The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1899-08-05

ms past life as left no reasonable doubt
OF his identity. The man had not been
Killed at Gettysburg, as supposed, but
was among the missing, and had af-
terward made out case for himself
which enabled him to get an honora ole
discharge and admission to the home.
For some reason he had no inclination
to renew relations with his family and
allowed himself to be considered as
dead. The clergyman spoke with much
warmth of the hard struggle his moth
er had made to support herself ana
him while child and of the sacrifices
by which he had obtained his educa-
ton. He desired to drop the matter
at that point.
Another similar case was discovered
while examining the claim of u widow
whose husband was supposed to have
been with Custer on the plains and une
of his fellow victims of the terrible
massacre. After good deal of diff
Guilty the supposed dead man was To-
Gated in the West, where he was lead
ing the life of tramp and living by
his wits 1t appeared that on the day
before the Custer fight he had left
the ranks and taken to the pack train
and by that means escaped. He, too,
had lost all taste for home or desire
to return to it, but of course his wild
ow, so-called, was obliged to withdraw
her claim.
The widow business has sometimes
developed into highly organized in
dustry. One such instance, which has
received very meagre notice in the
press, deserves good deal more. In
border state there is cemetery in
which are buried a large number of ne
groes who were in the Union army.
one hundred and six claims for widows
pensions came to Washington from one
source, all of them being for the widows
of colored soldiers in that general
neighborhood. Suspicion was aroused
in the minds of the examiners, who be-
gan an investigation. This had not
gone very far before they found that
1t would be necessary to put a handful
of skilled detectives on the scent 1t
was difficult to make Roadway for some
time, till a clew was obtained which
pointed to the fraudulent character of
one of the claims, and the alleged wild
ow was required to produce more salts
factory proof of her marriage.
A negro who had posed in the afflda-
Wits as her brother-in-l law was pinioned
down with cross-questions and finally
admitted that his memory of the cir
cumStances of the marriage was very
defective. The woman meanwhile was
evidently growing more and more nerv-
Gus from day to day, and at last she
invited one of the detectives to her
cabin, where she locked and bolted her.
self in with him and in terrified WhiS-
pers confessed her share in the great
conspiracy. She had not only never
been married to the man she claimed
as her husband, but she did not even
know him. She was one of group of
women who had been hired to act as
widows for corresponding number of
negro soldiers whose bodies lay in the
cemetery.
The attorney who organized the con-
spiracy had gone to work in a most
businesslike way. He had taken down
from the headstones in the cemetery
the names of the men. All the negroes
thereabout belonged to some mutual
benefit lodge of their own race and
from the lodge records the swindler
had sifted his list SO as to retain on
it only the names of unmarried men,
the widows of those actually married
being perilous to approach with such
business, lest some of them might al
ready be drawing pensions and give
the pension office warning Each dead
bachelor was provided with a ready
made widow from among the local col
ored population: the same set of wit
nesses were called into play for the
whole batch of cases and a colored
preacher was used, by virtue of his