WAUPACA POST

June 28, 1894

 

WHAT MARSTON SAYS.

 

To the Editor of the Sentinel.

            APPLETON, Wis., June 27. – The special committee appointed by Col. J.A. Watrous, department commander of the G.A.R., to investigate the condition of the Wisconsin Veterans’ Home at Waupaca having made its report, and the same having been published in The Sentinel of June 22, I desire to be heard briefly upon the subject.

            I deem it my duty, as well as my privilege to inform the Grand Army of this department and the people of the state at large that the said report is false and misleading, and that the assertions contained therein cannot be substantiated by an impartial investigation.  Furthermore, the said report is a slander upon the institution and upon those entrusted with its management, and the findings of the committee are not justified by the evidence presented at the investigation.

            I was present during the entire investigation, and many times informed the committee that the testimony of certain inmates and discharged ex-inmates called to the witness stand by Owen Clark of Stevens Point on behalf of the prosecution was entirely unreliable.  The witnesses in question were known by the management to be persons of unsound mind, incapable of assuming the obligation of an oath and totally irresponsible.

            It should be understood here that the said Owen Clark had no proper or authorized connection with either the investigating committee or the Home.  He is a resident of Stevens Point, and to the best of my knowledge is unfriendly to the Home and its management.  He was present during the entire proceeding and without warrant or authority took an active part in conducting the prosecution.  He selected the witnesses, indicated the line of testimony, and in various ways steered the case on the part of the prosecution.

            The Wisconsin Veterans’ Home has during the seven years of its existence been inspected by about forty different committees appointed for that purpose.  If the report of the present committee is not false, then there are forty reports in file in the Department G.A.R. and W.R.C. which by the report in question are declared to false.  These reports include those of the State inspector of State and National Homes, and also of the following ex-department presidents of the Woman’s Relief Corps:  Mrs. Dunlap, Lodi; Mrs. J.H. Rogers, Milwaukee; Mrs. Charity Rusk Craig, Viroqua; Mrs. Caroline H. Bell, Milwaukee; Mrs. Carleton, Mrs. Hanover, Mrs. Burchard, Milwaukee.  Besides the reports of the above named officers and of the foregoing noble woman of state reputation, there is that most thorough and painstaking report of ex-Department Commander Michael Griffin of Eau Clair, and every one of the aforementioned reports, without exception, have spoken kindly of the Wisconsin Veterans’ Home and its management.  Unless, then, all these reports by competent persons of undoubted integrity are false, that portion of the committee’s report having reference to Supt. Caldwell, his wife the matron, and ms. Richardson, the assistant matron, is slanderous and unworthy of a dignified reply, I am much mistaken if the noble women of this department W.R.C. do not hurl the false reports concerning Mrs. Caldwell back in the teeth of those who gave them currency.

            The writer has been active in the management of the Home from its inception to the present time, and for this reason, if no other, is better qualified to judge of the Home and its management than the committee which was steered by Owen Clark of Stevens Point, who is not friendly to the Home.  And again I characterize the report of the committee as false and not warranted by the testimony or capable of substantiation by an unprejudiced investigation.

            In regard to that portion of the report referring to the purchase of supplies from the Home from trustees of the same.  I have permission to quote the opinion of an ex-United States senator from this state.  He said he had read the report of the committee as published in The Sentinel, and could not believe that the committee was justified in making said report.  That portion regarding the purchase of supplies from trustees of the Home must fall to the ground, because the testimony did not show that higher prices had been paid than would have been the case had the supplies been purchased from others.  Said he:  “If I were a trustee of the Home, I should feel that I had a perfect right to sell supplies to the Home, and sell them cheaper than anyone else.”

            The prosecution having concluded their testimony Saturday, I was asked on Monday morning by a member of the committee how many witnesses we wished to have examined.  I answered, “one hundred and fifty.”  The committee then informed me that Mr. Owen Clark had gone home Saturday night stating that I had assured him that we “would not make this a show-down.”  I said to the committeeman:  “We will not; but Clark having had four days to present his case, we will ask for one,” adding, “if it were my case before a court, I would not offer a witness, but would ask for a non-suit,” so flimsy was the testimony offered and subsequently used by the committee as the basis for their unwarranted report.

