Americus times-recorder. [volume] (Americus, Ga.) 1891-current, 1913-02-08
NURSE TO GET
$4,000 LEGACY
Found in AtIuntiC City By
Law Firms Agent

will, detective employed by firm OF
British solicitors. found here today
MS. Helaine Russell, who has served
- nurse of the Red Cross society in
three wars, and as a result the VEN
cradle woman expects TO inherit $50
600 to make her last days more than
comfortable.
There had been an estrangement be-
tween herself and her entire family
since at the age of twelve years she
ran away from her home in Scotland
inspired with the motive of becoming
nurse. She found women who en-
couraged her design and she was en-
tered for training at the Swiss Red
Cross hospital at Geneva. For a long
time her family was unable to trace
her and when at last she had been
found her old Scotch father resented
her having left his home without per-
mission and later disapproyed of the
marriage she had made.
But some time prior to his death for
ty years ago he made a secret invest
ment of several thousands of dollars
in British Columbia iron and coal
stocks which have grown so largely
in value until the original Investment
now sums up $4,000 In codicil OF
his will her parent provided that this
money was to be kept in trust for his
absent daughter, but that the legacy
was on no condition to be paid to her
unless she should confront poverty.
Following instructions passed on to
them from their predecessors the Brit
ish law firm has kept Mrs. Russell
more or less under their observation.
1t was an eventful life that the sol
icitors had to follow At seventeen she
met w G. Russell a young artist who
afterward acquired considerable dis
tinction Afterward she got in touch
with her parents, but in their old-fasa
toned way they were scandalized by
the manner of her leaving home and OF
marrying at such tender years. She
received curt word that neither she
nor her husband need expect well
come there
After the death of the artist, Mrs.
Russells career as nurse really began.
She saw service in the Turco-Greco
war as Red Cross nurse, and later
in the Boxer uprising In China After
ward she came to Atlantic City wif'l
her two daughters
When the Spanish-American wal. DC.
Icurred she offered to enlist. but the
age regulations barred her from ac-
ceptance, She. however, had been
Cuba and acted as nurse for the pa
triots of the revolution in their rude
camps and decided she would go to
Cuba unattached She arrived there
on a blockade-runner of the Cuban
forces, but in order to get permission
to board that boat she had to pretend
to be a man. She put on male attire,
cut her hair short and successfully
carried out the disguise. She was well
coined in Cuba by commanders who
knew her of old and she served With
the native army till the end of the
war.
Then she came to Atlantic City.
II is understood the detective found
her and her daughters not in dire
need but in such circumstances as
warranted him in reporting that the
time of paying over her fathers Sc
cret legacy had come.
Aged Mrs. Russell willingly showed
a letter from Clara Barton, first pres'-
dent of the International Red Cross
society, and other credentials of her
career But she refused to discuss the
matter OF the legacy. She feared GER
tain relatives in Scotland who had
never forgiven her might undertake
to tie up the legacy with the red tape
of the British chancery courts.