FATE UNKNOWN.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVIII, Issue 120, 22 May 1937, Page 4 (Supplement)

FATE UNKNOWN.

COMPLETE MYSTERY.

DISAPPEARANCE AT NIGHT

A COUPLE of generations ago one of the most brilliant of New York's

coterie of editors was Samuel Stillman Conant. Jieion of an intellectual family, he had been reared in an atmosphere of learning. His paternal grandfather, a wealthy Vermont manufacturer, had been a presidential elector and had founded an institution of learning. His father had been professor of Greek, Latin, German and Hebrew in various colleges and had revised the common English version o£ the Bible. His mother wa* editor of a magazine, as well as the author of many books and possessed a mastery of the Oriental tongues that proved of great value to her husband.

Naturally, such learned parents would select the h.gher education for their son. So after finishing at Madison University, Samuel Stillman Conant wae sent abroad to finish his training at the Universities of Berlin, Heidelberg and Munich. Returning home, he became connected with various journals and eventually became editor of "Harper's Weekly." F

Following the example of his father, he selected for his wife a woman of profound education and brilliant intellect. ■She, too, had been educated abroad, and had a genius for translating the foreign classics into English,- for she was an acomplished linguist, speaking Spanish, (Jerman and French fluently.

In January, 1885,. this happy couple were in the autumn of their yeare. Their evenings were spent in the enjoyment of their books, or in planning a future for their eon, now in his early twenties. No known family troubles or financial worries were known to interrupt Mr. Conent's slumbers. He was robust and strong. He had been editor of "Harper's Weekly" for 16 years. He was now in his 53rd year and his wife was 45.

Evening at the Club. The evening of Thursday, January 15, 1885, Mr. Conant spent at the Authors' Club and appeared to be in the best of health. The next morning he left his Brooklyn home with the understanding that in the evening he and his son would go to Albany to spend a week-end with an editor whom Conant sen. wished to see. That was Friday, and after waiting for his magazine to go to press the editor bade a cordial good-night to his colleagues, adding that he* would see them on Monday or Tuesday.

Anxiety began to be felt when he failed to keep his appointment with his son and when he , 'failed to send her an explanation that night his wife became alarmed. The fact that he had always been scrupulous about notifying her of hie exact whereabouts added to her suspicion that some untoward fate had overtaken him.

No clue to the disappearance mystery was gathered until the following Wednesday when a man entered a place in Coney Island and borrowed five dollars on a watch and chain. Young Conant later identified the jewellery as his own and the description given of the man who had left it tallied very closely with the published pictures of the missing editor.

The fact that the receipt given for the loan was signed "T. P. Stevens" caused considerable comment, inasmuch a* "T. P." were young Conant's initials and "Stevens" was Mrs. Conant's maiden name. This clue was carefully followed up and the same stranger who had hypothecated the watch and chain appeared to have parsed the previous night in a shelter hut upon the Coney Island beach. After obtaining the loan he had strayed into a store and chatted for an hour or two with the proprietor; then next day he had returned and had made himself so ajrreeable that the shopkeeper had persuaded him tn etay for supper. After telling his host that he was Editor .Conant of "Harper's Weekly," he had parsed out, into the night stating that he hud to catch the 7 o'clock train into Brooklyn. All Searches Fruitless. Learning next day of Mr. Conant's disappearance the «hopkeoper who had entertained him at Hiipi>er wrote to Harper Brothers, but entrusted the mailing of the letter to W friend who jifter carrying it in his pocket for some time posted it too late to make its contente effective in the search for the vanished editor.

A week after Mr. Conant's alleged appearance at Coney Island a friend saw him leave a hotel on Fulton Street and aeked him where he was going, but received only the brusque reply:

"Don't you see, I'm going up the street!"

This meeting when reported at the office of Harper Brothers initiated another search revealing a clue whereby the missing man was traced to a hotel in Long Island City, which he had left only an hour before the detectives arrived there in search of hinr. He was never eeen or heard of' again.

After hie disappearance his wife continued to live for several years with their eon in their home on Willow Stvcet, Brooklyn, where she tried to l;c.t> hereelf busy with her writings.

She compiled some excellent works on butterflies and a primer on the Spanish language which became a standard work. A dozen years after the vanishing of her husband her life was further saddened by the death of her son. Deprived now of her last means of support, she became confidential secretary the distinguished engineer, RoseiteV \V. Raymond, of Brooklvn.

After having endured for over 14 years the pangs of uncertainty as to her husband's fate, she died in a Brooklyn hospital in April. 1899, and was buried from the home of General Horatio King.

