The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1910-03-23
END OF PECULIAR CASE.
Sister Of Mrs. B. F. Mcclellan, j, Held
Captive for Nearly a Year.

Considerable interest was aroused in
this county q year ago over the myster-
Ious disappearance Of the wife OF Mr..
John Edmunds, q brother Of Mrs. B. F,
Mcclellan, Jr., Of Greenwood. Nh. Edmunds
atthe time was q railroad employee maxi:
home late n night, having been detained
at his work, and found his wife absent
noneof his childl IN knew Of her going away
and for about a year the family were In
entire ignorance Of her whereabouts.
A letter was received here by Mrs. Nc
kellar recently rom a member Of the family
giving the history of the peculiar disapp-
earance and detention OF Mrs. Edmunds.
The letter says:
Kate says she went out, In the lot to
lock the h~en-hOuse door, after she got the
children off to bed. 1t was very wet and
cold, so she put on her rubbers and put
something on her head and threw an old
cloak around her as it was q little distance
she turned to go In, she saw a shadow In
front OF her. Suddenlya man caught her
by her shoulder and before she could move
another man had hold Of her on the other
side and threw q long heavy cloak over her
She screamed once and they told her to
shut upi if she wanted to live. Then she says
she would have dropped right there IL they
hadn't held her up. They walked a short
distance and in the woods was a wagon in
which they placed her. When she came to
herself, she was in a launch on the water,
strapped to the bench hand and foot. They
travelled two nights and one day, the cur
tains Of the boat all fastened down 81 that
no n could see what was inside. They
landed the second night, united her and
put her in an auto, there were three people
beside herself. They rode quite a while and
pulled up to an old bouse entirely sur
rounded by trees, covered with moss, the
most desolate looking place on earth as far
she could see. They carried her upstairs
put her In a oom with one chair and a
comfortable bed. The room had two win
dows, but she could see nothing but woods
everywhere she looked. There she spent
all this time until the last day of Decem-
Der, when they bought her a ticket to Biz
m lie and got on a boat, travelled all night,
reached New Orleans about day brek, put
her off and turned and left her standing In
the street near the depot.
''She wrote that letter John received
soon after her capture and this same man
who dictated 1t and an old negro woman,
and the woman who belonged to the gang
helped her to escape. This last woman also
had a ticket to Birmingh. m, 80 they got
the train at New Orleans together.
But the woman said they had better sep
arate 80 she left Kate and went to some
othe" part o: the train. Wlen they reached
Mobile, Kate got off and went back to New
Orleans because she wanted to be near her
she thought they we're still at Slid
dell and she thought too, maby these folks
we're sending her into another trap. She
finally concluded to write to her sister In
Birmingham, since she could not hear
from Slidell, and she had only a few
dollars and no clothes. She wrote and they
sent her money on the next train, and told
her to come on there at once, but she did
not know they had her children up there
as I said before she thought they we're still
at at Slidell and this man had told her sew
eral times to keep away from that place.
After remaining in New Orleans three
weeks she found out that her mother had
her children, so she went to Birmingham
at once. She says during this awful year,
she was most kindly treated. She had two
bid spells Of sickness while there and these
negro women and this same man who, by
the way, had studied medicine in Paris
were Just as kind and attentive to her as
they could be and she had everything she
wanted to eat, cooked any way she chose"
Greenwood Index.