Two hospital residents left to their own devices met their death

In the written public law of Rhode Island, in the “Act for the Restraint and Care of the Insane,” persons hospitalized for mental illness are referred to as “lunatics” and “insane persons.” Held in institutions ostensibly for their own safety and the safety of others, some prisoners were simply allowed to leave for a few days or weeks at a time when they pleased.

Inmates at the Rhode Island State Hospital for Mental Diseases in Cranston were allowed to leave the hospital grounds temporarily to visit area attractions, take day trips, or stay longer at the homes of family members. These trips were permitted with a parole card issued by the hospital.

Twenty-three-year-old Lester Howard Matteson, the son of William and Elizabeth (Vaughn) Matteson, a former Navy sailor, was admitted to the State Hospital for Mental Disease in February 1932. William Matteson was a fireman who lived with his wife and five children at 1411 Main St. in West Warwick—a home Lester often left to enjoy long stays during the seven months he spent as an inmate at the mental hospital.

Nineteen-year-old Roy Soucie, the son of Edmund and Annie (Pelletier) Soucie and a former day laborer, was admitted to the hospital from his home at 2 Pontiac Ave. in Natick in 1930. He often returned home to spend much of his time away from the hospital. On the afternoon of September 5, 1932, Soucie and Matteson were given permission to leave the hospital grounds to visit Roger Williams Park in Providence. The men set off on their adventure—and never returned to the facility.

The next day at about 5 p.m., Mary Lombardi, 17, daughter of Vincenzo and Felicia Lombardi of Wakefield Avenue in Natick, took her two younger brothers and a young neighbor, Benjamin Straight, to a swimming hole in the woods along Palmer’s Brook near the Cranston-West Warwick border. There, Mary saw a man lying on the bank of the river as if asleep and another floating lifeless in about 4 feet of water. Mary left the area and police were notified.

Matteson’s head was resting on two rolled-up sweaters. Soucie’s body was pulled from the creek. Both men were fully clothed except for the sweaters, which were wrapped around Matteson’s head. In their pockets, police found parole cards for Roger Williams Park, which was about eight miles away. The medical examiner determined that Soucie drowned and that Matteson had gotten out of the water and walked up a hill, where he died of exhaustion.

Soucie was buried in Saint Joseph’s Cemetery in West Warwick. Matteson was buried in Saint Mary’s Cemetery in West Warwick. It was not possible to determine what caused the two men to enter the creek fully clothed, although they may have done so accidentally in the dark. It was estimated that their lives ended early that morning or the previous evening. They may have been trying to make their way through the darkness back to the State Hospital for the Insane, where someone made the fatal mistake of allowing them to leave the grounds unsupervised.

Kelly Sullivan is a Rhode Island-based columnist, lecturer, and author.