The violent death of Barend van der Schuit

by J.J. van der Schuit Translation: A. van de Ruit

Barend Otto van der Schuit and Johanna Jacoba Muus (called Coba) were baptized as members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, also called Mormons, on December 22, 1897 and were married on May 1, 1901 in the Salt Lake Temple in Salt Lake City, Utah, U.S.A. Around 1900 Barend van der Schuit, his wife and three children set off from Rotterdam to the United States, where to family established in Ogden City, Utah. They were written out of the Rotterdam registry-office on May 14, 1902 due departure to the States.

His wife Coba became homesick for Holland and went to the Netherlands in 1913 for a family visit. Meanwhile Barend felt lonely in Ogden. He was member of the church choir where he met the over 13 years younger Bessie May Hoid. She was an attractive, long legged and robust built woman, married to a saloon owner called John Lawson Blosser. An intimate and lasting relation arose between Barend and Bessie. Upon her return in Ogden Coba was confronted with this reality and the end of her marriage was a fact.

After the marriage with Johanna Muus had been dissolved on July 31, 1914 Barend moved to Pocatello where on March 15, 1915 he married Bessie May Hoid, meanwhile divorced from John Lawson Blosser. The marriage characterized itself by regular quarrels and violences. After a (meanwhile revoked) charge due to ill-treatment Bessie left her husband.

She requested a divorce In Ogden on December 14, 1915 something and other due to Barend’s accusations that she would have indecent relations with other men and disturbances of peace in her house. It was asserted that Bessie in this period would have a pistol in the house to protect herself. On several occasions Barend tried to persuade her to return to him in Price.

The request for divorce was dismissed on January 7, 1916 on account of the fact that Bessie was not yet one year inhabitant of Ogden at the point in time of the indictment. In January 1917 Bessie and her two children returned to him in Price where the quarrels and physical abuses started all over again.

Striking however is the fact that Barend owing to friends and acquaintances was a quiet, modest man who never showed the nature of a violent person. He had many friends and was member of countless societies.

In the early morning of February 12, 1917 another quarrel with physical violence broke out in the Van der Schuit-home, after which Barend left the house in a bad mood. Later that morning Barend met in town Kathryn, one of his stepdaughters who wanted to mail a letter with a Valentine-card for het father John Blosser. Barend intercepted the letter and read that the stepdaughters Kathryn and Thelma asked their father to come and get them because their stepfather treated them like dogs.

Irritated Barend went home around 11 o’clock where he accused his wife of having incited her daughters to write the letter. A fierce disagreement arose in which the gun game into action and shots were fired. From where exactly the gun came from and who captured it first, is unknown.

The first bullet penetrated deep into the left part of Barend’s chest after first having damaged the muscles of his left arm. The second bullet penetrated the backside of the neck and intersected one of the central nerves in the spine. The chest wound brought about internal and external bleedings, while the neck wound caused an almost total paralysis of the whole body.

Shortly after the shooting Dr. Cloward arrived and found Barend shriveled up on the floor between a chair and a cabin trunk, several feet from the telephone and supported by his wife’s arm.

After a searching examination Dr. Cloward declared that the wounds were fatal and that there was nothing more he could do for the lamed Barend. Barend’s answer to this would have been: “I know it”. In the course of the night Barend languished further and further and became unconscious. In the morning of Tuesday February 13, 1917 at 3.45 p.m. he died of his injuries at the age of 43.

According to Bessie’s explanations Barend threatened to shoot her. During the fight over the possession of the gun it went off accidently.

Barend’s skin was seriously burned by the first shot, which showed that the gun had been fired from short distance. The second shot must have been fired, according the characteristics, from some distance. Besides the two empty shells another not exploded shell was found, which indicates that the trigger of the gun had been pulled three times.

Barend would have testified to his physician Dr. Cloward and prosecutor McGee of the Public Prosecution Service that his wife had fired the shots intentional and well-considered because he would have refused to comply with her request to agree to say that the gun had accidently gone off. Later that afternoon Barend would have stated that the shots were fired at different points of time and that the second shot had been fired by Bessie while he was trying to call a doctor to bandage his first wound.

On request of his first wife, Johanna Muus, the mortal remains were brought the next day, Wednesday, from Price to Ogden, where on February 18 Barend was buried on the Sexton cemetery.

That Wednesday Bessie was arrested on charge of murder in the first degree. During the appearance in court she declared not guilty. On Thursday February 15, 1917 a provisional hearing took place and as witness was called up among others Dr. Cloward, the family doctor on duty, who declared that Van der Schuit would have asserted:

“My stepdaughter wrote a letter full of lies and I simply asked my wife for an explanation. She grabbed a pistol and shot at me. I begged her to let me go, but she shot me once more”.

It appears from the doctor’s explanation that the event took place in the dining room and that Barend would have promised his wife that she could return to Ogden and that he should leave her in peace. He tried to call a doctor when the second fatal shot was fired into his neck. When the doctor arrived he was lying on his back on the bedroom floor against a cabin trunk.

According to Dr. Cloward Barend’s last words were: “The wages of sin is death. As long as I did right the Lord blessed me. As soon as I commenced to do wrong I began to go back”.

Late June 1917 the criminal case against Bessie went to court where Bessie stated that Barend during the fatal quarrel with his right hand had opened the drawer of the kitchen cupboard and had grabbed the pistol with his left hand. With both her hands she would have jerked away the pistol from him and had fired. She declared to have been overstrained to such an extent that she couldn’t remember having shot once or twice.

Twenty-five witnesses from Price, Pocatello and Ogden testified about the brutal behavior of the victim towards his wife. By the Public Prosecution Service was submitted that Bessie never had openly complained about the constant quarrels. During the hearing also letters from her to Barend were read out to the jury. Because the purport of the letters was very racy only a part was read out loud and the remainder of the contents was left to the members of the jury to read through during their deliberations. None of these letters contained any mention of misbehaviour on the part of Barend.

Bessie enjoyed the sympathy of the local community and the general public. An unusual great amount of people, under which many women, attended the hearings. All these circumstances formed atmosphere in the courtroom. The prosecutors did not have the ghost of a chance to win this case. The jury, after an hour of deliberation, was of opinion that Bessie van der Schuit was not guilty of the death of her husband and that there was talk of accidental circumstances.

After Barend’s death Johanna Jacoba Muus continued for some time the exploitation of the flower shop in Ogden. She died, 53 years old, on November 23, 1927 due to diphtheria. After her decease her sons Brigham Otto and Johannes Joseph, as well as her daughter Rachel Emily, left Utah and settled in Los Angeles, Cal.

Brigham Otto died without descendants. Johannes Joseph lost his life in 1986 in a car crash and left behind two sons, Warren John and Kimball Barend. They left behind a numerous offspring, by which the family name “Vanderschuit” also lives on in the United States of America.

For many years now the acquittal of Bessie May Hoid still evokes many questions by the next of kin of Barend van der Schuit. Did she indeed act in self-defence or did she murder her husband? Barend’s grandchildren Warren John Vanderschuit and Johanna Vivian Hansen Young are still collecting data of the case and are of opinion that Bessie did not tell the truth during the court case.

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The American Van der Schui(j)ts Warren John, alias Warren Vanders