THE FLAGLER TRIBUNE
Bunnell, Florida
Thursday, February 4, 1926

 

William Madison Wood, 68, multi-millionaire, former president of the American Woolen Company, Andover, Mass., and for the past month a guest at Hotel Ormond, with his wife, committed suicide at a lonely spot above Flagler Beach Tuesday morning by placing a revolver in his mouth and firing.

Ill health is given as the cause for his act. At the time of the suicide, Mr. Wood had been accompanied in his automobile to Flagler Beach by his valet and chauffeur.

Leaving the motor car at a point some distance north of Flagler Beach with an excuse that he wished to take a short walk through the palmetto bordering the road, Mr. Wood was gone for only a few minutes before the report of the revolver was heard and the servants rushed to the scene, to find him dying.

The chauffeur returned to the Hotel Ormond for Mr. Wood's personal physician, Dr. A. D. Griffin, but Mr. Wood had died soon after he had fired the shot into his head, Dr. Griffin said.

According to his servants, Mr. Wood left the exclusive hotel accompanied by only the two servants, giving his physician an excuse in order that the latter would not join the party.

About eight miles above Flagler Beach, near Fox Cut, Mr. Wood stopped the motor car, stating he wished to walk into the bushes along the roadside. This he did. Soon after he had disappeared from sight of his two employees, the shot was heard.

The valet, Augustine Frederickson, had been in Mr. Wood's employ for the past thirty-five years, while the chauffeur, Joseph Beaulieu, had been in the man's service for the past six years.

Ill hea1th for the past several years is the only motive advanced for the act.

A coroner's inquest was conducted at the spot where the act was committed. The jury, summoned in Bunnell by F. A. Rich, justice of the peace, returned the verdict that Mr. Wood had come to his death by a bullet wound, self-inflicted.