Holmes County Republican. [volume] (Millersburg, Holmes County, Ohio) 1856-1865, 1858-04-22
From the Milwaukee Daily Wisconsin.
Sad History of a Young Female.

Sad History Of a Young Female.
We have some painful facts to narrate
about woman who was recently found in
this city, in most wretched and degraded
condition. A simple sketch of her antece-
dents will show how rapid is ones going
downward, after the first step is taken, and
how mercilessly retribution follows after
wrong doing and crime.
The woman in question was, few years
since, a young lady in the Seminary Of
Prof. Crittenden, in Brooklyn, N. Y
She was then a protege of Henry Ward
Beecher, lived with his family, and was
being educated by him. Of course she
was placed under the most favorable cir
cumstances, and had her every want that
was reasonable, gratifed. She was sur
rounded by the very best of associations,
and had been adopted by Mr.. Beecher, be-
cause of her natural brightness of disposi-
ton and intellect. In the school, though
she was regarded as an eccentric and way
ward being, yet she was admired BY her
companions for her superior quality of mind.
No young lady in Prot. Crittenden's
school, Tone of the East could write so
brilliant and beautiful a composition as she,
and all had to yield to her intellectual SUI
periority. We have this from one who
was schoolmate of hers, that all her COM
positions were gems Of thought and Ian
gusge, and she promised to become prom
inent as female writer. Now comes the
circumstance that poisoned her happy
heart. 1t is the old story of love. She
became passionate admirer of one who
reciprocated her affections, but who was
forbidden to tender his hand in marriage.
He was already married to another. This
first disappointment occasioned violent
brain fever, which completely prostrated
her and in the course of her recovery she
was advised to resort to stimulants by
which she acquired taste for what has
since plunged her into the depths of degra-
dation.
Afterwards she went to Boston, and be-
came teacher in house of Refuge. 1t
was an advantageous station for lady of
education and character, and she is said to
have filled it at first, with great promise of
usefulness. Soon, however, she yielded to
the appetite which she had planted within
herself, when recovering from her previous
illness, and she was picked up in the streets
of Boston, one night in state of intoxica-
ton. Facils descensus Averni. Efforts
were made to efectually redeem her, but it
is almost impossible to reclaim woman
once disgraced. She soon married, and as
we have been informed, against the wishes
of those who had been her former friends
and protectors. From this time she sinks
rapidly, and whether by means of an
avenging Deity, or from the natural laws
of cause and effect, others may decide for
themselves.
Three or four years elapse, and she came
with her husband to Chicago, last year.
He found employment there, but in the
great fire of last fall his situation was lost
to him. Pretty much all winter long he
remained distitute of work, pawning away
his household goods and clothing mean
while, and when spring came they d ter
mined to come to Milwaukee. They had
one child, and on their way here that was
taken away from them, at Kenosha. Their
poverty had now become lamentable, in
deed, but undoubtedly their situation might
have been much better, but for the accur-
sed article of rum. to which they had both
now become addicted. Having buried
their child at Kenosha, they came on here
and hired miserable room in the third
Ward of this city. A few days passed,
and the wretched woman whose career we
have been sketching, was forced TO 90 out
and beg from door 10 door. In the course
of her alms-seeking she CHANGED upon one
who had been her schoolmate in Brooklyn,
and upon another who had known her in
Boston. Fearing the worst, but still igno-
rant of what wretched creature she had
become they went to her room, where her
husband and herself were almost freezing
and starving. She confessed to them that
she had had nothing to eat for three long
days and on their rickety old bed there was
but single sheet to protect them from the
cold. There was but single chair with
three legs to it, and scarcely any other ar
ticle of furniture numbered up the room.
These friends at once began to exert
themselves in her behalf, got others inter
ested to aid her and her husband, gave
them clothes and food, promised them both
a plenty Of work, and it seemed now her
destiny was taking favorable turn. The
woman wept over her poverty, manifested
touching tokens of a termination, but here
too, the fire was only being smothered a
few days, to break out again the first IA
vorable opportunity. The money that was
given her to buy food and clothing with,
was spent in the rum hole. aid when she
was next visited, she was found all demen-
ted by intoxication. From that time she
turned her back upon all friendly offers of
assistance, abandoned her first quarters,
was afterwards found by the authorities in
low houses of prostitution, and has now
again probably left the city, in company
with her husband. She has almost reached
the lowest round of misery, and this once
gifted young lady, an adopted child of Hen
ry Ward Beecher, will soon find that peace
in death, which she has been unable to find
in the cup and in the corruption of licen-
tiousness.
JOHN VAN BUREN-THE STRAY Dou-