Vanished: The Note Beneath the Plate
David W. Hunter was a former cigar maker, like his father before him, and long-time resident of Southwick, Massachusetts. He had lived along Congamond Lake before moving to Hartford, Connecticut, where he found work at the massive Billings & Spencer tool manufacturing plant. As the operator hired to run the elevator, he worked closely with the machinery—but on Tuesday, April 4, 1911, something went horribly wrong.
No one witnessed what happened in that shaft. It was only when someone heard David's desperate cry for help that workers rushed to the elevator pit and found him at the bottom, the elevator suspended high above. His right hand was crushed, his face and head cut, his left ankle dislocated, and his ribs fractured. The man, once well known throughout the region for his skilled hands, lay broken in the darkness beneath the machine he had operated. He was rushed to St. Francis Hospital.
For a few days, there was hope. But his injuries were too severe, his body too overwhelmed. On Saturday night, David Hunter, 55, died.
His death marked the end of a life that had been shadowed by far more than industrial misfortune. Years before the elevator claimed him, David had endured a different kind of tragedy—one played out in silence and absence.
On October 19, 1903, David returned home to find the table set for dinner. Everything was ready. Everything except his wife, Eva, who had vanished. In her place lay a note, discovered beneath his plate. She asked him not to follow her or tell anyone what had happened. The message ended with a single proverb:
“A wise head carries a still tongue.”
For a time, they attempted reconciliation. Eva contacted him and proposed an arrangement: he would pay her three dollars per week for housekeeping services. David agreed, dismissing the housekeeper he had hired to care for the home in her absence. But the reconciliation was as fragile as it was brief.
On May 22, 1906, David came home to find his wife gone again. This time, Eva had arranged for an elderly woman to manage the household in her place as a paid servant. Then she disappeared, leaving David with only the arrangement—and the silence.
Divorce was granted in 1910 on the grounds of desertion. By then, the scars of his marriage ran deep. He had left Southwick and Congamond Lake for Hartford, hoping distance might offer what proximity could not. He found work as an elevator operator—a steady job, a new start in a new city.
The elevator shaft would claim him the following spring, ending a story that had begun with absence and ended in darkness—a life interrupted not once, but twice, in ways that seemed almost designed to test the resilience of a man already worn down by sorrow.
Echoes
For diehard fans of the Southwick Time Machine, David Hunter's name may ring a bell: he had been called as a witness decades earlier in the trial of Joseph B. Loomis, who murdered David Levett of Southwick in 1881. Levett, a clerk and horse trader at the Southwick Hotel—known today as the Southwick Inn—was the victim in one of the town's most shocking crimes. The cigar maker thus appears in two chapters of local history, separated by three decades—once as a voice in justice, and finally as a victim of fate.
David Hunter’s name thus appears in two chapters of Southwick’s history, separated by thirty years—once as a voice in justice, and finally as a victim of fate.
Perhaps, in the end, silence was the only thing that ever stayed with him.
— First published exclusively on the Southwick Time Machine.
This article is based on primary source research including official records, census data, death certificates, and old newspapers.
Help us illuminate forgotten stories like David's.
Support the Southwick Time Machine.
Edited Out/Author's Additional Research Notes
David W. Hunter
- Born: June 1855
- Age at death: 55 years old
- Birthplace/residency: Southwick, Massachusetts; Congamond Lake area
- David’s father was a cigar maker
Billings & Spencer Manufacturing
- Located in Hartford, Connecticut
- Major player
- Notable distinction: First commercial drop forging plant in America
- Products: Forgings, hand tools, machinist tools, drop hammers
Marriage and Family
- Wife: Eva (Schriver) Hunter
- Born: September 1870
- Married David: June 15, 1886, in Waterbury, Connecticut
- Birthplace: Records conflict—some indicate Wisconsin, others Massachusetts
- Age gap: Eva was 15 years younger than David; she was approximately 18 when pregnant with their first child, while David was 34
- Died: June 18, 1931, at her home
- The Connecticut Trust and Safe Deposit Company obtained a judgment in foreclosure against Eva and David in June 1903
- Eva may or may not have had an affair with a Waterbury man in 1902 - 3. She sued him for a false promise. The case went to trial but was settled out of court in 1903, with Eva walking away with more than $500 but not quite $1,000
- Kept the last name Hunter after David divorced her on grounds of desertion
Children
- David Martin Hunter (August 18, 1889 – August 10, 1931)
- Occupation: Cigar maker; later a photo salesman
- Married July 13, 1909
- Struggles: Became an alcoholic; arrested for drunk driving after a vehicle crash in 1930
- Cause of death: Chronic alcohol poisoning
- Age at death: 41
- Frederick W. Hunter (January 1892 – August 21, 1916)
- Occupation: Picture framer for L.A. Wiley & Son (approximately 9 years)
- Cause of death: Long illness
- Age at death: 24
- Burial: Bloomfield, Connecticut