The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1891-02-25
ON DEATH WATCH Duty.
one Of the Reporters most I'm.
pleasant Assignments.
Correspondence Of the Press.

n0 up suo ARMY Oh news
paper readers of the United States real
a lew days ago of the serious illness
Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman. Sub
segment editions of the papers informed
them regularly of his condition, but1tn
not likely that one in a thousand even q
much as wondered how the reports o.
the dying soldiers last hours wereop
tanned.
AS soon as the serious illness OF tne
general was announced, the newspaper
reading nublic unconsciously expected TO
be supnlied with all the newson thesuD-
iect az matter of course. How was
This news srpphed2 Who gathered the
Information regarding the occurrences
in the gick chamber, the opinions of the
attending physicians from time to time
and al the other data for the newspaper
reports'
TO a person outside the newspaper
world these questions would most likely
prove hopeless riddles. To newspaper
man they suggest one of themost trying,
exhansting and thankless branches of
newspaper work-reporting the serious,
and probably fatal illness of apublic
character in whose.condition the world
at large is deeply interested. The re-
porter so engaged must be constantly on
the lookout for the death Of the person
whose illness he is covering" since his
position on the particular newspaper
staff to which he is attached would be
surely forfeited were the sick man on
woman to pass away, and he long re-
main in ignorance of that all important
fact. Probably this is why this branch
of newspaper reporting is knowni in tech
meal parlance as death watch" duty.
As a rule it is only in metropolitan
cities that newspaper "death watches
are set, but in exceptional cases, when
person of great prominence is lying III
in provincial city or country district,
reporters and correspondents for leading
Journals in that section of the country
are detailed to remain as near as posi-
BILE to the sick man until convalescence
or death ends their labors. 1t is now
Just about nine years since such a
"death watch" was set at Elberon, N.
j., the subject being no less parsonage
than the president Of the United States,
James A. Garfield. Every one remem-
bers the detailed reports and frequent
bulletins of the dying presidents condi-
ton, which were published in every pa
per in the land.
About four years later the newspa-
pers teemed with bulletins from the bed
side of man whose name was known
throughout the civilized world, Gen.
q. S. Grant.
In this case the ''death watch was
kept up for months instead of weeks,
and when the failing hero of the civil
war was borne to Mount McGregor,
thither followed the reporters who had
done duty in front of or near his New
York city residence. 1t is too long a
story to be told here, but an account of
the systematic watch which the score
and more of newspaper men kept up on
the house in which Gen. Grant was
slowly dying, and the incidents of that
watch, would be to the uninitiated rev.
elation. What these tireless, indefati.
gable and sympathetic newspaper men
saw and learned each day was spread
before the reading public of two CONT
nents. Often single paragraph repre-
sented the labor of an entire cold, cheer
less and seemingly endless night, and the
public little knew when it read the SIM
pie announcement, ssGen. Grant passed
a quiet night" that that sentence was a
summary of the news obtained by an all
night watch.
When the inevitable end came, and the
world read the sad words, "Gen. Grant
died this morning." did any one picture
the solitary newspaper man, who first
learned the news by private signal
from the house in which the dead hero
lay, dashing over the rough mountain
road to the telegraph Office, bearing in
formation which was an instant Later
flashed to every corner of the civilized
world, or the telegraph operator click
ing off the fateful sentence with fingers
like an aspen leaf? Dramatic
and stirring as was this situation, it was
but one of many which the reporters
who were ION the Grant death watch"
will remember to the last day of their
lives.
Since the illness Of Gen. Grant the
most notable death watches" set by the
New York papers have been those in the
cases of Miss Catharine Wolff, ex-Sena-
tor Roscoe Conkling, Jacob Sharp and
Congressman Samuel S. Cox, though
there have been number of less nota-
10 Tn, Of fhn
mentioned the watch was necessarily
maintained for several days or weeks,
and the work was thoroughly system
affixed. For weeks and weeks not day
or night went by that a dozen or SO
newspaper men did not mount the steps
of Miss VOLTS residence during her last
illness, carefully examine the tag at
tached to the door bell and marked,
Don't ring; no change" and silently
depart.
Roscoe Conldings illness was not quite
DO protracted, but for nearly three weeks
there was not an instant of the day or
night that the house in which the for
mer New York senator lay was not un-
der the eye of one or more reporters.
The men who represented the press asso-
ciationseerved twelve hour watches, the
different men from each association re
ieving each other twice a day. The day
"trick"-from 6 q. m. to sp.n.-was
not SO bad, for there was a lie in the
streets which broke the monotony; but
none save those who did that weary,
weary watch from p. m. to a. m,
when there was absolutely no diversion,
can appreciate what the duty meant.
The sentinel dare not sleep, for Mr..
Conkiing was towering between life and
heath, and the end might come at any
moment. All the reporter could do was
to.stroll back and forth in the deserted
street, or from the-window of the Office
of the Madison Square theatre, across
the way, which Mr.. A. M. Palmer had
kindly opened to the newspaper men,
6xedly stare at the dimly lighted win
dows of the sick mans chamber.
But all death watches are more or
less alike. They vary only in incidents
and surroundings. The death watch" is
an outgrowth of the advanced and sys-
tematized methods-of news gathering of
the present decade.
Nowadays the illness of prominent
person gets into print at once, and the
watch is set without delay. Perhaps the
attending physicians assist the reporter
by issuing bulletins at certain hours of
the day, or perhaps the reporters can
only obtain news from the doctors by
means of questioning. In any event, in
the case of very prominent sick per-
son, everybody who enters the house is
marked and his identity disrnssod &c he