The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1898-09-01
IN a MAD HOUSE.
Story OF Mrs. WiImerding, once
Belle of che -Four Hundred.

From the Chicago Times Herald.
From time TO time numerous books have
been published illustrative of the horrors
suffered by sane person in a madhouse.
of these perhaps the most notable are
Charles Reade's Hard Cash" and "A
Mad World" by Chambers. Now Mrs.
Jack Wllmerding has added the tale of
her own woefuI experience in the Bloom
ingdale insane asylum, and it is pitiful
enough, though no later than Thursday
board of experts declared the untor-
eunate woman insane.
Mrs. WImerding, il will be remember
ed, was Miss Marie Vanderbilt Allen, a
beauty and a belle great granddaughter
of Commodore Vanderbilt and one Of New
York's 400. Married early to Jack Will
merding, one of her own exclusive set,
the wedding was celebrated with great
pomp and circumstance, but turned out
nose the happier because of that. The
young wife drifted more and more into
the fast circle lived abroad a great
deal, because a victim to alcoholism and
excessive cigarette smoking, and few
months ago was brought over from Italy,
where she had been staying with her
father, Col Vanderbilt Allen, and was
placed by relatives In the Bloomingdale
asylum.
Mrs. Wilmerding has from first to last
declared herself sane; a number of her in
1uential friends believe in her sanity and
have tried to gain her freedom. Others
are equally strongly convinced of her
need OF control, and as Col. Allen died
soon after her departure from Italy the
unhappy woman, sane or mad, feels her
self utterly alone in the world and for
saken by all protectors. She was induced
by relatives IN New York to go to Bloom
ingdale under the pretext that it was a
sanitarium, needing as she did a rest af-
ter dissipation, sorrow and marital woes
The latter seem to run in the family, Col.
Allen had married three times and was
involved in alimony suits at the time of
his death. Mrs. Wilmerding says frank
ly of her own marriage:
My marriage to Jack Wimerding was a
grievous mistake. He should never have
married any one. His mother told me
that. His infidelities and cruelties made
me desperate and I began drinking. Then
came a separation and papers recognize
ing the separation We're drawn by Gen.
Tracy l wanted to get a divorce, but his
family shrank from the scandal involving
their name and begged me to be satisfied
with a separation.
She states that when she went to Capri
with her father she raised money for the
trip by realizing on some securities, and
adds that she has taste for business
and understands 1t. When she returned
to America ii was upon her fathers sug-
gecton that she become reconciled to her
husband. Indignant at the idea, she re-
torted that she would certainly go back
to New York, but not to Mr.. Wilmerding
She would return only to get a divorce
from him, and would then go upon the
stage, as many another reduced society
woman had gone. DR.. George Cerio who
was Col Aliens physician accompanied
Mrs. Wilmerding on the home voyage
ostensibly because she had been sick OF a
fever in Capri.
AT New York they were met by an aunt
of Mrs. Wilmerding, Mrs Franklin AL
len, who told the traveller that her father
Col. Allen, had written that she ought to
go to a sanitarium for a rest After this
Mrs. Wilmerding says:
They took me TO Brooklyn and to a
room where two strangers We're and locked
the doors while signed some papers,
which, 1 understood, expressed my will
ingness to go to eanitarium or hospital
for rest. did not know who the strang-
ers were and do not now, and / was too
i'll and lstless to read the papers. /
trusted the people l. thought were my
friends That is not always well.
I wrote some foolish letters after I came
here. 1 remember l did and that 1 knew
they were foolish, but it seemed to me
that if I did not have some channel Of
People who saw Mrs. Wilmerdlng at
that time declare that she lsoked the pic
ture OF health. and pretty as ever, but
that her bright active mind was pitifully
clouded. 1t was stated that her symp-
toms of paresis were well defined, her
nerves shattered, that she frequently failed
10 recognize her nearest friends, some
times lost her own identity, suffered de-
lusions, and fancied all who came near
her her enemies. That this was brought
on by drinking and smoking was the YER
dict.
She is said 10 have admitted her indul-
gence In from pint to a quart of whisky
every day, and as many as sixty cigar
cites.
That her married life had been unhap-
py was notorious. There had been open
quarrels in public places. Young Jack"
had a violent temper, and objected to his
wife's gowns which were frequently Of
the mannish orderl also he reproved Ter
extravaganza, though she had inherited
an independent fortune from her mother.
One evening at Delmenicos II has been
declared, he threw plate of fee cream
In his Wife's face, plate and all. So mat
tiers went from bad to worse. The couple
separated.
Mrs Wilmerding went aboard only to
return walking between a physician and
nurse. Since she has been back in Amer
lea her husband has never gone near her.
She lives in the most luxurious apart
ments of the Bloomingdale asylum, but
is under the constant espionage Of attend
ants.
Things looked black for the petted spir-
tied society beauty when her friend, Mrs.
Jack" Bloodgooa, interested herself in
the case and managed, with Attorney de
Lamere, TO obtain an interview with Mrs.
Wilmerding. Then they saw Mrs. Will
merding's attorney, Mr.. Levy, who fatty
denied the diagnosis of an Italian physi-
clan that the patient had incipient paress,
and insisted that his client was perfectly
sane. All this has caused a great upheyal
in New York society, which has had so
much to shock and disturb it that by this
time il should be getting used to almost
anything.
Meanwhile Mrs. Wmerding is not silent.
She declares to the world her sanity and
the story of her wrongs:
The sense of helplessness is one Of the
most frightful of the awful chain of SEN
sations felt by the sane among the insane.
have thought OF escape and laughed at
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