The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1901-07-03
SOLDIERS WHO ARE
DRIVELLING IDIOTS.
UPWARDS OF 1000 OF THEM SENT
HOME FROM THE PHILIPPINES.
Are Incarcerated in the Government As
sylum in District OF Columbia. A
Show Place of Washington.

One.of the saddest results of the
present war but comparatively un-
known to the nation at large and en-
tirely unreckoned in the glories of
Expansion, says Washington dis
patch, is the large number of once
promising young men made hopelessly
crazy by it, who are now worse than
driv Yelling idiots, compelled to spend
the remainder of their ruined lives in
them-just how many is secret, care
fully kept by the powers that be-are
incarcerated in the government asylum
for the insane. called "St. Eliza
beth s." which is situated Just inside
the district line, between the river
and the Mary land hills. On last Dec
Grafton Day the graves of more than
eighteen hundred insane soldiers, most
of whom died at ST. Elizabeth's since
the beginning of the war in Cuba,
were strewn with flowers and if tears
were shed heaven knows they were
not for the poor fellows at rest beneath
the sod, but for the infinitely less fort
innate comrades whose living TRACE
dies are hidden within the gloomy
walls of the asylum. The little Gods
acre with it's rows of planked-marked
graves occupies shady dell at the
foot of the hospital grounds. There
speakers stand had been erected
! festooned with bunting, conspicuous
among which were the flags of Cuba
and the Philippines. A bout four
| hundred of the less dangerous soldier
patients took part in the proceedings,
with veterans from the Washington
Grand Army of the Republic post
named John A. Logan" There was
a choir composed of employees of the
institution and insane inmates who
have their 'lucid intervals be-
sides the St. Elizabeth's Home Band
of fifteen pie ces, which may generally
be depended upon to do excellent
work, though now and then some daft
performer forgets his score and goes
off on d rag-time air of his owns
Meanwhile at barred windows pal
lid faces overlooked the scene, with
gibbering lips and eyes that mo spec
ulation" on them: wild yells were oc-
casiona.ly heard, subdued by the thick
walls of padded cells, and the keepers
watched with the eyes of hawks every
movement of those at temporary lib
lerty. 1t seemed like horrible trav-
esty when the speaker thanked the
Lord that so few had been removed by
death, and the band played "He Civ
eth His Beloved Sleep"
There is no doubt that everything
possible is being done toreceive the
condition of the wretchea wearers of
Uncle Samuel's army end navy uni
forms who are imprisoned in the va
riOus government asylums, but their
grim walls conceal horrors OF which
/ the world knows nothing, and beside
which Dante IS hypochondriacal visions
of Inferno fade to insignifcance. 1t is
said that to St. Elizabeth's alone up-
wards of thousands crazy soldiers
have been sent from the Philippines
but for some unknown reason the exact
number is withheld by the authorities
and com plete list of them cannot be
obtained. Even their names and real
condition are carefully concealed from
the public. People who have relatives
and friends 10 the asylum and who
have tried to find out something about
them say they might as we'll be dead
AMI buried, for all the information
that can be gained. Thus men drop
out and are forgotten while yet in the
land of the living. Perhaps there is
good reason for this extraordinary
policy of secrecy but if so it is not
apparent to an unenlightened public.