Year: 1877




New York Dispatch: A week ago
there died in the almsheuse at Newport,
Kentucky, opposite Cincinnati, woman
whose social record on the western CONT
nent is remarkable one. Her story is
well known to many A brief resume
Of it, however, will be Of interest to all
readers of the Dispatch. Helen Maude
Mosely was the only child of late ex-
governor Of Florida. Educated in
French convent, reared in what is termed
the lap of luxury" she was, two years
before the civil war, the belle of the
southern watering places and leader in
the society to which her fathers wealth
and social standing gave her entree. In
1889 she married prominent physician
in Savannah, Georgia. In 1860 she was
attended at childbirth by another well.
known member of the Esculapian guild
of that ci.y, The acquaintance thus
began ripened into illicit intimacy, and
the discovery Of the liason resulted in
divorce and the abandonment of the
young wife by her husband. Her lover
soon tired of her, and the outbreak of
war found her penniless and friendless
in Savannah. She then made the ac-
quaintance OF a man who afterward be-
came a COmmissary-general and a large
contractor in the service of the confed.
eracy, and lived with him until the entry
of the union troops into Savannah, when
he fed with Bragg army. On the morn
ing after the occupation 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 gar
den gate, and asked her for a glass of
water. Learning that she was
alone, he posted guard over
her house, and by various other attentions
soon came to occupy the place Of the alb
sent contractor Her house, during this
period, was a favorite resort of many
union officers. but she is said to have
been unalterablv faithful to the one.
In conversation with Dispatch reporter,
one of the then habitues of the house de-
scrlbes Nelly Walsh, as she called her
self as a lady in every sense, OF social
and Intellectual development. Previous
to the war she had written for various
papers---n notably the New York Ledger
over the name of "Flora de Forest. She |
was a woman OF deeply devotional ma
ture, and to use the intormants own
words, drank and ate opium to kill her
memory When the regiment OF her
lover left Savannah, Nelly Walsh applied |
to one of the generals in change-.a sol
dier whose name stands among the first |
in the records of the rebellion-for a |
continuance OF the protection. The /
general did more. He assumed the duty f.
himself, and when he took charge of a
department, one OF his adjutants escorted
the fair rebel to his train. She lived
with him several years, and when he was
appointed to a mission abroad he took
her with him. His efforts to secure her
social standing there, and, after his re.
turn, in this country, caused great scan
dial and a Auttering in high society. He
clung to her faithfully, however, and it
was only when the opium habit gained
a ruinous ascendency over her that he
left her, even then giving her consider
able sum OF money. OFF this and the
products of her pen shelived for couple
of years more, writing for several Of
helocal serial papers, but her besettingsin
brought her down step by step until her
brain refused its office, and she disap-
peared. How she lived from that time
until halt crazed and wholly broken
down and hopeless, she obtained sdmis.
sion to the New York poor house, will
never be known. Her identity was es,
tablshed from her incoherent rawlings
and few remnants of letters in her
pockets. For weeks before she died she
was insane. Every night and morning,
instinctively, as it were, she repeated the
prayers learned in her happy youth in
her French school, and her last words
were supplication to her creator. In
her maddened moments the recital of
verse of poetry would calm her. She
asked continually for her child--a little
girl long since Gead--.the very child in
giving birth to whom she had met her
seducer. No word ever escaped her as
to her own life since 1875. The physicians
report serves as a pregnant comment on
the frightful habit to which she was
slave. For two weeks previous to her
death she consumed two ounces of laud-
anun, 1av y