St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1897-10-15
Saved Twenty-Nine Lives.

In the October Century there is an
article by the Hon. Theodore Roose.
welt, entitled 1.-THE Roll of Honor of
the New York Police" In speaking
Of promotions for gallantry, Mr..
Roosevelt says:
Among the first promotions we
made were two which illustrated the
attitude OF the board toward cases
of this kind, and which also incident
ally illustrated exactly what we
mean by taking the force out OF pol
itics"-that is, by administering on
principles Of decency, and appointing
and promoting men on their merits,
without regard to their political
backing. The first case was that of
an old fellow, a veteran of the civil
war, who was at the time rounds
man. happened to notice one day
that he had saved a woman from
drowning, and had him summoned
so that 1 might look into the matter.
The old fellow brought up his record
before me, and showed not a little
nervousness and agitation; for itap-
peared that he had grown gray in
the service, had performed feat after
feat Of heroism, but had no political
backing of any account. He was
Grand Army man, but not one OF the
political" type, and so had not re-
ceived any attention from the former
police boards; and now, at last, he
thought there was chance for him.
He had been twenty-five years on
the force, and during that time had
save some twenty-five persons from
death by drowning, varying the per-
Torrance once or twice by saving
persons from burning buildings.
Twice congress had passed laws es-
pecially to empower the then secre-
tary OF the treasury. John Sherman,
to give him a medal for distinguished
gallantry in saving lite. The Life.
Saving society had also given him
its medal, and so had the police de-
partment. On examining into his
record carefully, we found tina it was
wholly free from complaints of any
iniraction of duty, and that he was
sober and trustworthy. We felt that
he was entitled to his promotion,
and he got it. We did not know his
politics, nor did we care about them.
1t is very unlikely that the woman
whom be last saved, as he swan out
towards her, felt any special interest
as to whether he had voted for Cleve.
land or Harrison; nor did we. He
had risked his life freely again and
again in the performance oil his duty /;
he had conducted himself so as to be
a credit to the department, and o
credit to the city; and we felt that
he was entitled to his reward.
1t is worth while mentioning that
he kept on saving life after he was
promoted to sergentcy. On Octo-
Der 81, 1896, he again saved man
from drowning. 1t was at night,
nobody else was in the neighborhood,
and the slip from which he jumped
was in absolute darkness, and he
was about ten minutes in the water,
which was very cold. The captain
Of the precinct, in reporting the case,
said: THE seargent was off the
bulkhead and into the water after
his man quicker than it takes TO say
Jack Robinson There was nc
way in which the board could re
ward him for this, except by telling
him that he was an honor to the de
partment; for he had been given all
the medals. and bars to the medals
that he could be given. 1t was the
twenty.ninth person whose life he
had saved during his twenty three
years. service in the department, anc
he was fiity-6ve years old when hi
saved him.