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Fires, disasters & public safetyA Shamokin Stabbing and a Death at Miners’ Hospital
By June 1, 1910
Two June 1910 reports followed the same attack from a Shamokin street corner to the hospital in Ashland.
Some details remain uncertainA stabbing on a Shamokin street corner became a fatal case by the time two Mount Carmel newspapers reported it on June 1, 1910. The Item named the victim Henry Leichtleitner. The Daily News printed a different spelling of his surname and reported that the fifty-five-year-old man had died at Miners’ Hospital in Ashland.
The accounts identified Antonio Rizzi as the accused man. The Daily News reported that he was held in Sunbury jail and printed his explanation that the victim and companions had laughed at him. That was the prisoner’s reported account, not a finding of motive or guilt.
The Item’s headline attributed the attack to the Black Hand, although its body called Rizzi an alleged member and said the motive was unknown. Its heading and body also differed about the wound. The Daily News did not use the Black Hand label.
Read together, the reports describe one attack and its hospital outcome. They do not establish a criminal organization behind it, settle the disputed details of the injury, or supply the later charge and verdict.