The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1903-04-18


weak that could not even respect her.
| So it went on for years, and l never
| once forgot my obligation. / do not
| know how the rumor reached her that
was dead, unless it may have been
| at the time l was hurt in a fire.
Finally I could not stand to live any
longer the way l was, and decided TO
go back to my wife and do my duty
by her. / got there at night and
went right out to our old home. From
the streets l saw a man reading by
the table. Presently a woman whom
recognized as my wife came in with
bundle in her arms. 1t was a baby.
The man rose, looked at the baby,
kissed it and then the mother, and they
went out of the room together. I
knew that l would not be a welcome
visitor. AS I turned away l asked
chance passer-by who lived there. He
told me and also told me who the wom
an had been before her marriage. 1
had made no mistake. l came back
West that night. I felt that she had
freed me by her own action. OF
course 1 knew that legally she was
still my wife. But no one knew, and
1t is a long way from Pennsylvania
to Kansas City. And then, too, 1
loved the other woman. And so we
were married, and we have been hap
Ply, and no one has ever known. She
thought me dead, and 1 am dead TO
her. Let her have her pension from
her second husband. 1 would never
put a stone in her way"
But the United States pension de-
partment thinks differently of such
matters. And the grandmother in the
little town knows that she cannot have
a widows pension because she has
never been a widow.
An Innocent Victim.
Another past which this same pen-
sion agent has discovered is quite as
romantic, except that in this case a
woman was the innocent victim and
the deception practiced on her was
deliberate. This woman has lived her
life in Kansas City; she is a church
worker, and has brought up a family
of law respecting sons and daughters.
Only now has she discovered that for
more than twenty-five years has she
beeing living in violation of the law
that she so respects. She was married
in 1867 to an ex-soldier of an Ohio
regiment. He was a locomotive en-
gineer by trade, and in the course of
two or three years went West in the
hope of advancing himself more rap
idly. She stayed behind until he should
be able to send for her. He wrote to
her regularly for year and sent her
money. AT the end of that time she
received one day a copy of an Ell Paso,
Tex, paper, containing an account of
a wreck near that place and stating
that the engineer had been killed The
name of the engineer was that of the
womans husband. For six years she
mourned him, then married and moved
West, finally locating in Kansas City.
Here she has lived since, rearing her
children.
Last year pension claim was sub
mitted to the local Office of a widow
who proved her marriage in 1887, and
also the death of her husband in 1899
in soldiers home in South Dakota.
The question of a prior marriage Of
the husband had been raised and the
matter was sent here for investigation.
1t was another hard case, but little
by little it worked itself out 1t de-
veloped that the young Ohio engineer
had tired of the wife he had left at
home, and wanted to be free. The way
that suggested itself to him was to
make her think. he was dead He
caused to be inserted in the Ell Paso
paper the notice of his own death
| Then he calmly marked it and mailed
| it himself to his wife. The claim of
| his second wife for a pension brought
| the whole sordid little story to light.
In order to disprove fully the claims
| of the second wife it was necessary
/ to learn whether the first wife had
| ever secured a divorce. Such a thought
had never entered, her head. The ne
cessity for it had never suggested it
self to her..
Why, of course, thought he was
| dead" she walled. Wasn't it in the
paper? Here is the clipping now.
| What shall we do? My children are
disgraced, and what will my husband
say. But he isn't my husband is he?
l am So years old and never had any
thing happen to make me hide my
head. Do you think we had better
be married again? Oh, what will the
children say?" So sincere was the
distress of the poor soul, and so con-
scientious was she that the agent had
| difficulty in persuading her that there
was no occasion for the children or
| anyone else to know of her predica-
| ment.
But the other woman did not get a
| pension.
1