Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1877-08-28
A Matrimonial Romance.

A Matrimonial Romance.
AN ELOPEMENT AND TEN YEARS OF
SUFFERINGEA CHECKERED CAREEF
"A REPENTANT WIFE REMARKED TC
THE husband SHE DESERTED.
An Elmira IN. W correspondent ol
the New York San furnishes the follow.
ing particulars of strange story, the
truth of which is affirmed by the parties
interested:
about ten years ago the wife of Amzi
5. Timer, prosperous miller, in small
village in Southern Pennsylvania, near
the Maryland State line, eloped with a
young man named George Mills, a Vir-
ginian by birth, q clerk in the store OF
Ori Gates, the father of Mrs. Timer. The
match between Miss Gates and Timer
was made by the father against his
daughters wishes. She desired to mar
ry young Mills. She had been married
less than month when the elopement
took place. The runaways were fol.
lowed by the husband as far as Wheel
ing, West Virginia. There all trace of
them was lost, and nothing was heard
of them afterward In 1870, Gates, the
father of the runaway wife, died. He
made will leaving his property, valued
at 500 900, to Timer, the daughter having
been his only child. There was in the
will provision that if any news should
be heard of the daughter within two
years after her fathers death, and she
was in want, she was to receive the in
terest on $4,000 for one year at per
cent, to be paid in instalments of $40 a
week. If at the end of year after her
being found she had not voluntarily re-
turned home and begged her husbands
forgiveness, no further claims of hers on
the estate was to be allowed. In the
event of her being with Mills, if found
within the two years, she could have no
claim against the estate. If she returned
repentant within a year, the executors
of the will were to provide her a suitable
home and allow her $40 week as long
as she lived The executors were Amzi
S. Timer and Myron Pool, q cousin of the
testator.
Timer made every effort to find some
ing procured divorce from her in 1872
and married again. His second wife
died in 1875, leaving him two children
On the 23rd of July last letter addressed
to Mr.. Gates, and postmarked Litchfield,
Mimi, was handed Mr.. Pool as one of
the executors of the estate of the de-
ceased. 1t proved to be from the runa-
way wife and daughter. It breathed a
spirit of repentance, and declared that
the writer was anxious, after ten years of
suffering, to ask forgiveness of those she
had wronged, and be permitted to come
home, if only to be servant. Pool went
with the letter to Timer. The latter re-
solved to go at once to Litchfield. He
was accompanied by Mr.. Pool. On
Wednesday last Timer and the wife who
had deserted him ten years ago, and
whom he had found working as seam
stress in a Litchfield family, arrived in
Elmira where he has relatives. The story
of his wife's life since she left him satis-
fled him that, while she had compro-
missed both his and her honor, she was
more sinned against than SHINING, and
they were remarked in st. Paul on the
4th inst. The runaway wife's story is
substantially as follows:
She accompanied George Mills only as
far as Wheeling. There he left her to
go to st. Louis. She then went to In
diana. She refused to become the COM
panion of Mills until she could legally
become his wife. He had $500. He
gave her 5000. She went to Lafayette,
Ind, where she obtained a divorce
through the agency of divorce lawyer
Bowditch, being in the place but few
months. Mills, meantime, had gone to
the plains, and brought up in Central
City, Col. She Joined him there, and
they were married. Mills made consid-
erable money by supplying miners with
stores, and they lived contentedly to-
gether for year. Then Mills fell into
the habit of gambling; he squandered
all his gains, and his business passed
into into other hands. They then went to
Utah. Mills got a position as mining
steady in his habits. The life of clerk
was not stirring enough for him, how
ever, and he finally resigned the posi-
tion and went to Salt Lake City. There,
in company with miner named Olney,
he opened faro bank. He began drink
ing, and abused his wife. To cap the
climax of her misery Mills Joined the
MOrmons, and added two more wives to
his family. This indignity the unfortu-
nate woman, who had left her home and
friends for Mills, could not brook, and
one night, in 1871, she ran away from
his house, and after month of hardship
reached Denver. She was q year and a
half in that place, working in hotel
While there she read the account of the
killing of George Mills in Salt Lake
City by his partner, Bill Olney, while
quarreling in their gambling saloon.
In 1873 she engaged as waiting maid
to an English lady who was travelling
with a party in the Rocky Mountains.
She visited New Mexico, the Spanish
Peak and all the principal points of in
terest thereabouts, with the party, re-
turning to Denver in 1874. There she
left the party and started East. She was
prostrated with fever in st. Louis, and
all of her money was used up before she
was able to leave. She was then en-
gagged as travelling companion to Mrs.
Van Alta, of New Jersey, who, with
her husband, was going to Minnesota
for her health. They travelled through
that State until September, 1876, when
Mrs. Van Alta died in the vicinity of
Itaska Lake. Having some money she
determined to return to her old home
On the way from the lakes to the rail-
road, some so miles, she was robbed by
her guide, half-breed Indian. She
walked 80 miles to Brainerd, on the
Mississippi, and had been working as a
seamstress in different towns there
abouts ever since Her health failing,
she feared she would die in q strange
land before she had told her story to her
father and received his fergivness, and
she wrote the letter that resulted in so
unexpected a sequel to her ten years.
bitter experience.
Mr.. and Mrs. Timer have returned to
their old home, apparently as happy as
if there had never been shadow in
their lives"
An American man after dining at a
London restaurant, paid his bill and was
about leaving, when the waiter (want-
ing compensatory suggested that the
amount did not include the WAITER
"Ah!" said the man, "but 1 didn't eat