The Opelousas courier., 1894-04-28
MAJOR e. a. BURKE
A Man with an Exceedingly Varied
ans Checkered Career.

His 4drentures in Honduras Since His
Flight from Neu Orleans-He was
on the Losing Side IN the Last Rer-
o1"tion-Who Merit?
From the Atlanh Constitution.
New Orleans, April 1S.-The press re-
ports bring the news that Major E.. A.
Burke, formerly of New Orleans, but
for some years past a resident OF Hon
duras, has reached the last stage of mis-
fortune, and that he is now a fugitive,
under pain of death, from the foGlorn
country in which he originally sought
refuge from an American penitentlaly.
Burke was the treasurer of Louisiana
for eight or nine years. His term OF Of
flee ended in 1888, and very soon, under
the incoming state administration, 1T
was discovered that he Lad for "A long
time, and to a very great amount, been
robbing the treasury of Louisiana. He
was in England at the time of the dis
closure, organizing a company to deyel-
op certain mining property in Hondu-
ras, of which he had become possessed,
and he made haste to flee to Central
America from a prosecution which be
doubtless knew be could not safely face.
There he has remained ever since, and
from time to time his friends have heard
of him, now us being on the point of a
brilliant success, and again as being in
volved IN hopeless and irremedlable
failure. At irregular periods it would
be given out that he intended returning
to Louisiana as soon as he could accu'
mulate money to meet the expenses OF
his trial, but it is not likely that he OF
any one else ever believed this, for there
Gnny1oa fn h IA va hnaY r,, SnrhT nc fn tina
nature and extent of the enlightenment
and as little as to Burke's sole respon-
sibility for it. But, however that may
be, the game seems to be played out
now, aud all uncertainties set at rest.
Burke has fed tt San Salvador with
Vasquez, the defeated pretender 10 the
presidency, and Bonilla, the triumphant
aspirant, makes no secret of his homi-
cidal purpose with reference to either.
The history Of this man Burke is TO
mantle enough to have been laid in the
days OF Sir Walter Raleigh, John Hawk
ms and Amyas Leigh. Nothing is Ger
talnly known as to his antecedents, al
though he claimed that he was the son
OF an Irish political exile OF the better
class and that he was born in Kentucky.
What is known absolutely is that at fif-
teen years of age he was brakeman on
some Indiana railroad, and that two
years later he was a soldier in the con
federate army. Toward the close of the
war he appeared in Texas as an officer
in the quartermaster's service, and here,
through his extraordinary ability as an
organizer, he attracted universal atten-
ton. After the close of the wal lie first
went to Galveston and later to New Or
leans. In the latter city be made his
debut as a workman in a marble yard
at 81 80 a day. He was a man of superb
physique, of iDdomitable energy, of
sleepless ambition and phenomenal in
genuity. Very shortly after reaching
New Orleans-so shortly, indeed, that it
sayored of a theatrical transformations
be turned up as local freight agent Of
the Illinois Central railroad. Next he
went into politics. In 1874 he was elect
ed administrator of improvements of
the city, a place of great responsibility
and particularly rich in political patron
age. In 1879 he bought Tie Democrat
newspaper; a few months later he alb
sorbed The Times, and then established
the journal since known as the Times
Democrat. About the same time he be-
came state treasurer, which office he
held until 1883, as has already been re-
lated. Throughout that period he was
foremost in all public enterprises, and,
to all appearances, utterly unselfish in
his labors. Certainly no one thought at
the time that his inspiration was q sor-
did one, for be always headed the sub
scription list and gave in effort as liber-
ally as he did in money. He was a man
OF dazzling schemes, of theatrical sur
prises, OF prodigious achievements. Ten
years after his appearance in New Or
leans as a day laborer in a marble yard,
he had made himself the most c%onspicu-
GUS figure in the state. 1t was he who,
in the fall Of 1874, tore up the track of
the Illinois Central railroad SO as to
keep the United States troops from
reaching New Orleans in time to pre-
vent the overthrow of the Kellogg gov
eminent by the White League. 1t was
be who in the winter Of 1867 promoted,
alize, the deal by which the electoral
vote Of Louisiana was given to Hayes
and the state government and the legis-
lature to the democrats. He organized
campaigns, fought tuels, devised
schemes OF public development, wreck
ed and resurrected newspapers. When
the famous but Inflated exhibition of
1885 was first suggested he opposed it in
has newspaper, but when the merchants
and capitalists Of the city offered him
the director generalship, he at once
threw himself into the project with all
his fire and enthusiasm, and with all
his matchless genius for organization.
It was a failure, but through no fault of
his. He did everything excent create a
patronage. If devotion, ability and un-
firing effort could have awaited, the |
New Orleans exhibition would have
been the greatest triumph of the gener-
alton. He worked himself to a shadow,
spent his money and all that he
could borrow, and was the chief victim
of the downfall.
But the general impression among
those who knew Burke most intimately
between 1879 and 1883 is that he cared
for money only as a means Of making
himself honorably prominent. He was
a man Of ordinary vices. He did
not drink or gamble; he was not ad-
dicted to borses. His private life-if he
can be said to have had anyways one of
absolute simplicity and purity. He low
ed display, and no doubt desired to pro-
ft by it. but it was display Of the large
kind. He sought prominence in con-
with great public affairs, with
works OF beneficence and industrial de-
He seemed possessed by
an Unsuitable fury of unrest. Nobody
acquainted with the mans history at
time believes that a single dollar
Of the thousands purloined from the
state treasury was used for Burke's per-
sonal purposes. The opinion of those
to him is that it was taken for
he campaigne Of 1884 and sent to doubt
sul states, such as Indiana, Connecticut
New York. Indeed, it is known
hat a very large sum-thought to be
BLOC, OOO-was received by the demo-