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Surnames: Merriss, Stiner, Fristoe
Classification: Obituary
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Message Board Post:
"Permission granted by the Decatur Daily Democrat for
obituary transcriptions on the Adams Co., IN GenWeb site only."
Decatur Daily Democrat, Adams County, Indiana; Tuesday Evening, November 11, 1913
DIED IN VERY FEW MINUTES
Ellsworth Merriss, Prominent Pleasant Mills Farmer, Had Fatal Attack
ON LAST EVENING
Believed to Have Been Apoplexy
Had Been in Good Health
Death came very unexpectedly last evening at 8 o'clock, to Ellsworth Merriss, a
prominent man of Pleasant Mills, when he suffered what the physician, who arrived shortly
after his death, believes to have been apoplexy. Mr. Merriss was a man tall and portly
and apparently in the very best health. Tuesday he had been working on his barn,
covering every crack and crevice to make the structure warm for the winter. In the
evening he got up from the table, and going into the living room, remarked to his wife
that he believed he would go to bed. He sat down behind the stove on a box and talked
for a while. His wife also talked with him and after a few moments she noticed that his
answers had ceased. Fearing something wrong, she looked and saw him sitting with his
head drooping. She went to him and shook him and asked him what was wrong but received
no reply. She hurriedly left him and called a neighbor, and when they returned he had
fallen partly over. He was st!
ill breathing slightly, and they laid him in a better postion and began at once to use
what restorativity they had at hand until the physician who had been called could arrive.
He lived only a few minutes, however, from the time he was first stricken. It was the
first attack of any kind that he had ever had and had never been afflicted with heart
trouble.
The news of his death could scarcely be believed this morning when it reached the city,
as he had always seemed to be a man of unusually good health. Only a few weeks ago he
served as one of the jurors in the Dr. Thain case, on trial in the Adams circuit court.
Mr. Merriss was born on the farm and in the house in which he died, June 3, 1862, making
him at death, fifty-one years old. He was a son of Venis and Margaretta Stiner Merriss.
The father died June 5, 1898, and the mother only a year ago last September 6.
In young manhood Mr. Merriss entered the employ of the Erie railroad as car inspector.
He lived at Lima, Ohio, and Huntington and then went to Lexington, Ky., where he lived
twenty years. Later he purchased an interest in a store at Rochester with his
brother-in-law, Al Fristoe, and was there two years. After his mother's death he
took over the old home farm at Pleasant Mills, moving there last March.
He is survived by the widow, Della C. Merriss, and one son, Dennis, who is married and
resides at Covington, Ky. The son and wife and children visited here only a few weeks
ago. One brother, Wallace, of Indianapolis, and one sister, Mrs. Al Fristoe, of
Rochester are living.
Mr. Merriss was a member of the Masonic order of high degree and was active in his
lodge.
Coroner D. D. Clark visited the scene and held an inquest about 9:30 o'clock Monday
night and stated this mornig that his death was due to heart failure.
Unless other arrangements should be made after the son's arrival from Covington, the
funeral will be held Thursday morning at the Baptist church in Pleasant Mills. The body
will then be brought to this city and taken to Fort Wayne, where it will be cremated.