Shep's Place Family Tree

Beloved Teacher Is Survived By Wife And
Three Children, One A Baby - Born At Vinton
And Known Throughout Gallia County

Charles C. Hughes, member of the Gallia Academy High School faculty, died at 6:20 this morning at Holzer Hospital of the burns he received at his home on Bull Skin in Harrison Tp., Christmas morning.
There was a marked change for the worse last night & he lapsed into unconsciousness about midnight. Despite his own cheerfulness from Saturday on, hope for his recovery had not been strong among hospital attaches. So much of the surface of his body, approximately one-half, had been burned, that he could not throw off the accumulating poison in sufficient volume.
Family's Loss Incalculable
His death is a sad one indeed. He was extensively acquainted in the county & universally respected & esteemed as countless inquiries about his condition received at the hospital & this office from day to day clearly indicated.
There is a poignancy about his passing that will reach thousands of hearts because of the overwhelming, irreparable loss inflicted on the wife & baby & two older children by a previous marriage.
Mr. Hughes who had been an instructor in physics & commercial work here for six years or more, was in his 46th year. He was born at Vinton, Aug. 6, 1891, the son of Nathan & Eliza Swick Hughes.
He was twice married. His first wife was Maudelle Sheets, daughter of Mr. & Mrs. Alphonso sheets of Guyan tp., their marriage taking place May 29, 1920. she died a number of years ago, leaving two daughters, Louise, now a sophomore in the local high school, & Ruth a pupil in the Eighth grade.
On July 8, 1933, he married Helen L. Gillingham, a daughter of the late Charles Gillingham of Thivener. Not long after that he bought of the son of the late T. J. Porter what had been a part of the J. Vint Porter farm beyond Thivener. There the Hughes family, to which a baby was added some months ago, has been living.
It was in a smokehouse there that Mr. Hughes was fatally burned. He undertook to rekindle a fire by the use of kerosene. From a three-gallon container he dipped out a small quantity in a small coffee can. The latter vessel leaked. When the fire flared up, it spread along the line of the leak & the kerosene container exploded.
In less time than it took him to tell a Tribune reporter about it, he was enveloped in flames & his clothes were burned off, except for a pair of galoshes. All the skin on both legs were seared above the tops of the galoshes & there were deep burns on his chest & splotches on his face. Somehow he had rid himself of the flaming garments so quickly that his back was not burned much if at all. Saturday morning he was quite cheerful & seemed to think he would get well & told the few who saw him that he was not suffering directly from the burns.
From the hospital, the body was removed by c. R. Halley to Elias Wetherholt's funeral parlors.