What was the saddest death in your Tree ?

[PrueM]

dhowse, those stories are so sad 
I can't get over the idea of drinking fermented watermelon juice though - having inadvertently eaten off watermelon myself, it sounds disgusting!

[Shaztoni]

I have just come across one where during WW1 a woman's husband and brother and brother-in-law were killed, she was left with four children under six to raise on her own poor dear.

[mitchell]

I have twin brothers born in 1904 - one died at age 11 months and the other died when he was 4.
In the same family 2 sons were killed in action during WW1 within 2 weeks of each other and 2 daughters died aged 14 and 25. Only my granny (their sister) survived to old age.

Also, my x3 great granny (different family) is described as a pauper lunatic patient  when she died in Banffshire Asylum

Elaine

[sandie]

I have two I can think of.  The first was my grandmother who was knocked down by a lorry on 23rd December while out buying bits for Christmas.  The saddest bit about it was my father passed by on a bus as the body was covered and remarked to the man next to him what a terrible thing to have happened so close to the holiday, only when he arrived at his parents house did he find out it was his mother.

The other is my uncle.  He had started work at a gummed paper factory in Camberwell and was killed in a lift accident   aged 15.  According to the newspaper report, he must have climbed up to look over the lift door and accidently tripped the lever.  The foreman apparently told the inquest that he had warned the youngster not to operate the lift by himself, but he hadn't listened.  I personally think it was easier for him to blame the dead boy than admit he told him to use it, but then I'm biased.

Sandie

[PrueM]

Like most here, there are so many sad passings to choose from but this one is the event I automatically think of when I think "tragic".    It made the local paper (probably the most exciting thing to happen there all year) and here is the article:

TWO CHILDREN DROWNED - An utter gloom was cast on our community last Thursday [27 Dec 1895] when the information passed from one to another that two bright children, well known to all, were drowned.  It appears tiny Ada (about 11 years) and Minnie (about 8 years) [actually they were 10 and 6], daughters of Mr. John McKay, of lower Ulmarra, went to the river about 4pm, close to their dwelling, to have a bath.  At this place there is a shelf projecting a little distance into the river, and then abruptly breaks into a perpendicular wall.  Minnie, it is said by another little girl who was there, got over the edgeof this ledge, and was immediately out of her depth.  It is believed Ada, in tryign to help her sister, was also pulled into deep water.  The unfortunate and much-to-be-pitied mother came on the bank just in time to see the head of one dsappearing.  Mrs. McKay summoned her husband from the field by her shrieks, but he, after futile endeavours to recover the bodies, sent to the police...who went with the grapnels, and after about two hours dragging recovered both the bodies...The deeply stricken mother is almost bereft of reason, and the father almost breaks down under the affliction.  It was a sore blow to a happy family...

They went on to have more children, but soon moved back to Sydney after only about 5 years in Ulmarra.     

Prue

[Quinn]

Out of all my relatives and ancestors, I guess I'd have to say my da.  For all his faults and personal problems in his life, I loved him so very much.  He was my hero, for honestly unknown reasons.  He taught me about nature, respect of wildlife, surviving in the worst of conditions, and hanging on.

I was a literal basket case the night he passed and I was the last one to talk to him at the hospital and the last one he spoke to, and I held his hand as he passed. 

I can barely remember his funeral and wake, and have only vague memories of being carried from the gravesite by my husband and an uncle.  It's been 25 years, and the tears still come every time I see his face.  And I have no memories at all of the next 6 months of my life, it's all a blank to me.

After that, I guess it would be my grandda Frank Quinn, who died before I was born.

Patty

[Cotswolder]

The saddest death in my family was, I believe, my great grandmother. She had 23 children and suffered from asthma.
From what we know 4 of her sons were away in WW1. One died and one was listed as 'missing, presumed dead'.
This missing son arrived home unannounced about one month after the end of WW1. It was such a shock to his mother that she suffered a massive asthma attack and died as a result, aged 58

[Rebecca Steele]

Cotswolder what a sad story

[DianaCanada]

I guess the saddest was my great-uncle's death in 1899, if I have the year right - in Burnley, Lancs.  He was about 15, and drowned trying to save a younger boy's life (he also died). 
My great-uncle's name was David Dixon.  His mother had died of pneumonia soon after he was born.  He had only one sibling, my grandmother, Lily.
Lily's father Elijah married again a few years after David's drowning, but he had no other children.
Diana.