Boy Loses Life in Trinity Saving Sister

Eugene Leach of Sterling, Oklahoma, lost his life about 4 o'clock Monday evening in the Trinity River between the Cotton Belt bridge and the dam west of Carrollton.  His sister, Lulu, was wading in the river and stepped into deep water and called for help. Eugene could not swim, but went to the rescue and was successful in getting his sister near the bank so that she grasped a pole held out to her by another brother but Eugene was carried into deep water by the swift current and went down. He did not come at all and an alarm was given and search made for the body.
When information came to Carrollton many persons went out to help and a party composed of Walter Kennedy, Claude Vinson, Holman Rhoton, Harrison Pratt and Charley Johnston were among the first to respond. Walter Kennedy was fortunate in locating the body and first time he went down, but the water was swift and it was some time before he recovered it.  The body had been in the water an hour before recovery and no hope for resuscitation was entertained, much water already being in the body.  Al large crowd of people had gathered to help find the body.
Rhoton's ambulance was called and the body brought to their undertaking parlors where it was viewed by several hundred persons. Mr. Rhoton communicated with Mr. Henry Leach of Sterling, Okla.., grandfather of the drowned boy, and he instructed to embalm the body and he would come on Tuesday for it and take it to Oklahoma for burial, which was done and on Tuesday the body was taken to Sterling where it was buried beside of his father who had died just six years before on the same date.
The family, the mother with a daughter and three sons, together with other relatives from Sterling Okla., had come to this section to pick cotton and had been working for R. B. Johnson near Coppell. Rain Sunday night prevented picking on Monday so they had come to the river to spend the day fishing, wading and swimming. The mother, Lula, and two sons, Robert, and Herbert. Some years ago she lost a five year-old daughter by drowning, the husband committed suicide six years ago, and about a year ago their home in Oklahoma burned, so we are told.
Judge V. F. Blewett held an inquest and returned a verdict of death by accidental drowning. The dead boy was 18 years and 20 days old. The girl rescued was 10 years of age. The party had been in this section about three weeks.

The Carrollton Chronicle, Friday September 19, 1930
Submitted by Edward Lynn Williams