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Wandering around in Woodvale Cemetery, you may come across this lonely grave, not part of any family plot, the only one in the graveyard with that surname.
Louis Mains was a farmhand, working for the Buchfuehrers southeast of Ainsworth. They had taken him from "a home in Terre Haute" — whether private or institutional isn't clear — when he was just 11 years old. His parents were both living, but separated, and apparently neither could provide him a home. At the same time Louis came to Ainsworth, his older sister, Lucile, went to stay with the Frank Schumacher family in Hobart.
When Louis and Frederike Buchfuehrer retired from farming in 1917, their son Emil kept Louis on at the farm. Over the years, Louis had so impressed the Buchfuehrers with his good character and serious work ethic — he "was a splendid boy to work," they would later say — that they had grown quite fond of him. They probably expected him to make a success of his life, in spite of its rather shaky start.
The end came on August 11, 1918. It was a bright Sunday afternoon. Louis and a friend, Ralph Edwards (a hired hand on the Julius Triebess farm), walked over to the Deep River to go swimming. Ralph knew how to swim, but Louis didn't, so he wore "wings" — probably a cork version of our modern-day inflatable water wings. The boys plunged into the water, heading toward the opposite bank. And then something went wrong. Louis yelled; Ralph looked back; Louis' arms flew up; the "wings" had slipped off and were floating away; suddenly Louis disappeared under the water. It all happened so fast — Ralph couldn't reach his friend before he sank, and once he sank, he was lost.
Ralph ran to get help. As the alarm spread, a number of men left their Sunday-afternoon activities to join in the search. After about an hour, William Wood found Louis' body, in about 10 feet of water, and with Robert Thorpe's help pulled it out. They carried the drowned boy home to the Buchfuehrers. Dr. C.C. Brink was summoned from Hobart, but it was as deputy coroner — there was no hope.
The Buchfuehrers, deeply grieved, behaved as if Louis had been their own son. They hired Alwin Wild as undertaker, arranged for the funeral to be held in the Deep River church, and laid the boy to rest in Woodvale Cemetery, near their home.
The funeral was "largely attended." Among the mourners was Louis' father (name unknown); he came up from Covington, Indiana. If sister Lucile was still living with the Schumachers in Hobart, she likely made the short trip down to Deep River that day. But the boy's mother, who resided in either Covington or Terre Haute (depending on which newspaper you read), apparently did not attend.
I don't know who bought that nice grave marker for Louis. I'm inclined to think it was the Buchfuehrers.
Sources:
♦ "Boy Drowns in Deep River." Hobart Gazette 16 Aug. 1918.
♦ "Louis Mains Loses His Life by Drowning Sunday Afternoon." Hobart News 15 Aug. 1918.
3 comments:
Thank you so much for posting this...I found Louis (Maines), age 6 on the 1910 census with father Cash and mother Sarliah, sisters Hilda, age 10, Lucille, age 8, Aletha, age 4 and Bertha, age 1 living in Pilot, IL...Cash's marital status in 1920 was single and widowed in 1930...Hilda shows up in Danville, IL in 1920 living with g'parents named Martin...Aletha is listed samed census as an "inmate", Bertha is in Richmond IN in 1930...so many ?? that will never have answers...it's still reassuring and comforting to know that g'gpa Louis and g'gma Rica thought fondly of him and took care of him to his untimely end...next time I am at Woodvale I will find his grave and say a little prayer.
Thanks for sharing that information. You have a talent for tracking people down!
I was drawn in thinking of this poor child and his dysfunctional family...it's helpful to learn about these things that happened so long ago as it gives some insight as to my g'grands...I'm sure they felt devastated by this, as they had lost 2 of 8 of their own children.
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