The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1899-08-11
SHOCKING
IF TRUE.
Miss Day Tells a Sen
sational Story Of Mrs.
Eyler's Rule at
Trenton.
GIRL DRIVEN INSANE
Sadie Weissman Choked,
Beaten and Fed On Bread
and Water In a Dun
geon for Six
Days.
THEN GIVEN COLD DINNER
Her Condition Became So
Alarming She Was Put
in Hospital and Then
Sent to Asylum.
coLoRED GIRL FLoGGED
Managing Trustee Alleged to
Have Witnessed the Whip
ping and Finally to
Have Interfered.


TRENTON. Aug. Il. 1S99.-A new phase
of the trouble at the State Industrial
scf1g0f FOR tssrEs was brought to light yes
terday when Miss Frances Day. who was
superceded at the institution by Rev.
Clarence z. Eyler, husband of the princi-
pal. as clerk. appeared at the Office OF
Counsellor John H. Backes and made
sworn statement OF alleged conditions at
the school Miss Day is now clerk to the
State Charities Aid Society and an agent
Of the State Board of Children's Guar
dians The statement will be submitted
to Governor Voorhees,. Miss Day now
lives at Bayonne.
Mrs. Mary A. Miller, who for dozen
years was the assistant matron at the
school, came down from Watertown, n.
Y, to corroborate Miss Days testimony.
Mrs. Miller was present while Miss Day
was giving the testimony and subsequent
" made an affidavit that she was person
ally familiar with every charge contained
in Miss Days deposition and that all were
true. These are the first sworn state
ments taken in the inquiry, Governor
Voorhees,, at the time of the examination
of the other witnesses, stating that he
did not think it was necessary to make
them tell their stories under oath.
The witnesses told the details of the
horrible punishment inflicted upon Sadie
Wisseman, who after six weeks of
solitary confinement in dungeon, pun
ishment room and hospital, during which
time she was half-staryed. was finally
taken out to be placed in a lunatic
asylum-a physical and mental wreck,
transferred from a plump, rosy checked
girl to a miserable, forlorn creature,
hardly able to drag her body from one
side of the room to the other
For six days, Miss Day said, the girl
was kept in the dungeon, although she
expressed repentance at the end of the
first day Then she was put in the
'sboard room,'' which is few degrees
better than the dungeon and kept there
until her condition caused so much
alarm that she was placed in the hos
pital room, but under lock and key.
Here she spent the remainder of the six
weeks. a prisoner, fed first on bread and
water, and then getting one meal of
cold food a day.
An equally horrible story was told by
Miss Day of the cruelties inflicted on
Louise Stokes, a colored girl, who was
placed in the dungeon for a week until
she became sick. Some days later she
was designated, with other girls, to
plant potatoes in a field, and upon re-
fusing, saying she waA sick, she was
taken by one of the men and dragged to
the field by the hair while Mrs. Eyler
brutally lashed her all the way.
significant fact connected with the
testimony of these two witnesses is that
it is the first evidence of any witness not
directly under the control of Mrs. Eyler
or called to testify by either herself or
Managing Trustee Cook Presumably all
the witnesses called while the Governor
was at the school were favorably dis
posed toward the natron, and what they
said that might reflect discredit on the
institution was either casual in its nature
or unwillingly dragged from them by the
sharp cross-examination of Mr.. Backcs.
The story of her experience and what
she saw at the school was told by Miss
Day as follows
Il went to the institution when I was
thirteen years Of age. At the age Of
eighteen 1 was appointed clerk Of the
school. and made one Of the nurses Of the
institution. Mrs. McFadden was the
principal when / first went there. She
was succeeded BY Mrs. Eyler. February
15 1897. was at the institution under
Mrs. Eyler from that date until April 20.
1888 ! resigned because Of Mrs Eyler' 5
treatment Of the children under her
charge and because OF her conduct to-
wards me.
TT was my duty whenever punishment
was meted out by Mrs Eyler to put The