota where his ward was domiciled as well as under the law of Virginia, had the husband survived, his father, if living, would have been sole distributee. In the event of his father’s death, then his mother and any brothers and sisters would be his distributees jointly.” This was surely a bitter pill for Roxie’s aggrieved family.

However, according to the depositions Mrs. Lewis and Dr. Frasier filed in the cause, Roxie outlived her husband by several minutes. This eyewitness testimony proved critical to the legal distribution of Roxie’s estate.  In October 1911, her father as her sole beneficiary was awarded the guardian’s funds.

In his answer, her father, James C. (J. C.) Bumgarner, indicated awareness of his daughter’s mistreatment and previous attempts by her husband to take her life. As the newspaper clipping submitted with the bill of complaint indicates, the five dollars that Henry borrowed from his brother changed the course of their lives forever. Given the abrupt nature and manner of their deaths, the pages in the life history of these two people will never be completely closed.

The Grayson County chancery causes, 1795-1912, are indexed, scanned, and freely available for research through the Library’s Chancery Records Index. This project was made possible through the innovative Circuit Court Records Preservation Program (CCRP), a cooperative program between the Library of Virginia and the Virginia Court Clerks Association (VCCA), which seeks to preserve the historic records found in Virginia’s circuit courts.