Shame Kills a High-Popularity Lawyer

February 25, 1932
Daisy Yao
Staff Reporter

Yesterday, in Weston, Ontario, a well-known local family lawyer committed suicide in his hunting activity, whose name was Orpheus Wattenhall.

Police wanted to keep this information secret, but eventually it leaked out. Police said Orpheus Wattenhall has been killed by a hunting accident, but actually he committed suicide because of the disclosure of his debts.

Orpheus Wattenhall was a famous local family lawyer of the old school. He looked after a number of estates for farmers and people who had not learned about new ways of doing business.

Wattenhall had been paying his clients a good unadventurous return on their money for years, but he had been investing that the same money in the stock market for big returns. When crash came, he was unprepared, and since 1929 he had been paying out quite a lot of his own money to keep his affairs on an even keel.

But two weeks ago, one of Wattenhall clients died because of pneumonia, this had made his affairs impossible to go on, and his failure of investment would have to come to light. He could not bear the shame, so he committed suicide.

Although there were old people whose money Wattenhall had spent who would now be destitute, but people had liked him so much and felt sorry for him. “I am so sorry for him. He was such a good and cheerful man. He should not die” says Rita Woods, one of Wattenhall’s clients, “Ms. Shanklin should not die so soon, otherwise Mr. Wattenhall would not commit suicide.”