The Somerset herald. [volume] (Somerset, Pa.) 1870-1936, 1896-01-15
Bridget Murphy.

New York Tribune.
My boy used to be good boy ur.-
Ill he began To drink"
II was poor old Bridget Murphy, Of
No. 50l East Fourteenth street, who was
talking. She was saying it 20 "A narse
in Charity Hospital on Blackwell's
Island last Sunday. The film was
slowly closing over poor old Bridgers
eyes. She couldn't have been sorry
10 die; for she had little 10 live for.
Her lines had fallen for many years ia
hard and cruel places made infinitely
harder by the thought that she had
who in one Of his drunken Outbursts
of passion had pounded and kicked
and beaten her till she was a pitifui
spectacle Of wounds and bruises, and
was taken off to the hospital TO die.
And now that it was all ending-a
tragedy just As sOrrowful and sugges-
tive as if Bridget Murphy had been
born in the purple and had lived in
luXury-the grim fate that had follow
ed her softened for moment and let
in upon her fading sight the light Of
"A tender memory. ale was a good
boy" she said, ''until lie began TO
drink"
1t was after he ''bcgan to drink that
Martin Murphy ceased ''to be good
boy" First lac became a burden to
his mother, compelling her to furnish
him money for drink out Of her small
earnings as a laundress. Then he
began abusing her in his drunken fits
until, a. the poor old woman moaned
there in tire hospital, ''he became a per-
feet devil" SO when good old Bridget
Murphy, on the night of September :,
in the kindness of heart-the kindness
and gentleness which as national char
acteristics Outshine even the pro-
verbal eiOquence and persuasiveness0 Of !
the Irish people-ofered shelter in her
own home TO some dispossessed neigh
bors, this boy Martin, utterly worth
less through the idleness that attends
on drunken habits, made vicious by
the associates which they entail /
and bristling with the brutality en-
gendered by fiery potations rose up
aud demanded that they should be
elected. Upon his mothers refusal TO
comply with the order Of the drunk
en Erdte, he turned upon her, beat her /.
and kicked her and 30 maltreated her
that when found later she was covered [
with wounds, with one Of her ribs I
broken, and unconscious. Aud he used Z.
to be good boy" the poor old woman
moaned as she lay dying of his brutali
ty ''until he began 10 drink"
So Bridget Murphy is dead, and /
Martin Murphy, the good boy until /
he began to drink, is in prison wait
ing to be tried for killing his mother /
In East Fourteenth street in the |
neighborhood Of Avenue y, where
Bridget Murphy lived, and by hard
days work made a home for Martin
Murphy, her son, and furnished out o.
her earnings money for Martin 10
spend in the purchase Of drink, which /.
made brLle OF him anl took ali pity I.
out of him and sent him home at night /.
ready 10 knocl down and kick into q
shapeless Jelly the best and pIobably !
the only real friend he had on earth, /
there are from three to four places in n I
block where 1.-THE poor man" can get /
the drink which was the one necessary I.
OF Martin Murphy's life. 'rhe poor /
man" can get it at every hour of the /
day and night, and until Commits I.
sioncr Roosevelt began his highland .
ed interference with the liberties of cit I
izens by directing the enforcement of a /
law which the same citizens had en- [
acted, could get il at all hours for seven I.
days in the week all the year round. I
The law closed them on Sundays in .
order that good boys like Martin Muir .
ply might have 4 few hours rest from ,
drunkenness and brutality, end that /
good, harj-working mothers like /.
Bridget Murphy might have little /
rest from the cruelty and hard blows !
inflicted on them by their own good /
boys who had learned TO drink. But I!
when the law was enforced Martin /.
Murphy's personal liberty was in
fCinged. '.The poor mans clubs
three or four of them to a block /
where Martin Murphy was accustom- /
ed to spend his waking hours diligent-
~ training himself to n mental and /
physical condition in which he could |
20 home and beat his mother into in
sensibility, Were shut up to him. Mar
tin Murphy was doubtless angry. So
also was the distiIler into whose Golfers /
Martin Murphy's mothers money fell.
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