The Cheyenne daily leader. [volume] (Cheyenne, Wyo.) 1870-1884, 1877-03-02

checkered Career Of a Citizehess Of Chey
enne.

woman, "Aunty" Barrett, who, no
matter what the weather may be, daily
perambulates our streets with her bas-
ket, soliciting custom. Her history, as
detailed by an old acquaintance to Il
Laramie Sentinel man, runs as follows /:
Mrs. Amelia NJ. Barrett's maiden name
was Russell. She was born in Raleigh,
North Carolina, in 1909, and is, there
fore, about siyty-eight years old. Her
parents moved in what may be termed
the upper walks of life, her father being
a lawyer of prominence, who at one
time was a member of the Supreme
when Amelia was about nineteen years
of age, she removed with her parents to
Wheeling, Virginia, where her fathers
fine legal attachments at once placed
the family in social communion with
the F. F. VS. of the Old Dominion
Virginia, 1.-THE Mother of Presidents"
Previous to Amelia's removal to the
State, however, the best educational
advantages had been bestowed upon
her which the "Old Tar-Heel State
at that early day furnished. In the
reigning society of Wheeling she was a
belle-the acknowledged peer of any
lady in that city. She had many adj
mirers, but as time wore away, there
were none against whose persuasive
appeals she vas powerless to turn a
deaf ear. When to all appearances,
she was wooed and won, it was her pro-
vince to be to them like an ignis tatmns
"a will o. the wisp. Her blithesome
and gay disposition led her to act from
her heart what her lips dared not
speak.
While thus living a round of social
enjoyment her father met with finan-
cial embarrassments, which wrecked
his princely fortune and his grief hur-
ried him to IN untime'y grave, soon to
be followed by the broken-hearted wife
of his bosom. The pledges of their
married life were scattered Amelia
remained in Wheeling and obtained
employment as a governess. In 1881
the acquaintance of a Wheeling banker,
Harold B. Barrett, who knew her in
her better days, resulted in their mar
riage. She was then twenty-five years
of age. Barrett vas soon after elected
to the Virginia State Senate, from
which he merged into Congress, serv-
ing during the latter two years of the
second term of Jackson's administra-
ton. Local complications at Wheel
ing conspired against him and he was
defeated for denomination to a seat in
Congress. His influence with the Sec
rotary of State, resulted soon after in
his appointment as Il Minister to Peru,
where, after representing the United
States Government less than a year, he
sickened and died from a malariousdis-
ease prevalent in that country.
The wife of his bosom, the Aunty"
Barrett, now in Cheyenne, was living
in Baltimore with a widowed sister at
the time of his death. Little by little
her means of support faded away as
the mist of the morning. She lived in
penury and wandered from one place to
another-tossed like a football upon
the worlds great highway-taking in
sewing at times, peddling at others,
until time and the tide in human affairs
which waits for neither man nor
woman, cast her lot in Cheyenne, arriv-
ing there eight years ago last June.
Since that time she has constantly been
engaged in peddling apples on the
streets, in the saloons, hotels, stores,
and, in fact, wherever she conceived
there existed an opportunity to effect. "a
sale. She is now getting old and feeble,
being in the sixty-eigth year Of her age.
Rarely ever communicative, except
upon business pertaining to her calling,
she has an eye to the "main chance
and locks in her WI bosom the events
which at times undoubtedly are i'm
printed upon the tablet of her memory.
Some call her a miser--and perhaps not
unjustly as she is known to have be-
tween seven and eight thousand dollars
deposited in Stebbins, Post & Co.'S