The Kootenai herald. [volume] (Kootenai, Idaho) 1891-1904, 1892-05-13


him during that long, exciting and acri
monious campaign, before the end of which
The Tribune's great founder WAS practi-
cially lunatic A short time afterward he
died, rs DR. Brown had predicted he would.
In the meantime some one had caused an
article making serious charges against The
management Of Bloomingdale TO be pub
llished. 1t was alleged to have been writ
ten by IA man who, while perfectly sane,
had been admitted as a patient to the asy
.lum Brown is said to have believed that
this article was inspired by the Greeley
coterie and the apparent ingratitude of
this-from his point-together with
the physical exertion and mental anxiety
consequent upon his close and unhagging
attention TO Greeley during the campaign.
first caused the bright lamp OF his intellect
to flicker The attendants at the asylum.
by whom he was greatly beloved first sus-
pected his alteration because of his in
creased studiousness. This circumstance
of itself goes far TO disprove the theory
pronounced absurd by the best alienists
of New York city, that the superintendent
had become crazy through sympathy with
his patients.
When DR.. Brown resigned his position
at Bloomingdale he was carried abroad in
the hope that change of scene might cause
the restoration of his mental faculties.
He however got worse, and it was found
necessary to put him in an Edinburgh asy-
lum. Reports received in America were
to the effect that he was very violent, and
after some time letter brought the an
nouncement of his death. The purpose of
this falsehood never has been thoroughly
explained, but long afterward New York
paper published a story from special cor
respondent at town in Illinois, in which
it was related that DR.. Brown had been
living quietly in the vicinity with his fam
lily for several years engaged in the occu-
patton of farming. He seemed happy and
contented, was perfectly sane, inquired af
ter his old friends in New York, but We
hemently asserted that he would never set
his foot upon the soil of the metropolis as
long us he might live This publication
was made Aug. p, 1889, and ten days later
DR.. Brown left his family in the supper
| room went out to the Toulouse and
hanged himself The notoriety given his
case, it is believed, had recalled the cir
! cumstances of the Ito HIM terrible sum-
| mer of 1872, with the result of bringing on a
! form of determined melancholiac insanity.
From this statement it certainly does not
appear that DR. Browns occupation as SUI
perintendent of the Bloomingdale insane
asylum had anything to do with the de
rangement of his mind.
With DR. Andrew Mcfarland the facts
were essentially the same. In 1916 he was
appointed superintendent of the New
Hampshire hospital. He left there in 1850
to prosecute his studies on diseases of the
mind in the great asylums of Europe. He
returned to America in 1852, and in 1858 he
was put in charge of the Central Illinois
asylum He retained this position until
1870, when he resigned to found the Oak
Lawn Retreat. in Jacksonville, Ills. Dur
ing all these years there had been no talk
of his insanity But in 1889, after forty
three years of almost continuous service in
the immediate supervision of the dement,
ed there was fire at his asylum. The
lives of some of the patients were threat
ened by the flames. and DIR. Mcfarland
CALAMITY went to the rescue. He succeed
ed in his noble purpose, but received a
severe blow upon the head from falling
timber Ever since that day he has been
"flighty," and for more than year he has
been constantly watched, but few weeks
ago he eluded his friends, and going to q
vacant apartment hanged himself by &
I oh m ma