The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1906-04-08
MRS, READER IS
AGAIN IN ACTION
Her Batteries Trained on Peru
This Time
SHE WANTS S5,OOO,OOO
Declares the Peruvian Government
and the American Minister Are
Connivlng With a Mining
Syndicate.
SHE WANTS S5,0O0,00O

New York. April 7.--tSpecial.)-Mrs Ella
Rawls Reader, the Alabama woman in
whose life the starting of a revolution
Is mere incident, is again training her
batteries on a South American govern
ment Although she has started on war
there she is again after Peru. 1t is Il
trine of S5,OOOOOO that Mrs. Reader de-
mands of the Peruvians.
To back up her demands she asserts
that she has been the victim of an
abominable plot in which the Peruvian
government. the Peruvian courts and the
American minister to Peru have connived
with a mining syndicate to keep her out
of the country
Mean looking scoundrels,n she says,
"haye logged my footsteps and my life
has been in peril What I now demand
IS retribution / want S5.20O00O damages
and will fight for it."
Besides making excitement in Peru
Mrs Reader for a brief space turned
her attention to Santo Domingo and
stirred up a rumpus between that coun-
try and the United States. Then she
dropped out of sight until she tackled
this latest Peruvian diversion.
Why She Wants Damages.
According to her story her present
grievance springs out Of the mining con
eessions given her by President Can
damo. Mrs. Reader, as president of the
Cerro de Pasco Tunnel and Mining COM
of miners in 1902 and began preparations
for working the mines. Before trans
porting her mineworkers to Peruvian soil
Mrs. Reader at her office at No. 45 Wall
street contracted with the Andes Min
ing company, concern backed by the
J. B. Haggin syndicate, for Il set of
smelling machinery, paying. under the
terms of the deal. $4,000 down and Civ
ing notes for a $25 600 balance.
When she tried to get hold of the
smelling machinery. stored at Callao,
Peru, she found it tied up in some
mysterious litigation which she didn't
understand. She promptly hired some
Peruvian lawyers, and the first court
they went to Immediately gave an or
der compelling the custodians of the
smelter to deliver the property to her
When this order was served upon Dr.
Julldn hulclluO INoiiitAos 1OuiStl " liit
Andes company, he tossed it aside and
held onto the smelter.
Another order was secured from the
court and this time in turn ignored
The custodians declared that they had
received an order of the court not to
let go of the machinery until the Andes
company had consented. and as yet no
consent had been received. The custodi-
ans. in the meantime. were charging a
commission of per cent q month of the
entire value of the machinery for storage.
Mrs Reader figured that In a year this
would eat up half the value of the ma
chinery Three months had gone by and
she was no nearer getting the smelter
than before she made the contract in
New York
Mrs. Readers lawyers went from one
court to another. collecting a variety
of orders to delivery the machinery.
but the custodians chung to it, As the
litigation progressed Romero was elevated
TO the bench, and in his capacity of Judge
Mrs Reader says, handed down a num-
Der of decisions that prevented her get
ting the smelter
Appeals to Minister.
In desperation, Mrs. Reader, who was
mourning great expense in the board of
herself and her idle mine workers and
the various turns of litigation appealed
10 Senior ID. Jorge Polar, the minister
of justice of Peru. She explained that,
while the Andes company seemed to eN-
ercse some strange influence over the
courts, she was unable to get any sort of
action. The minister took il up and then,
Mrs. Reader says, suddenly dropped it
without explaining why. Later on. she
declares she discovered that some of the
-
were interested in the Andes company.
which wanted to get a monopoly of the
Peruvian mines. and that Polar did not
want to get mixed up in it.
Mrs Reader next tackled Mr.. Dudley
the American minister at. Peru. and
Dudley, she says, expressed intense in
dignation over the affair and promised
to see that she got the machinery. lie
asked her to call on him the next day.
She did so, and found to her surprise,
that Dudley's manner had undergone a
complete metamorphosis.
There is very delicate matter con-
nected with this" he told her, "and
hope YOU will not press me 10 go fur
Their with It.
Mrs. Reader says she later found that
Dudley's picture had been played up in
an advertisement of the Andes COM
pany in Boston paper as being one of
the hackers of the company, and she
readily understood. after that, why he
had suddenly lost interest in her plight
Loses Her Lawyers.
In the mean time various of Mrs
Readers lawyers were being won over to
the side of the opposition. Sometimes
when a new feature of her action against
the Andes company was called In court
she would lind herself without counsel
II got so that she could not trust any
body. The whole crew. she says, seemed
10 have fallen into the clutches of the
Haggin syndicate
She would have gone to the president of
the republican, long before, but Candamo
had died and she had heard that his
successor, Pardo, was not in sympathy
with her. When finally. she did go to
Pardo and pleaded her rights as an
American citizen, she says he told her
that her presence in the country was
distasteful TO him and requested that
she leave Immediately President Roose-
welt, he said, had confided TO him that
he was opposed to Mrs. Reader doing
any mining business in Peru. Mrs. Read
er testify replied that she proposed stay