Death of a Hero

Little Jose Felix Estigarribia was bom of a family that had been rich and powerful in Asuncion for generations. As a boy he wanted to be an agricultural expert, but finally decided on the Army. So brilliant was his work at the Asuncion Military Academy that he won a scholarship in the Chilean Army, later went to Europe where he boned up on French tactics at the Ecole Superieure de Guerre. Soon after his return to Paraguay, war broke out with Bolivia. For three years he kept winning promotions in the Chaco jungles, rose to General and Commander in Chief by handing the superior, German-trained Bolivian Army a thorough pasting. When an armistice commission of tne U. S., Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Uruguay and Peru broke the deadlock in 1935, Jose Felix Estigarribia won for Paraguay, on paper, more territory than it had ever held before.

His role of conquering hero lasted only until a mild revolution sent him hustling into exile. Next year another revolt brought him back, sent him to Washington as Minister from Paraguay. Last year he stepped into his nation's top office, six months after his inauguration proclaimed himself Dictator. This summer he resumed the democratic mantle, swore allegiance to a new constitution he had drawn up.

One day last week, at the peak of his career, handsome, laconic, 52-year-old Jose Felix Estigarribia, soldier, diplomat, statesman, boarded a plane with his wife in Asuncion for a holiday at his country home on Lake Ypacaray. Somewhere between Altos and San Bernardino, 65 miles east of the capital, the pilot ran into fog and crashed.

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