The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1901-10-25
MADE A SENSATION
C. A. r.. AND w. r.. c. CIRCLES
STIRRED BY DEVELOPMENT
IN PENSION CASE
LIFE SECRET LAID BARE
Prominent and Pioneer Resident es
Lake Preston Makes Fraudu-
lent Application for
Pension.

SIOUX FALLS, S. D., Oct. M-No
event for years has created such "a sen
sation especially in G. A r. and w. r.
c. circles throughout this portion of the
Northwest. as the case brought in the
United States court here against Mrs.
Sarah J. Flynn, prominent and highly
respected pioneer resident of Lake Pres
ton. For over twenty years she has lived
at that place, and has always taken an
active interest in Grand Army and
Womans Relief corps matters.
AS announced in dispatches on Wednes-
dty, she pleaded guilty in the federal
cCTrt to an Indictment charging her with
milking a fraudulent application for
per ION, alleging that she was the widow
Of ~ j. Flynn, who served during the
War b. the Rebellion in the Seventeenth
independent New York artillery.
The arrest of Mrs. Flynn revealed the
life secret of herself and the veteran
whose widow she claimed to be. More
than twenty years ago the couple eloped
from the East, she leaving 81 husband
and he a WIFE from whom neither ever
obtained a divorce.
They came westward, living for time
at Milwaukee and other places and then
coming to Dakota with the first rush of
settlers. locating at Lake Preston, in 1881
After reaching Dakota they lived as hus-
band and wife, and the most intimate
of their wide circle of acquaintance
never suspected for u moment during all
the long Years that they had never been
married. While residents OF Dakota they
reared a family, some of the children
now being grown.
Like thunderbolt out of a clear sky
came the revelation that the couple We're
not husband and wife
Flynn died in May, 1900, and the secret
of their guilty love was revealed III 4 Gu
rious fashion. Mrs. Fiynn's friends af-
ter the death of her supposed husband,
advised her to apply for a widows pen
sion under the act of June q, 1890. She
hesitated, but they became so persistent
that she, fearing that If she longer de-
clined to do so, the suspicious OF her
friends would be aroused that all was
not right, finally consented to sign the
application papers and make the neces-
SarY attidtVitS. Thus, in the hope of
keeping tn secret of herself and Flynn
from the World she committed another
crime which drew down upon her the
sleuths of the pension bureau and re-
suited in her arrest and the laying bare
TO the world of the carefully guarded
secret of Flynn and herself.
In her application papers she claimed
to have been married to Flynn at Lock
port n. Y, on Sept. 8, 1873, even giving
the name of a minister of the gospel who
was alleged to have performed the mar
Tiage ceremony. Even then she might
have kept the secret of herself and Flynn
had it not been for other curious COM
binations of circumstances.
About the time that the Dakota Mrs
Flynn applied for a pension as the widow
of Silas ]. Flynn, the deserted wife of
the old veteran, Mary c. Flynn, CHANGED
to read an article in a newspaper which
referred to the right of deserted wives
of pensioners to share their tickle hus-
bands pensions. She therefore made
application to the pension bureau at
Washington for half the pension of Silas
J. Flynn. Thus the officials of the pen
sion bureau had two applications before
them for a pension on account of the
service III the army of Silas J. Flynn
The matter was referred to special
agents for investigation. They speedily
ascertained the truth as revealed in the
papers in the present case against the
spurious widow of the veteran
Tt is said that when the defendant in
the present suit was approached by a
pension examiner she readily confessed
everything. She had no desire whatever
to defIaud the government, the only OBJ
ject in applying for the pension being to
8llay suspicious on the part of her friends
that she was not the widow of Slas j.
Flynn, the man with whom she had lived
for more than twenty years.
Sire the death of Flynn she has been
earning livelihood by sewing. The
minimum penalty for the crime COM
United by her in making a fraudulent
application for a pension is fine of
$1,000 Sentence will probably not be pro-
nour Cd by Judge Garland until Satur-
day /