            Most of the witnesses called to the stand by Owen Clark in behalf of the prosecution were old women who in my opinion were not competent to give testimony under oath.  For this reason we did not deem it necessary to cross-examine many of them.  We could not believe that their testimony would be credited by the committee.  To quote the words of an eminent authority on the inmates of similar institutions:  “The great majority of the inmates are old people who have gone there to end their days.  They are broken in spirit, homeless, comparatively friendless, many of them cripples and all of them diseased.  Some are there because of their own improvidence, some from the neglect and ingratitude of their children, and some in the hard struggle of life have simply gone to the wall. Without regard to varied causes of their misfortunes, these they are:  old, feeble, helpless, sorrowful, suffering with dimmed eyes, trembling hands and tottering limbs.”  It was on the testimony of such unfortunate and mentally enfeebled persons as described above that the report of the committee was founded.

            In conclusion I would say that the trustees were led to believe that the complaints were not of such a nature and importance as to need any particular defense on the part of the Home and its management.  During the recent encampment at Janesville it came to my knowledge that it has been charged by those unfriendly to the Home, that I have during my seven years’ service as trustee, in some cunning manner succeeded in sidetracking everything that would reflect on the management of the Home. [This charge was not made by the committee.]  Would that I could have “side-tracked” the report of this committee!  If I could have done so it would have been the proudest act of my life, in as much as it would have defended the Home from a cruelly false report.  Most respectfully submitted,               J.H. Marston.

 

*****

 

(Sentinel, June 29.)

UNNECESSARY ACERBITY.

            We think that Capt. Marston, president of the Board of Trustees of the Waupaca Home, is unduly and unwarrantably violent in calling the report of the investigating committee false and misleading.  He is quite entitled to hold a different opinion from that arrived at by the committee, but there is no occasion for the use of such strong language.  This excessive irritability seems either to indicate that he has been touched in a sore spot or that he regards the Home as outside the pale of hostile criticism. Even supposing that some of the findings of the committee are erroneous, we do not think there is reason for impeaching their impartiality.

            The character of the members of the investigating committee clears them completely from the imputation of unfairness contained in Capt. Marston’s letter.  Further, the publicity given to the investiga-tion shows that it was conducted with a manifest desire to get all the facts and render a decision purely on the merits of the case. Whatever may be said for or against the Home, there is absolutely no evidence that the investigation was conducted unfairly.  The judgment of the committee may be impugned, but its motives should be above suspicion.

 

*****

 

            Stevens Point Gazette:  The committee recently appointed by Commander Watrous to investigate the charges against the management of the Waupaca Veterans’ Home, have made their report.  The report severely criticized the superintendent and matron as well as some of trustees and others employed in official capacities and recommend a number of changes, both in persons and in the manner of conducting matters.  The report is a lengthy one, covering some six columns.  The committee was composed of two Republicans, E.D. Coe, of Whitewater, and P.J. Clawson, of Monroe, and one Democrat, John Meeham, of Darlington.  This investigation was commenced by Mayor Owen Clark, of this city, who brought the matter to the attention of the department encampment of the Grand Army, and when it was attempted to hush the matter up, he threatened to have over one hundred affidavits and statements which he held in his hand published by the state press.  This caused a change of sentiment in certain circles, and an investiga-tion was ordered. Mr. Clark naturally feels well pleased over the report, and believes that much good will follow.

 

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            The Evening Wisconsin:  The report of the committee appointed at the instance of the G.A.R. to investigate the State Soldiers’ Home at Waupaca is an arraignment of the trustees rather than the managers of the institution, though it recommends, and no doubt wisely, that the management should be changed.  There was a want of proper system in the conduct of the Home, and the matron evidently had more duties assigned to her than any one woman could perform. As for the trustees, those of them who sold supplies for the institution from their own stores followed a course that is perilous to men who would retain the confidence of the public.  The investigation was a good thing.  Vigilant oversight of the management of all public institutions is a good thing.  Unless there is frequent and efficient oversight, evils are likely to creep in, and the longer they pass undetected the larger they grow.