The Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1877-1885, 1884-10-21
The CLAIMANT" FREE.
Arthur Orion, the Australian p,tchor
Liberated.
mort Account Of the Tvos, xpoS
"' vase on Record I'm British
courts-What Et Ali
Cost

oce. I.-The Tichbo,ne claim
u , was released from prison Monday. and
alenough his release was premature. a crowd
Oh ms friends were waiting at tic nrisop n
ieeelVe MN, rumor that the government
would discharge him from prison n dav n,
TWO previous to the 9th inst in order to ma.
vent any demonstration having kept them
VI" que LOOKOUT Tor the release of their friend
AL scotland Yard Police station, the claim
ahG received ticket-of leave, reduirinp him
10 report monthly by letter to the authorities
nc appeared to be in good health He viii
REMAIN quiet for the present, keeping his res
ldence secret.
Inc famous Tichborne trial ended in 1871
Inc proceedings which were preliminary to
this most wonderful case on record lastcd
tnree years, and the active eiectment case Inv
'ne claimant, who has just been released,
nis'eo SIX months, Then he was put upon
MS own trial for perjury, and after six
, mo In which there were actually
ioS days sittings the jury, after be-
ing out, found him guilty of periurv
Inc solicitor general occupied thirty-one DAYS
IN opening the case, the counsel for the de-
Tense forty-seven days in summing up. and
the Judge eighteen days in giving the chorre,
Inc judges charge alone occupied $50 solid
columns in The London Times, Half mil
ION dollars were contributed by the English
people III the shape of bonds to enable tho
Claimant to prosecute the case, and accord
ing to the spectator, the case cost all no,.tias
Sl,H5OO0e. $3.50 f''' ''N''
roger Charles Tichborne was born in 1929
and was heir TO a baronetcy and an immense
English estate, yielding an income of
$4,000 year. The mother and father
were ill-aSsorted The boy passed throu,h
the hands of priests and tutors at Paris. and
entered the army. Finally he determined
70 travel. After visiting the South Amcri-
can ports no disappeared, and is supposed to
have been lost at sea in 1854. He was
slender, and because of his half English half
French education had many marked pecu-
haritles. His disappearance placed his
proud, willful and haf crazy mother in n
peculiar attitude as to the estate The prop
erty bid fair 60 pass into the hands of a de
testod daughter-in-law She would not l,c-
lieTo in her sons death, and SO al
Vertlsed in the Australian paIers f.,
information regarding the missing hc.r
to the vast Tlchborne estate There soon
appeared q customer. Arthur Orton, al
Australian adventurer, II butcher and stnci,
driver, who had sailed the Atlantic and Pa
clfc, and who had visited places where.
Roger Tichborn, had been, an adept at
duplicity, presented himself He az
nounced himself SIS the genuine Sir Roger
Tichbornc, tie sole survivor OF the los;
bella, who had been rescued and picked
up by another Australian vessel wllns,
identity he professed never to know.
He was fat, clumsy, ignorant, low-5rod lie
did not understand a word of French, cOGIa
not write a note without twenty VULGAR
blunders, and for twelve months after an
nouncing himself, was ludicrously in the
dark concerning matters pertaining to the
TichbOrne family. 1t is said that at first he
was hardly serious about his pretensions but
was soon surrounded by plenty who were Sc
rious-attorneys, money-lenders and
dupes, who encouraged him in the enter
prise. In 1857 the claimant landed in Eng
land and was at once recognized by his
overjoyed mother, Lady Tichborne. The
woman, infatuated and half insane, at once
handed over to her supposed son every
Journal, letter, scrap, token Of every kind
that she could, to aid him in his identified.
ton. The claimant had also clever and
INSCRIPTIONS accemplices Of the case The
Spectator said: "The credulity which has
been disclosed throughout the case is posi-
lively frightful Evidence Of the most IN
answerable character left the believer.
absolutely unmoved."
"It.would appear" said The Saturday Re
view, "that there are epidemics if not Of in
sanity at least of folly and mreasonablenesG
which comssto pretty much the same thin2.
It is possible only on some such theory to &c
count for the deplorable exhibition of human
Stiffness as has been afforded in the Tichborn,
case
Half the people in England, high and low
educated and unlettered, believed in the clai
mant.