The Death of Charles Rutledge Homes

Contributed By

NEWSPAPER

Week of September 26, 1929 The Gadsden County Times newspaper, Quincy, Florida

Architect Takes Own Life in His Quincy Office Thurs. Night R. Holmes is Found Dead Friday Morning with Bullet Through HeartBody Shipped to Greenville BurialLeaves Note Written in May Designating Kind of Burial Wanted

With a bullet wound through his heart and a .32 calibre pistol lying by his side, the dead body of Rutledge Holmes was found in his office on the second floor of a Quincy bank building Friday morning. In opinion of officials the case was so clearly one of suicide that no inquest was deemed necessary.

Efforts on the part of business and professional men having offices on the same floor to receive response from Holmes, who is reported to have been drinking heavily for some time, prompted them to push aside the covering over a letter apertuer in the locked door to find him lying dead upon the floor. Justice W. B. Greer and Deputy Sheriff Ralph Long were summoned before a negro man was assisted through the transom to unlock the door.

The dead man was dressed only in his night clother, a shirt and bedroom slippers. The muzzle of the pistol had been placed inside the shirt before firing of the fatal bullet, for there was no hole through the shirt where the pellet entered the body.

Rolled and placed in the ring of an alarm clock standing on a nearby table was the following note:

Quincy, May 2, '29.

Do not notify any one. I have some pains in the region of my heart. Should I die I would like to be wrapped in one of my camping blankets and buried under some pretty trees in the country in an unmarked grave. Take what I have in Quincy for the trouble.

R. Holmes.

The body was placed in charge of the Clark Funeral Home and prepared for burial. Saturday it was shipped to Greenville, S. C., for burial, at request of a sister of the deceased there. Services were conducted by the Rev. E. M. Claytor, rector of St. Paul's Episcopal church, at the funeral home Saturday afternoon. The remains were accompanied to the train by a number of friends.

Mr. Holmes was born at Charleston, S. C., December 23, 1866, and was aged 63 years. He was an architect by profession. Coming to Jacksonville in 1901, after the fire destroyed a great part of the city, he drew the plans for the Duval county court house and some of the most imposing buildings in that city. He was architect for the state when a number of buildings were constructed at Gainesville.

After undergoing treatment at the state hospital at Chattahoochee, Mr. Holmes made his home at Sneads, in Jackson county, for a short time before coming to Quincy nearly a year ago. He was architect here for the Gadsden County Times building and for the handsome new residence fo N. B. Jordan, local banker.

Mr. Holmes' wife, a sister of Frank Deering, of Jacksonville, died several years ago. They had no children.

A member of one of the oldest and most prominent families of Charleston, Mr. Holmes was prominent socially and had gained wide recognition in his profession. He was an educated, cultured man and news of his tragic death was received with genuine regret by friends here and elsewhere.