Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1893-10-07
STRANGE CASE OF MIR: BRADLEY
FOrsaking Home md Comfort, Late in
Life, for a Hard IncoHnitO.

Lie, TOT n t0ru IncOHn1tOs
From the Kansas City Star.
The strange disappearance of Milton
Bradley from his home at FL Dorado, Kan,
three years ago, was a local sensation of
the hour. His confession of identity and
his death at Parsons this week revive the
interest in the old story, though they do
not solve the mystery of his disappearance.
Bradley was "a prominent man in Butler
county. He was wealthy. owning several
farms. and when elected county treasurer
moved to Ell Dorado. the county seat. where
he lived and served two or three terms.
When he left the farm he developed a great
passion for fishing. He, with State Senator
Murdoch, and NJ NJ. Murdoch of the
Wichita Eagle. and four or five cronies in
the little country town were on the Walnut
all the time fishing for bass, which are
found abundantly in the clear, green, rock
bottomed river. One day Bradley hitcned
up his covered spring wagon, put a small
tent and some cooking utensils in the
wagon, with his fishing pole. shot gun. ana
rations, and started for a three weeks OUT
ing trip. After he left the bridge across
the Walnut at FL Dorado he was never
seen there again. The very ravines Of the
Walnut might have swallowed him up, so
far as any clue as to his whereabouts was
concerned. He was a prominent Odd Fell
low, and that organization spent several
thousand dollars trying to find him. The
flint hills" twenty miles east Of Ell Do
rado--a wild stretch of country wherein
there is dead mans gulch" and all sorts
OF cairns and gulleys-were searched. The
Walnut river was dragged for his body.
But wagon. gun, tent. man and dog were
completely obliterated, 1t seemed.
The newspapers contained detailed de-
scriptions of the lost man. A wandering
man was found in Arkansas-the usual
Arkansas wild man of the woods-but he
was not Identified as Bradley by the search
ing party from Ell Dorado that freed the.
nyill An ,x,ilS
man turned up in Arizona The county
commissioners Of Butler county sent Mrs
Bradley down there with the sheriff, but
the trip was useless. Every little while
photographs of some strange man would
appear at FL Dorado to be identified as
Bradley. but none of them tailed
AS the months wore by into years the
matter was dropped, and Bradley was
given up for dead His estate was probat-
ed, and, though he held thousands of dol
lars in trust for others, every cent was ac-
counted fer and no one suffered the loss
of a penny. His son and daughter and his
wife mourned him as dead And as such
the community accepted him.
AS such he was to his former lise after
he left the bridge on the Walnut. from
that moment he began another existence
He went to Parsons, where he began Lire
anew as a farm hand. He was then a man
of nearly sixty years, but manual labor
though he had not been used to 1t for
twelve years, did not discourage him. He
did not breathe of his identity, OF his social
position and his political influence in Butter
county. but persisted in his new life He
read the story of his own disappearance
of the search for him, of the mistakes of
his friends. Of the grief of his wife and
children, and was silent
A few moments before he died he re-
vealed himself to his new-found friends
But he did not explain his departure. That
was his secret. and, being always a silent
man. he died with 1T unsDoken. His wife
has identified the remains. and they will be
inferred in the bleak little graveyard on
the wind-swept hill overlooking the little
town where his success in life was ATTAIN
ed and where the people who knew him
wonder and surmise and gossip about the
cause OF the strange deed which mark ed
his latter days.