Los Angeles herald., 1909-06-20

copyright 1902 by the New York SSd e AZ Rt
~ YER on Wards Island, where the State gives
hpitying to its mental unfortunates' there
y sits white haired, thin checked figure with
wasted folded hands, staring upon vacancy
the she'll of a 1t is all that is left of Robert
Caldwell in his way of the most remarkable indi-
viduals of a generation who has been the topic FOR
wondering comment on three continents; whose vivid
imaginative faculty and marvellous powers of simula
tion made him prominent if a false and temporary
factor in the two greatest mysteries of the twentieth
century-the disappearance of the body OIL A. l.
Stewart and the Druce-Portland case.
He is seventy-two years old feeble. impotent inert
stricken with fatal disease The hospital on the kind
ly island is douby his asylum. sovereign govern
ment keeps watchful eye upon him, ready to claim
its own the of Justice if nature should With
hold its hand-if he Shall regain normal relation to
the community In the view of the law
Those who know him now say that that vigilance
can result other than the routine completion
of official entries. They say Robert CadwelPs next
summons will be from earthly tribunal His long
est journey at present is from his bed to an arm
chair; his only pleasure is the weekly visit of his
daughter the friend left him. His only occupa-
ton is to sit and look, with gaze fixed far away-ou
what? Who shall say what Robert Caldwell sees?
This is the wreck of mighty imagination.
The "Twist."
Perhaps that helps to explain the white silent figure
on Wards Island. The Imagination awoke crippled, it
was not a genuine imagination, but twist To sat
isfy the immediate pressure of its existence the man
had to- exercise it, so much necessity. And in
forcing itself into action his faculty took strangely
useless form simply that he should try to convince
and important litigation That was all.
There are some who similarity between Cald-
well and the Tchborne claimant that extraordinary
Young Australian butcher, who memorized bible OF
facts and statistics and who never forgot to use the
right one at a snap emergency. But the claimant
had nothing beyond his memory He did not forinu'
late The resemblance between the men ends with
the pertinacty of each in supporting his pretensons
before the courts Caldwell went to no one for his
information. He created it, out of thin air, and then
advanced it cevery, plausibly, enthusiastically until
even those who had measured him began to doubt.
Caldwell's early life in Londonderry, Ireland is
but vaguely known. There some suggestion that
when he left there he living like corporation
attorney on an income of $500 year. Perhaps that
was first result of his Imagination His first serious
attempt, so far as is recorded, to put one of his
products into USE was made in the early eighties
He came to New York from Londonderry without
a copper his pocket in 1871 and obtained position
with the firm of A. T. Stewart The manner in which
he found this opening reads almost like one of his
own inventions. 1t seems that small Tammany
politician became involved in quarrel with some
0rangemen while travelling in the north of Ireland.
caldwell came to his aid So the politician remem-
bered him and paid his debt by placing the immt
grant In the store of the weathest merchant prince
of the country.
After the death of Mr.. Stewart and the subsequent