Williams news., 1917-05-31


 I suppose that very few casual readers of the New York Herald of August 18th observed, in an obscure corner, among the Deaths" the an nOuncement:
 'NOLAN. Died, on board U. S. Cor gette Levant, Lat. % il" S., Long. 1310 w., on the 11th of May, Philip Nolan"
 happened to observe it, because was stranded at the old Mission house in Mackinac, waiting for Lake Superior steamer which did not choose to come, and was devouring, to the very stubble, all the current literature could get hold of, even down to the deaths and marriages in the ''Herald." My memory for names and people is good, and the reader will see, as he goes on, that had reason enough to remember Philip Nolan. There are hundreds of readers who would have paused at that announcement, if the officer of the Levant who reported it had chosen to make it thus: "Died, May 11th, The Man without a Coun-. try.'" For it was as '"The Man with put Country" that poor Philip Nolan had generally been known by the off, cers who had him in charge during some fifty years, as, indeed, by all the men who had sailed under them. [ dare say there is many a man who has taken wine with him once a fort night, in a three years cruise, who never knew that his name was "No- lan," or whether the poor wretch had any name at all.
 There can now be no possible harm ln telling this poor creatures story. Reason enough there has been till now, ever since Madison's administra- lion went out in 1917, for very strict secrecy, the secrecy of honor itself, among the gentlemen of the navy who have had Nolan in successive charge. And certainly it speaks well for the es- prit de corps of the profession and the personal honor of its members, that to the press this mans story has been wholly unknown, and, think, to the country at large also.
 have reason to think, from some Investigations made in the naval lrchives when I was attached to the bureau of construction, that every of icial report relating to him was burned when Ross burned the public buildings 1t Washington. One of the Fuckers, ,r possibly one of the Watsons, had Nolan in charge at the end of the war; ind when, on returning from his cruise, be reported at Washington to one of he Crowninshields- was in the navy department when he came home 'Hhe found that the department ig- bored the whole business. Whether hey really knew nothing about it, or whether 1t was a non mi ricordo, de- .ermined on as piece of policy, do aot know. But this I do know, that since 1917, and possibly before, no naval officer has mentioned Nolan in his report of cruise.
 As I say, there is no need for se- crecy any longer. And now the poor creature is dead, 1t seems to me worth while to tell little of his story, by way of showing young Americans of today what it is to be
 A MAN WITHOUT A COUNTRY.
 Philip Nolan was as fine a young officer as there was in the Legion of the Vest" as the western division of our army was then called. When Aaron Burr made his first dashing ex- petition down to New Orleans in 1905, at Fort Massac, or somewhere above on the river, he met, as the devil would have it, this gay, dashing, bright young fellow, at some dinner party, I think. Burr marked him, talked to him, walked with him, took him a day or two's voyage in his flatboat, and in short, fascinated him. For the next year barrack life was very tame to poor Nolan. He occasionally availed of the permission the great man had given him to write to him. Long, high worded, suited letters the poor boy wrote and re-wrote and copied. But never line did he have in reply from the gay deceiver. The other boys in the garrison sneered at him, because he sacrificed in this unrequited affec- ton for a politician the time which they devoted to Monongahela, sledge, and high-low-jack. Bourbon, euchre,