He had entered the Civil War with the 2nd Pennsylvania Bucktails, had fought bravely for the Union, had risen to the rank of lieutenant-colonel, had been twice wounded at Gettysburg and finally honourably discharged on account of his disabilities.

Following his discharge, he had speculated in lumber at Williamsport, Pa., and had become a partner of the famous Peter Herdic He returned to the place of his birth at Windsor, and there married the daughter of a rich farmer.

He was six feet two inches tall, and weighed 2501b. His beard was long and bushy. After some time he purchased a residence of his own and insured it at an unusually heavy figure. One night, when he and his family were in New York, the house mysteriously caught lire and burned to the ground. Some gossips accused him of incendiarism, but the insurance was paid, and with it he bega-n to promote lavish developments in Binghamton. He laid out a park, built 40 cottages and a hotel, named after himself, the Dwight House. In a short while he boasted of being a millionaire. Hobby Was Insurance. His hobby was insurance, and he took out big policies, upon which he directly began to negotiate heavy loans. He borrowed 30,000 dollars from one company, 40,000 dollars from another, 50,000 dollars from a third and various amounts from otners. Then came the awful financial panic of 1873. He went down before the avalanche and filed a petition in bankruptcy, rating his liabilities at 400,000 dollars. Deserted now by the friends who had enjoyed his opulence, he set off for Chicago and attempted to start life over again, but failure continued to lurk at his door.

Five years after the panic he returned to Windsor, glowing with health. He now took out life insurance policies aggregating 256,000 dollars, and, despite his excellent physical condition, had built for himself an elaborate brick-lined tomb. Then he made a will, leaving many bequests to persons, some of whom, it was later charged, he was to use as tools to carry into effect the most stupendous insurance swindle on record.

His extraordinary behaviour now began to excite much gossip. He appeared to be either courting death or pretending to subject himself to dangers that might account for future rumours of his demise.

In midwinter he would ewim icy streams, climb snow-clad peaks and return apparently exhausted from long cross-country walks. One insurance company sent an agent to tender him the amount of the premium which he had paid in and to cancel the policy, but Colonel Dwight, knowing his rights, haughtily declined.

At the Fifth Avenue Hotel, New York, about this time, he greatly surprised a friend by claiming a serious illness, despite the fact that he still appeared to be the picture of health. Shortly after this Dwight moved into a small cottage in Binjrhamton, went to bed, complained of chills, had a friend stay up with him all niprht, had his beard and hair trimmed, and the next day was reported to have died in the presence of a former law partner and of a brother-in-law.

Mrs. Dwight, who was staying at a hotel next floor, was summoned, as were the hotel proprietor and one of his guests. Body Pronounced Dead. All who saw Dwight lying in his bed attested to hie being dead. For two days his body lay in this room,- upon which had been placed a Yale lock. The only key was in the hands of the hotel proprietor. A physician stated that Dwight had died of gastritis, but physicians • representing the insurance companies maintained that he had killed himself. Some of them claimed to have found the imprint of a rope übout his neck.

Belief in Dwight's death, either from 6uicide or from natural causes, would have been universal had it not been for a little bottle found upon' the ground under his window. Upon its label was the word "Gelsat tium." Although this

mysterious drug was almost unknown to the physicians of Dwight's day, there were some who learned that its effect was to paralyse the motor nerves without the loss of consciousness and to thus produce temporarily an absolute simulation of death. Medico-legal authorities, considering the possibility of Juliet's suspended animation in the tomb where Romeo found her, have held that "gelsemium" would have produced her deathlike trance. Many Theories. To account for certain happenings apparently corroborative of Dwight's death, many interesting theories have been advanced. One was that after recovering from the drug he had been smuggled to some country and a corpse from a \cw York medical college substituted for his live body; also that the autopsy thought to have been performed upon Dwight was really performed upon this cadaver, one very essential feature of the operation having been the severing of the scalp across the top of the head and pulling it down over the features so as to mask them.

A few months after Dwight's reported death a man who had shared an office with him was absolutely certain that he met him on the street in Chicago. Tjiis appearance immediately gave rise to further theories as to his means of escape, one of them being that he Lad had himself placed in a box and thus ehipped out of Binghamton to a place where confederates had unpacked him and set him at liberty to enjoy a generous share of the insurance money handed back to him by some of those whom he had named as his legal heirs. One of the big companies which had insured his life made immediate payment without contest, but another made a bitter fight, which was pending in the Xcw York courts for many years. Whether Dwight escaped, hanged himself, died of carefully planned exposure, or from natural causes will in all probability never be known.