Year: 1877

Shame and Death in a Poor
house.


New York Times.J


A week ago there died in the


Aims House at Newport, Kentucky


opposite Cincinnati, a woman whose


social record on the Western CONT


nent is remarkable one. Her
story is we'll known to many. A
brief resume oft however. will be oi
interest to the readers of the Dis
patch. Helen Maude Mosely was
the only child of late Ex-Governor
of Florida. Educated in a French
convent, reared in what is teamed
the "lap of luxury she was, two
years before the civil war, the belle
of the Southern watering. places and
a leader in the society to which ner
fathers wealth and social standing
gave her the entree. In 1859 she
married a prominent physician in
Savannah, Georgia. In 1860 she
was attended at childbirth by anoth-
er well known member of the Escu-
lapian guild of that city. The ac-
quaintance thus began ripened into
illicit intimacy, and the discovery
Of the liason resulted in a divorce
and the abandonment of the young
wife by heS husband. Her lover
soon tired of her. and the outbreak
of the war found her penniless and
friendless in Savannah. She then
made the acquaintance OF a mal
who afterward became a Comnis>
sary-General and a large contractor
in the service of the Confederacy.
and lived with him until the entry
OF the Union troops into Savannah,
when he fed with Bragg's army =.
On the morning after tue occupatio
of the city by the Federal army,
young officer of an Ohio regiment.
who had been posting guards in the
street, saw her at her garden gate,
and asked her for q glass of water.
Learning that she was alone, he
posted a guard over her house, and
by various other attentions soon
came to occupy the place of the ab-
sent contractor. Hec house, during
this period, was a favorite resort of
many Union officers, but she is said
to have been nnalterably faithful to
the one. In conversation with q
Dispatch reporter, one of them habi-
tues or the house describes "Nelly
Walsh" as she called herself, as q
lady in every sense, of social and
intellectual development. Previous
to the war she had written for Xari-
Gus papers--notably the New York
Lecger-ever the name of ''Flora de
Forest" She was a woman of a
deeply devotional nature, and, to
use the informant's own words.
"drank and ate opium to kill her
me mory." ai" h'De


When the regiment of her lover
left Savannah, Nelly Walsh applied
to one OF the Generals in charges
soldier whose name stands among
the first in the records of the rebel
lion-for q continuance of the pro-
lection. The General did more.
He assumed that duty himself, and
when he took charge of a depart
ment, one of his Adjutants escorted
the fair rebel in his train. She lived
with him for several years. and when
he was appointed to a mission
abroad he took her with him. His
efforts to secure her a social stand
ing there. and, after his return. in
this country, caused great scandal
and a huttering in high society.
He clung to her faithfully, however,
and it was only when the opium
habit gained ruinous ascendency
over her that he left her. even then
giving her considerable sum of
money. OF this and the products
of her pen size lived for couple OF
years more, writing for several of
the local serial papers; but her be-
setting sin brought her down step
by step until her brain refused its
office. and she disappeared. How
she lived from that time until, half
crazed and wholly broken down and
hopeless. she obtained admission to
the New York poor house, willneyer
be known. Her identity was estah-
lished from her incoherent rawlings
and few remnants of letters in her
pockets. For weeks before she died
she was insane. Every. night and
morning, instinctiyely. an it were,
she repeated the prayers learned in
her happy youth in her French
0o