The daily gazette., 1878-07-03
From the n. Y. Herald.
ELIZA PINKSTON AND AGNES
JENkS.

lllkStOll, Will ilOI take III anlSS tllat we
couple her name above with that of Mrs. |
Agnes jerks. The simultaneous re-
appearance of these two notable
characters must be an excuse, and we
will at once do Mrs. Pritchard formerly
Mrs. Pinkston, the justice to declare
our belief that on the whole she is
far the most reputable of the two wo-
men.
While Mrs. jerks was amusing herself
at the expense of the Potter committee
and innocently giving the public an in
sight into the various and curious system
Of rascality which passed current in Lou
isiana as Republican politics, Herald
reporter was engaged in conversation
with the famous Eliza Pinkston. The
tragic appearance of the poor woman be-
fore the Returning Board and tn, visiting
in 1876, has hardly been for
gotten by anybody. Weak, scarcely able
to speak, stretched upon a sofa, she was
suddenly but tenderly brought into the
room where Wells and Anderson were
to count the vote of Louisiana
anu DtlllS ollt gave Ill low
tones and apparently with extreme suf-
tering from her numerous wounds, an ac-
count of brutal and cold blooded act of
and outrage of which she
aud her husband had been the victims at
the hands of democratic bull-doZers in
Ouachiia parish The manner of her in
PRODUCTION, her appearance of suffering
and exhaustion, and the story she told,
produced as was not unnatural, deep
effect upon the whole country. Demo-
Gratis as well as republicans declared that
this kind of thing would not do. For the
moment nobody doubted the truth of her
tale for was she not there hers9lf, wound
ed, Scared, suffering to tell it? When
the Returning Board made that awkward
dicovery of the insertion to aparish return
of a protest dated ten days after the re-
turn was mailed, the ready-witted Mr..
Stoughton came promptly to the rescue
with the immortal remark that "llere is
evidentlya clerical error" but when Eliza
Pinkston testified from her sofa no demo-
cratic Stoughton was there to throw
doubt upon her story. Very soon it was
pronounced on positive evidence to be
false; but it was then too late; Eliza had
and was supposed to have
died of her injuries, and her tale remain
ed as a convenient campaign document.
But il seems that, far from dying, she
recovered, married again, removed to
and now relates, ION oath, the
true story of hlr appearance before the
Returning Board, The sworn state
ments of Eliza, her present husband
and several ether persons, are priGted
elsewhere, and will be read with Inter
est, Eliza relates that she received five
hundred dollars for her appearance and
testimony that she was careful ly in
srructed what TO say before the visiting
statesmen that though entirely able 10
walk she va. laid Oh sofa when sue
was about to enter the chamber Of the
Beard that her testimony
was false ; that her husband was muir
dered and she was assaulted, not by
democrats as she testified ther, but, as
she has always believed, by u colore3
man who had threatened 10 Rill her
husband, ard that the quarrel had notE-
ing to do with politics.
This is her present story, freely COM
municated to IA HERALD correspondent
who had the natural curicusity TO hunt
her up and question her about all event
which the adroitness of the Louisiana
republicans has made almost historical.
IL Will he noticed that her present hus>
band, Pritchard, testifies that it is the
version which he has always heard from
her. 1t is C, n6rmed fl rvher by the fact
tn At though kt llosg remained Govern or
of Louisiana until The st Of the January
Eliza's dramatic appearance
and through he had hot only his own
police to send all over The
stale, and his own cours, but also the
help of United st ,tes troops, no attempt
was ever made 10 bring 10 justice the
persons who We're supposed to be The
authors of shocking outrage. Eliza
Pinkston dropped out Of sight as soon as
Mr.. Kelloeg's friends were done with
her.
But We do not wish to give undue inn
portance to this poor woman's latest
sIatemeI t. True or false, accurate or
Inaccurate, 1t is useful chiefly to show
oil CO more the kind OF means used by
handful of conspiratOrs against good
government in Louisiana to keep that
great and rich state in their own con-
troll. Eliza Pinksi on, Anderson, jerks
and Mrs. jerks, Darra |, Pitkln, such
We're the cho> en- instruments OF Kellogg,
Wells and whether their first Or their
late tale is false, whether anything they
say can be believed, their testimony in
any case puts the fatal stigma Of low
and vulgar roguery upon the republican
m nagers in Louisiana. III 9 result a.
tanned by the Potter committee may
disappoint politicians, but they are OF
real importance 10 the country, because
they show the base character OF the men
who in the name ofthe repuL lican party,
manipulated the politics Of one of the
gres test and richest States of the Union,
as gamblers load dice and stock cards.
Anderson, Agnes jerks, Eliza Pink
ston, Dennis, Stearns, McLin, Madison
Wells-these are the kind of people
about whom republican stump orators
preached to the country in 1876; these
were the hopes and martyrs, the uphold
ers of equal rights, the faithful and suf-
ferinp Unionists, the gentlemen as in
teliipent and as honest as l am" as Mr..
Sherman feelingly described the mem
h, r. of the Returning Board in his place
in the Senate. Wherever the Potter
Committee has touched the politics of
louisiana or Florida it has turned up
perjury or brazen mendacity. So far as
h - -, m; ttaa has gone il has not heard