TAKES PIPE TO BED
Lodger Smokes Himself to Sleep and is Probably Fatally Burned in Blazing Cot.
Falling asleep with his pipe in his mouth, Adam Borthwick, a bricklayer, set fire to his bed in the Queen rooming-house at No. 107 Wilmington street about 8 o’clock last night, and was probably fatally burned before he could be rescued. His body was blistered and his arms and hands were scorched. He was treated at the Receiving Hospital, and later removed to the County Hospital. The damage by fire is about $25.
Borthwick, who lives in Ontario, came to the city Sunday to see the balloon race. He began drinking heavily, and since Wednesday has been on the verge of delirium tremors. When he went to his room last night, he was intoxicated, the proprietor says, and about half and hour later smoke was discovered in the hall by Bert Keyting, who occupied the adjoining room.
Keyting shouted fire and then kicked in the door. Borthwick was lying on the bed unconscious and the bed clothing was ablaze. Keyting pulled him onto the floor and then, wrapping him in a sheet, sent for the police ambulance. Several lodgers came to his assistance and the fire was extinguished.
Adam Borthwick Fatally Burned
While in Bed in Los Angeles He Lights His Pip and Recives Burns That Cause His Death.
Adam Borthwick, a well known bricklayer of this city, was fatally burned while in bed in a rooming house in Los Angeles, last Thursday.
It was at the Queen lodging house at 107 Wilmington street about 6 o’clock in the evening that the accident occurred. Borthwick had gone to the place about 4:30 and secured a room. It is said that he had been drinking and retired as soon as he had been shown to his room. Later in the evening he awoke and lighted a pipe and smoked in bed.
It is supposed that Borthwick dropped to sleep again and allowed the lighted pip to drop on the bed clothing. At all events he was found by a man named Keating in bed with the clothing all afire and was rescued with much difficulty.
The police ambulance was called and the man removed to the receiving hospital. More than one-half of his body had been burned, and while he gave no signs of pain and was apparently strong the surgeons at the hospital at once pronounced his case fatal.
Relatives from Ontario who visited Borthwick in the Los Angeles hospital state that his back, hips and shoulders were horribly burned. Borthwick was conscious and talked to his visitors. Borthwick’s watch and all his money was done and he did not know what became of it. When Perry Ensley, a brother-in-law visited him for the first time, Borthwick asked him if he had them. There is little question but what Borthwick was doped for no matter how intoxicated he might have been he would hardly laid in bed until he was burned as badly as he was.
He died Monday afternoon. Tuesday Undertaker Draper went to Los Angeles and brought the remains home for burial. The funeral services were held yesterday morning at ten o’clock under the auspices of the Odd Fellows of which order he was a member. The remains were interned in Bellevue.
Articles from an unknown newspaper article.
