Arizona republican., 1906-11-30


seemingly unnatural surroundings Mr..
Banta asked him what possessed one OF
his attachments to waste his life in
such a desert, -forsaken country
as this is. He replied that he had
lived the life of a wanderer and an
adventurer so long that he never could
bring himself to return to his home
land and submit to the social hypo-
crasies and prescribed customs thar
such a life would demand. He prefer
red the wild life and freedom of the
frontier where he could be a law unto
himself. And then. as II to justify his
conclusion. he related something of
his life story. He said he was born
in England of noble family. Whether
he was himself a lord by birth or
whether only the brother OF a lord. the
latter title being given him here by
compliment. was not disclosed. but IN
any event he was from that sort OF a
family. Early in life. after finishing
his studies in the English schools. he
went to Paris where he studied for some
years and acquired command of the
French language. Going from the bo
hemian life of the French capital 10
Madrid. a few more years were spent
in study and in acquiring command
of the Spanish language. Here he
yielded TO the spirit of real adventure
and took ship at some Spanish port
for the new world. Captain Banta
does not remember for certain what
port Duppa sailed from but thinks It
was Barcelona. The destination was
Valparaiso. Chilli. Somewhere OFF the
west coast of South America the yes
sci was wrecked and Duppa made
a landing after a hard battle with the
waves. At that time he thought ne
was the sole survivor but learned years
afterward that a couple Of sailors were
also saved. For sometime after that
Duppa wandered or rather Travelled
around over South America, as his in
clination dictated, finally sailing for
New Zealand, a possession Of the
British government and in a measure
a little more like home, though about
as far from home as he could get. He
took to the grazing sections Of the is
lands and made himself at home in
the sheep camps for a time, until the
gold excitement in Australia began to
attract attention and he went there.
After the novelty of that had worn
away and the big gold excitement in
California electrified the world Duppa
sailed from Australia for San Fran
cisco and the gold diggings Later
when Arizona claimed attention I'm the
carly COS he came here. being first
seen by Captain Banta, as mentioned
above. in Prescott in 1868.
This story. told with but few details.
compared TO the many things that
might have been said. was q good an
swer 10 Captain Banta's question.
However, il did not reveal a great deal
of Duppa's boyhOcd surroundings or
his family connections and the visitor
not wishing to be too inquisitive did
not make further inquiry. Anyhow it
was bed time and sleep was next in
order
Nothing occurred that brought this
story wildly back to Captain Banta
until a number of years afterward,
when he CHANGED to pick up a book
somewhere telling 4 very strange tale
of the estate of a family named fish
man or Tishner. II seemed from the
book that this was a large estate and
that the heirs We're somewhat scat
tered. One in particular was greatly
sought for and an imposter who had
heard of the facts in connection with
the estate, had played the part Of the
missing man. He had heard that the
missing heir had sailed from Spain
for Valparaiso; had been wrecked and
that all on board were lost. He had
studied the situation so well that he
was fairly well fortified with facts and
went from the western world to Eng
land. representing himself to be. the
lost heir However he was so different
in appearance that he ELECTED sus-
picion from the first. Pictures Of the
lost heir as he appeared when last
seen in Europe. were among the pos
sessions of the solicitors for the es-
tate and they were so unlike the ap-
pearance of the claimant it could not
be admitted that he had changed so
much. \ thorough investigation prov
ed the man a fraud and he was sent
10 prison for life or for very Ions
term. This mans picture was repro
duced in the book. and further over
was the reproduction Of an old dagu-
erreotype of the real heir. as he APP
peared just before sailing for Spain.
Captain Bants says that the moment
he saw that picture. he felt that he was
looking at a photograph of Darrell
Duppa. Furthermore the book made
mention OF the fact that the lost heir
was classical student, fond OF
Shakespeare and could repeat his
writings page after page. That was
distinguishing feature of Duppa's per-
sonality. as many Arizona pioneers can
testify and the fraudulent heir when
put to the Shakespeare test failed ut
terly. giving as the reason that he
had been in the wilds so long he had
lost the memory Of those things. II
was a long time after that before MI.
Banta saw Duppa again and when he
did he restrained himself from speak
ing about the matter for a number OF
reasons. First Re knew that Duppa
was either directly or Indirectly in