Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1884-03-24
APAYMASTER'S A HARD LOT
AFTER YEARS OF WORRY HE
BECOMES MAD.

AFTER YEARS OF WORRY HE
BECOMES MAD.
Racking Experiences while Guarding
Government Funds-The Victim of
Two RObberies-Pitied but not Con-
sOled-The Thanklessness of the Office
as Described by an Army Officer.
Paymaster Broadhead's case, says a
! Washington letter to the Philadelphia
/ Record, is very sad one. About 10 years
ago he went down into the Southwest to
pay the troops at a small field camp. He
had $1,000 with him IN a little iron safe.
lie got to the camp at night. He took his
safe to the tent he was to share with a
brother officer that night. He was very
tired and slept heavily. even though a
storm ragged outside. In the morning he
found an impression on his mind that dur
ing moment of wakefuiness in the night
he had seen his companion bending over
the sale, candle in hand. He dismissed
II as dream and prepared to
pay the troops. When he opened
his safe it was empty. High
spirited, sensitive, the very soul of honor,
Broadhead was crushed by the discovery.
he thought the man who slept in his tent
had taken the money, but he could not
prove it, and so he had to assume the loss
himself He paid it all back in two years
out OF small salary. He worried all the
time about the matter, as he feared an
other loss. He travelled with every pOssi-
BILE precaution, and even then he trem-
Dled. Eight or nine years past, and he
was beginning to be himself again. One
day he had to pay out S25, 900 at Fort Sill.
lie sealed up the money in an iron safe at
Fort LeaYenworth, and turned it over to
the express company to be carried
to Wichita, the railway station nearest
Fort Sill. At Lawrence he had to change
cars. 1t was an hour before the train left
for Wichita. At Wichita Paymaster
Broadhead noticed that the wax seal over
the keyh0le of the safe had been disturb
ed. lie told the express agent before he
surrendered his receipt that the seal had
been removed and then replaced. The
express agent thought he was mistaken
thought the seal had been partially re-
moved by the rough handling which the
safe had received. Finally, Paymaster
BrOadhead surrendered his receipt, call
ing attention of witnesses to the cOndi-
tiOn OF the seal. Then he put the safe i'm
wagon and slowly iOlted more than 100
miles to Fort Sill. Arrived at the fort. he
opened his safe and found it filled with
brown paper. Every dollar of his money
had been taken. The shock was terrible
to man of his experience, then 60
years old. For timO be was pros
trated. Then he rallied and at once
returned to Wichita. OF course. he
found no trace of his money. He at once
sued the express company. After several
years of litigation of the most veXatiOus
character he won his suit in the highest
courts, and the express company paid the
money to the government. But Broad
heads success did not bring him peace.
He was too old. He had become mOrose.
nervous, suspiciOus-suspi spiciOus of him
self and of everybody else. A word. a
kindly word, from the Secretary of War
or the Paymaster General would have
sOothed and cOmfOrted him. But the iron
rules of .Otficialism forbade the expression
of the sympathy which they felt with the
unfortunate hymaster. And now his
brain has yielded to the incessant worry.
and he is on his way East to die in an
asylum. II refused a Paymastership in
the army" said an old army friend:
II would not carry the burden
involved for ten times the salary.
To start With, you have to give an
irOn-clad $4,000 bond. Your bOndsmen
are, of course, responsible for all vOur
accidents and mistakes. You are always
carrying large amounts of mOnev-any-
where from $1,000 to $500, ,OO0-under the
most dlsagreeable and hazardous circum-
stances on the most fatiguing journeys.
Most OF our post garrisOns are so small
that when Paymaster starts out on the
plains they can only spare him two, three.
or, at the most, four or five soldiers as an
escort. In order that the chances of rob
berry may be lessened he must travel with
the utmost secrecy. He must get out of
the little frontier towns without being
known, and must travel as RAPIDLY as
possible. He has two ambulances-
Tor himself and the money, and one for the
escort. OF course, he has to travel
In the beaten track and stop at
the usual watering places. There
are no others. remember
several years ago Paymaster Of nv ac-
qualntance stopped for the night by a
stream. A quarter of a mile farther up
was another camp fire. Thither two of
his four soldiers rode after supper. There
they sat down with some plainsmen to
cards. They drank, they quarreled. FL
nally one of the soldiers was shot dead.
The other was too quick for his enemies.
lie shot two of them before either could
pull his weapon out. Then he gaIlOped
back to the Paymaster's camp. The Pay
master hearing the shots, feared the
worst, and was prepared, with his little
force, to give his life for the $50, 900 he had
in his safe. But the plainsmen made no
pursuit. The Paymaster always believed
it was all part of scheme to
MS camp anu capture MS SaIe.
and that it was defeated only by the
prOmptness of the second soldier. no. |
never wanted to be a Paymaster Except
once" be added refectively. ''ThaU was
during the early days of the war, when
the Federal troops were occupying Ar
kansas. The General IN command sent
to New York and bought for a song or
two several million dollars i'll counterfeit
Confederate money. He had his Paymas-
ters and his Quartermasters and his Com
missaries instructed. They were to take
nothing from the people except for a con-
slderatlOn. They were to be offered first
Quartermasters' receipts; second, green
backs; third, the counterfeit Confederate
money. Nov, as a general rule, the peO-
pie knew nothing about Quartermasters'
receipts. They knew that the greenbacks |
would render them suspicious to the Con-
federacy, under which they expected to
live; but they were entirely willing to
take the Confederate money, which was
so much brighter and cleaner than anv
they had ever seen. They gave receints
for money received. They were perfectly
willing to give receipts for anything, be-
cause they got three or four prices for
their things-but it was all in counterfeit
Confederate money. / don't suppose that
the Federal Government was the gamer
Inv If