The record-union., 1897-04-17
Satisfies His Mother and Friends OF
His Identity.
Lived Several Years in All at Fresno,
Hanford, Los Angeles and Red
lands Under the Name OF Harry
Price, Which He Assumed Alter
Leaving Puget Sound.

written MS IHOllItI eaiAN
Fayette. Ohio, where his body was sup
posed to be reposing in a grave IN the
Fayette ce emetery. To the Fayette
Record he has written a letter IN
which he says:
Il wish to inform my friends through
your paper that 1 am living, notwith-
standing contrary reports. When L
wrote home a short time since L found
some trouble in proving that l was my
self, for strange combination of cir
oumstances seemed to prove that was
dead
II lived in Fresno, Cal, two years; in
Hanford two years, and the past year
in Los Angeles and Redlands. Since
leaving Puget Sound I have lived under
an assumed name, and any one wish
ing to inquire will learn nothing dis
ereditable by writing; to the places
have mentioned and asking for Harry
Price by which name l am known. Or
the cause which led me to take the
course did l will say nothing, for do
not think 1 could do it satisfactorily.
Il am a laundryman by occupation,
which business l have followed for
nearly five years. OLIVER PIKE
The letters to the Ohio newspaper
and his mother and friends are taken
as authentic and they no longer doubt
his identity. AS explained in Pixies
letter, he had some dofficulty in es-
tablishing the fact of his existence to
his relatives, as they had identified his
body they thought beyond the shadow
of a doubt.
Pixies temperance opens up the en-
tire case again and makes it a greater
mystery than ever.
March % 1896, Philip Cries and
Chas. Haas of Austin purchased
large box at auction from auctioneers
who We're selling a large quantity of
unclaimed freight for the Chicago and
Northwestern Railroad. Two days af-
ter the box was opened at Austin and
found to contain a medium sized green
trunk, bound with iron strips. Several
layers of white oilcloth We're wrapped
around the trunk Within the trunk
was a zinc box, the cover soldered tight.
This box was also wrapped in oilcloth.
Within the inner box was found the de-
composed body of a man. 1t had been
bound with light rope SO as to fit
,ompactly in the box and some chemi
Gals had been placed around it to de-
stroy the flesh.
The box was shipped from Salt Lake,
Utah, on the morning of February s,
1893. It was left at the freight office
of the Union Pacific at that place the
day before by a man giving his name
as G.. NJ. Morgan, and was billed to CT.
NJ Morgan. No 416 jefferson street,
Chicago The freight was prepaid and
the shipper took a train, ostensibly for
this city, the same day. 1t was shipped
as household goods and weighed $40
pounds. The box arrived in Chicago
February 10th and remained in the
Chicago and Northwestern freight de-
pot until July 2S, 1893. 1t was un
claimed and notices sent to the address
on the box ELECTED no reply. On that
date it was delivered TO the warehouse
belonging TO the auctioneers, where it
remained for nearly three years. On
February 9th it was decided to sell the
box at auction, to get back the freight
and storage charges. A notice was
then sent to the consignee at Salt Lake,
that he would be given until February
2Sth to pay the charges and redeem it.
No reply being received, the box was
sold and the discovery of the body fol-
lowed.
The address at 166 South jefferson
street is the home of Mrs. Frederick A
Mueller. She knew nothing of the man
Morgan, who shipped the box, except
that an expressman had called a few
weeks before the box was sold and asked
for G. NJ. Morgan. An examination of
the body disclosed the fact that the
skull had been fractured in two places
plainly indicating a murder. The blows
were supposed to have been struck with
a hatchet.
Two clews were followed by the police
Henry Devere and Bas Marcel, two
Frenchmen living here. told a story of
the disappearance of a friend of theirs.
named Joanes Prosper Chazel, at Salt
Lake, during February of 1893. No trace
of him has ever been found. Chazel was
native of Lyons. France. and was
well-to-do. The two men identified the
body as being that of their friend, and
strongly maintained that everything
pointed to the correctness of their sus-
picions that he had been murdered for
his Jewels. of which he always wore a
collection of great value.
The second theory was that the body
was that of Oliver Pike, and that he had
been murdered in Seattle, Wash. His
IGldliNCS luGliAlltd AiiG bOQN anu Hdu II
taken to Fayette for burial. He disap-
peared from Seattle July ), 1892, and
was never heard from until n few days
ago. when he wrote to his relatives It
was thought that Pike had been mur-
dered from damaging evidence he pos
sessed concerning the operations of an
insane asylum at Steilacoom. Wash. An
investigation was made, but no definite
proof was ever established that Pike
had been done away with by the sus-
pected persons at the Steilacoom Asy-
lum, and the matter was dropped.
Mrs. A. T. Mosher and C. C. Goriot
cousins of Pike, were seen last night in
Rovenswood. They have been in COM
munication with the missing mans
mother and stated that she believed her
son was still alive and that mistake
had been made in the identification of
the body found in the trunk at Austin.
Presents had been received by Pixies
sisters purporting to come from him,
and he had also sent a photograph. Still
the strange actions of the missing man
in the past three years have made many
of his relatives doubt whether he is
really still alive. They attribute the
report that he is at Redlands and the
writing of the letters to the men who
are interested in the money which the