The Mt. Sterling advocate. (Mt. Sterling, Ky.) 1890-current, 1896-02-11
Was Marshal Ney Executed?

Y France and Duke OF Etchingen. Thl
Y story is a long one, but the gist of it i
Il that Marshal Ney was not really ex
IS ecuted in the Luxembourg gardens ii
1915, that the execution was sham
and that he was spirited away anC
came TO America. 1t is an undispu
/ ted fact that there was school teacher
in North Carolina for series of years
who called himself Peter Stuart Ney
The theory is that he and Marsha
Michel Ney were one and the sam,
, person.
This theory is not now advanced fol
the first time. II is one OF those the.
: cries that find expression in the press
Inow and again, as the memory of for
mer publications becomes, or is sup
posed by some editor to have become,
faint il the public mind. Formerly
the Question "Have we Bourbon
among us?" would bob up in the
newspapers from time to time. The
assumption beneath this question was
that the Rev. Eleazar Williams, a
missionary of the Protestant Episcopal
church to the Indians, was no other
than Louis XVII, who was the son of
Louis XVI, and Marie Antoinette,o of
France, and who was born in 1T85,
and was supposed TO have persisted in
the temple. Williams himself pro-
fessed to believe this story, and some
think he was sincere. Ii first became
public in Putman's Magazine in 1853,
in an article written by Rev. John FL.
Hanson, ID. d., and thousands, per-
haps, have gone TO their graves be-
lieving it true.
Similarly, the story that Wilkes
Booth was still alive used to crop out
from time to time, and various facts
and fictions were cited to back it up. |
Doubtless there are still those who
think that Booth is alive. There were
thousands such twenty years ago.
There is class of minds that take
peculiar pleasure in trying to support
these improbable stories. Among
them all il is barely possible that one or
two may be true, but the preponder-
an'e of the evidence is against them.
In the case of Ney it is impossible
to deny that there is some evidence
tending to show that Peter Stuart Ney,
of North Carolina, was Marshal Ney
We do not mean legal evidence, in a
form that could be offered in court,
but statements published in news
papers purporting to come from per-
sons who had knowledge of the facts
which they state. The Rev. IL.
Gay, of BeVier, Mo-, an Episcopal
clergyman, who was pupil of r. s.
Ney, in 1928, is firmly convinced that
his old teacher was Marshal Ney.
He tells how, on his deathbed in North II
Carolina in 1916, z. S. Ney rose on his
elbow and said: 81 may as well tell 7
'ou l am Marshal Ney, of France" .
But Mr.. Gay does not say he was u
present when this was said, and it is d
highly improbable that he was.
The fact seems to be that Peter New. +
# North Carolina, bore striking re-
to the pictures of the Mar
hal, at least in the opinion of some of .
rs acquaintance, and that when .
nder the influence of liquor he was 81
n the habit OF giving out hints that n
e was Marshal Ney. lie also held FL
hat Ney was of Scotch ancestry and b
escended from the Stuarts, doubtless I'll
nth the intent to make the impression in
,at he was of royal blood These
nd other circumstances too tedious
} detail have created the impression kl
| some minds that the North Carolina bl
hoolmaster was Marshal Ney. III
The improbability of this story is lif
Fry great. The death of Ney in the Sc
luxembourg gardens December z, th
80, is generally accepted by histofi- We
rs. The act caused great indigna- SCI
On, and had the execution been
am evidence of it would long since b
i've been forthcoming, since many -
'rsons would have been cognizant of -
e facts. That the guns of the squad 80
ere loaded with ball is known from "
e fact that some of the bullets ~
dyed in the fence behind the spot '"
here Ney stood. That he himself
Id the soldiers to aim at his heart sti
d gave the order to fire is told by ur'
'martine. The body lay on the n pn'
ound for quarter of an hour, and we
4 l..