The Worthington advance. [volume] (Worthington, Minn.) 1874-1908, 1881-12-29
STORY OF THE CIVIL WAR.

Mother and Som United After Mourning
Each Other for Dead.
Cleveland Letter.
A few days since there arrived in this city
from Texas, the hero of one Of those un-
written histories Of the war, and in q. little
house in our very midst was enacted tho
closing scene OF the drama, which is a
forcible illustration that truth is strange
than faction" The story is in substance as
follows:
Some years before the war wealthy
southern gentleman passed the summer
months in a little town in northern Ohio.
He boarded with the clergyman, and q
warm love grew out of the acquaintance
Of the young Tenneseean and the clergy
mans daughter, then fifteen years old. 1t
ended in his returning the next year {,
claim her for his bride, anA bear her to his
home in the sunny south; which proved,
indeed sunny south to the happy couple
until the angry mutterings Of the war we're
heard, and, like maby others, their little
circle enlarged now by two precious chill
dren) was broken, and the happy family
separated.
In the midst of the excitement. the day
after the secession OF South Carolina, the
leave the south, because of her staunch
pies, and in obedience to the behest Of tina
tyrannical power, which aimed with such
determination at the nations lifo, she
turned away from tho sacred spot where
were centered all her dreams Of love and
joy, and with her baby started for Ohio.
expecting her husband to follow with her
little four-year old son, by the next boat;
but the next boat came not. The blockade
was ordered, cutting off connections as
we'll as travel, and in vain did she wait, for
tidings from her lost ones.
Days of weary watching followed each
other for nearly two years, and when the
oft-toll tale Of his death IN a southern hos
pital reached her ooliterahng the bad ray
of hope, the agony of despair settled upon
her. As soon, however, rs the condition
of the country would admit of travel she
returned to her home for the child, only to
tnd that the relatives had gone to the far
west before his fathers death, leaving him
with old friends, of whom she could hear
nothing. All efforts to find them, or to
regain even a pittance of tho fortune her
husband had left in trust for her, failed.
Her handsome wardrobe and Jewels we're
sacrificed to secure the services Of lawyers
and detectives. who received her money
emily to add one more to her long list Of
disappo:ntments. Death tore her baby
from her, aud heartbroken and despairing,
with no more means to carry on the search,
she gave up and ,uourned as dead her dear
first-born. 1t is impossible to describe
her suffering in those years Of mourning.
Only those who 'hAvo drained the bitter
dregs can understand the misery Of the
sleepless nights, and the cad, empty days
of this poor, lonely mourner.
After many years she returned to her
home and mother, in Ohio. One day, not
long ago she received strangely familiar
letter, bearing for distant portraark, and
from it child taught in the long ngo his
mother was dead: turned into the world to
care for himself, when he should have been
tenderly nurtured and educated, while a
cruel and treacherous guardian lived in lux
ury upon his inheritance; and how through
all these years his heart had yearned With
he had wandered from place to place in
search OF her; though ignorant OF her
whereabouts, until hope deferred had made
his heart sick, and he, too. had given up in
despair; how his young wife had found in
the lining Of on old trunk, letter which
she thought gave new address, and,
anxious to satisfy the constant, longing de-
sire Of his life, made this one more effort
to accomplish it. # it were impossible tc
tell her JOY, or tho Impotence with which
she had waited till time and circumstances
through the medium Of a scrap Of yellow
time worn paper, should bring to her EN-.
brace her long lost son.