Memphis daily appeal. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1847-1886, 1884-02-03
A REMARKABLE MAN.
Sudden Death Yesterday Afternoon of
Edward Niederer.
Sketch of His Cheekered Career in the
Confederate Service.

Edward Neiderer, one OF the most re-
markable men in this part of the country,
died yesterday afternoon OF an ehusion of
water ON the brain. He was suddenly
and violently stricken down about 10
o'clock the night previous and never raj
lied. Edward Niederer was a native of
Switzerland and came to America from
that country with his parents when a
child. He began life with relative who
did a wholesale merchandise business
in New Orleans, but first became promi-
nent from the fact that he went out as
captain under Walker in the celebrated
Nicaragua expedition, of which he was
one of the few survivors, and one of the
most gallant members. He afterward ac-
cumulated considerable money in the
steamboat business. When the civil war
broke out he joined the army in
Virginia, and was detailed to the commits
sary department, by which he was at once
sent to Arkansas to procure cattle. He
was very successful in his performance of
this duty, displaying the greatest skill in
the means he employed to get the beef
through to the army. Hundreds of thou
sands of cattle were handled by him.
About the beginning of the year 1868 he
was dispatched to Europe on secret mis-
sion by the Confederacy, passing through
Canada on his way thither. The precise
nature OF his trip is unknown, but it is be-
lieved to have been satisfactory in every
respect to the Southern Cabinet. Upon
his return from Europe he was made cap
6in OF the secret service, and performed
q sseat deal OF valuable service in that Ca
tJaaty. About six months prior to the
surrender he came to Memphis, which he
made his headquarters, his purpose being
to procure medicine and cotton for the
Confederate forces. He opened a saloon
as a blind, and when the war was over
continued in that business, in which he
has ever since been engaged. He was sin
gularly taciturn and very hard to approach.
He had hundreds of acquaintances, but
few, if any, of them ever developed into
friendships. With all his shrewdness and
his sound business sense, he invariably
impressed strangers rs a weak or simple
minded man, and there are perhaps not
three men in Memphis, where he has
lived for twenty years, to whom the fore
going sketch will not be entirely new mat
ter. He is said to have been a remarkably
successful poker-player in the days when
all men played that fascinating game, and
one incident is recalled when a party OF
eight men in this city sat down with him,
intending, as the phrase goes, to bluff
him out. They had struck the wrong
man. His countenance remained abso-
lutely immovable, and not "a muscle
twitched as he "raised it" to $4,000 and
raked in the pile. He was successful in
other ways, having drawn, it is said, one
lottery prize of $4,000, and an
other of $4,000. He is believed
to have had a paid-up policy of 100000 on
his life in the Atlantic Mutual. His resi-
dence was over his saloon, on Madison
street, between Second and Main, where
LII Ill = Il.
apartments, occupied by himselsf and
wife alone. He has relatives OF some
prominence in Wisconsin, Illinois and
New Orleans.