Year: 1876

A correspondent of the Providence
Journal writes as follows: In the au-
tumn OF 1868 [ went up from southern
Europe to spend few months in the
gay capital of Saxony. Those of our
nationality in. Dresden are very clannish,
live in the same part of the town, give
parties and dinners and germans as at
home, and mix little with foreigners, 80
that once one commences to move round
In the circle, one soon meets all who
compose it. Among the many whom ]
met at the American club, at parties,
dinners, and at his own house, was an
American gentleman known to us as
VIM. Thomas. He was a large, stout
man, weighing possibly two hundred
and fifty pounds. He wore heavy red
beard and mustache, and always ap-
peared in public with heavy gold spec
tacles. He was quiet sort of person,
never taking the lead in anything, but
still interesting himself in everything
that was going on, and good member
of society generally. He lived at the
time with his wife, a charming little
black-eyed woman, and family, in a
handsome suite of rooms, on the corner
just above the club, and used frequently
to entertain in a quiet, pleasant way,
those whom he counted among his more
intimate friends. Among them I may
say was numbered, and so often found
my way through his hospitable door.
He lived, he said, in North Carolina,
and at the breaking out of the war found
himself obliged to 60 into the Southern
army. He was in North Carolina reg
iment during the summer campaign Of
1862, and at Malvern Hills was wounded
in the arm. 1t WAS in the evening, as
he sat with some comrades around their
camp fire, that a shell exploded in their
midst, killing nearly all, and weunding
him, as 1 have said. He was sent to the
rear and finally discharged as unfit for
active service. He went then to Viii
mington, bought all the cotton he
could, ran the blockade successfully,
took his cargo to Liverpool, and sold it
at an enormous profit. Then he imme-
diately invested his money in United
States bonds, which were then at their
lowest figures in the English market.
Afterward they trebled on his hands,
and between the cotton and the bonds
he made from $3.50, 900 to 100000. He
married afterward Southern lady, who
had been educated in Europe, and by
her had several children. He had not





the sea, and should be surprised if it
should be proved he had ever command
ed vessel. A sailor, as a rule, never
gets rid of the effect of the salt air in
his ways and habits and appearance, and
1 never was able to discover that Thorn
as was in any manner different from the
rest of us Thomas was the last person
among us in Dresden whom one would
select as man capable of doing such u
deed as he certainly did at Bremerhaven.
He was jolly good fellow, as the world
would say, yet quiet, and in fact, rather
lazy. That he was not insane when he
designed the plot for blowing up the ves-
sci, L cannot believe. It is SO entirely
different from what the man was from
his character as his friends knew it, that
I am unwilling to believe he was wholly
accountable for what he did. He was
in his family an extremely affectionate
man, and his wife and children we're as
tenderly cared for as wife and children
could be. It used to be remarked
among us that Thomas was unusually
devoted to h;s wife, and not O whim of
hers was allowed to go unsatisfed.