Knoxville journal. [volume] (Knoxville, Iowa) 1874-1986, 1875-03-25
Who Is Bessie Turner2

The Lee correspondent of the Spring
field (Mass.) Republican,, after investi-
eating the story that Bessie Turner's
real name is McDermott, and that her
father is now living in the Berkshire
town, writes that, while the evidence is
not conclusive, everything that has thus
far come TO light confirms the story that
Barney McDermott is the girls father.
Barney is an Irishman, about sixty years
old, OF moderate intellectual power, but
apparently truthful in his statements.
He saws that the death of his first wife,
which occurred at Brooklyn, some TWEEN
ty.two years since, left him with three
children, James, William and Mary Ann,
aged respectively eight, six and four.
Being poor and having no housekeeper,
he put them into the Brooklyn Half
Orphan Asylum. Not long after he re-
moved to Lee to work in the Hubner
quarry, and in year or two married
again. The second Mrs McDermott was
willing to take the step-children into her
family, but On going to Brooklyn for
them he found that they had all been put
out into different families and he could
not ascertain their ocalities-probably
did not prosecute his ideas very intelli.
gently or perseveringly. Some ten years
since his son William, who has been
well brought up in Orange County,
N. Y, incidentally hearing that there
were some McDermotts in Berk-
shire County, came there in quest
of his father, and while Visiting
at Bridgeport, Conn, for change of cars
asked milkman If there were any
McDermotts in that city. The man re-
piled: Il have James McDermott in
my employ. 81 have brother by that
NAME" said William, "whom have not
seen for years. Where can find Jamess"
81 will have him here in ten minutes"
said the milkman. Of course the two
brothers did not recognize each other,
but their stories were convincing proof
of their relationship. Both had served
in the army during the war. William
came on TO Lee and became satisfied
that he had found his long-lost father,
but the one being Protestant and the
other Catholic, and having been sep
arated SO long and educated with such
different tastes, there was not the SYM
patty between father and son that might
have been expected from the relation.
ship. Both brothers, however, moved to
Lee and William bought house on Main
street, and, being bachelor, let it to his
brother James, who was a man of fam
lily. The brothers subsequently removed
to New Jersey, William to Bricksburg
and James to East Long Branch, where
the latter now lives and keeps
up correspondence with his half
sister in Lee, Sarah McDermott, a
miss of nineteen, the only child
of the second marriage, who has received
a respectable education in the common
schools and is the main-stay of her pre-
maturely infirm parents. Barney says
the age and description of Bessie Turner
correspond with his remembrance of his
lost daughter, and although Tilton testi-
fed that the name of the waif whom he
brought into his family some fifteen
years since was Lizzie McDermott he
feels very hopeful that Triton was mis-
taken, and that her real name was Mary
Ann. Further inquiries are now being
prosecuted If Bessie Turner is really
Mary McDermott she need not be
ashamed of her brothers nor of her half
sister, although the latter lives in mis-
cradle old shanty, with few of the COM
forts of life around her. She is a bright
girl and a most dutiful child, devotlng
the four dollars which she earns per
week in paper-mill wholly to the COM
fort of her feeble father and half-blind
mother She walks over two miles day
to earn this money and seems to take
great pleasure in her self-sacrifice and
independence Her father works, sum
mers, in the quarry, but in the winter is
not able to stand the rough weather and
rough work, though he contributes his
mite by Going light jobs for the support
of the family.