From the : The Paducah Daily News, Saturday, August 18, 1888
                                   Transcribed by : Kent Johnson    July 20,2003

                                                    KILLED BY LIGHTNING
                                  Martin Englert, of the County, Thus Meets His Death

                      At Home, Beside His Blind Wife, The Sudden Summons Comes-All the Particulars.
 
McCracken County has lost another of her good citizens.
Last evening Mr. Martin Englert, of the St. Johns neighborhood of Houser was killed by a stroke of lightning, and this will be sad intelligence to a large acquaintance and many friends who esteemed the deceased, recognizing in him a good citizen, a worthy gentleman and a valued friend. The most earnest sympathy will be extended the bereaved wife and children and other relatives.

 The particulars of the sad occurrence, as gathered by the News from (illegible) as follows: Mr. Englert had been about his farm during the shower which fell over this section during the evening and had returned to his house about 7 o’clock, slightly damp. He had entered his room and was standing in front of the fire-place while his wife was wiping the rain from his back and shoulders with a towel. He had taken a position within a few feet of the mantel, with his arms slightly elevated, Mrs. Englert at his back, and had just remarked to his wife, "Mother, reach a little higher," when there was a bright flash of lightning, strongly visible in the room, and a terrific peal of thunder, and Mr. Englert fell at his  wife’s feet at full length. Mrs. Englert, who has for years been entirely blind, for the moment failed to  realize her sudden great affliction, but a son who was sitting in a room just across the hall and was looking at his parents through the open doors, quickly divining the true state of affairs, ran to his father’s side to find him with but slight evidence of life. The heart and pulse could be felt and there was quick and faint breathing for a quarter of an hour, but the stricken man never evidenced any consciousness. In less than twenty minutes after the flash of lightning, surrounded by his grief and horror stricken family, the beloved husband and father, who but a few minutes before was in robust  health and had every assurance of many days, had passed away.

The stroke which caused Mr. Englert’s death was barely if at all felt by Mrs. Englert. She rembers  there           was a slight jar and Mr. Englert fell to the floor. Other members of the family felt the jar, but nothing more. On the second floor of the house, which is a story and a half frame, and in the room just above the one in which Mr. and Mrs. Englert were standing, was an open window, and through this the bolt to all appearances came, as there is no indication of the house having been struck. From the window the lightning seemed to have passed to the floor above and down the wall, the plastering of which is slightly cracked, to a large old fashioned clock standing on the mantel, tearing this to pieces and loosening and slightly damaging the mantel. From the clock the lightning apparently leaped to Mr. Englert and there spent its force. The dial of the clock shows it was stopped at 7:20, as also a watch which hung on the wall a foot or two away, which was also stopped but was not injured.

An examination of Mr. Englert’s body after death exhibited but little sign of the manner his life had been taken. There were no bones broken and no abrasion of the skin. Just beneath each arm pit was a blue place, and each looked like it had been made by a small and sharp instrument, but no other mark was visible. The  fatal result of the stroke is consequently the more mysterious from this fact than if there had been signs of some severer injury.

Mr. Englert was a native of Bavaria, Germany. When twelve years of age he came to this country with his parents and has lived in the neighborhood steadily, where he died, since. He followed farming all his life and was very successful. Mr. Englert leaves, besides his wife, five sons, three of whom are married, and five daughters, all single. He leaves also one brother, Mr. Jacob Englert, and three sisters, Mrs. M. Poat, Mrs. John Roof, and Mrs. George Worth. A sister, Mrs. Feast, died five years since, as did his mother, and his father about fourteen years ago.

The funeral is set for this evening at 5 o’clock. Mass services were held this morning at St. John’s              Church, of which the deceased had long been a consistent member.
This evening there will be further services before the interment. The burial will be in the St. John’s cemetery, where lie the other  deceased members of the family.

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