MILLIONAIRE'S SON DIES DESTITUTE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLV, Issue 13727, 18 April 1908, Page 2 (Supplement)

MILLIONAIRE'S SON DIES DESTITUTE.

DISINHERITED FOR LOVE. "He was an atheist in belief, but I took his hand in mine and knelt down by thll bedside and prayed for him.- Then I said. "If you cannot s.|ie*k you can think; and if you cannot see outward things you cam look inside.' Then I sat down, and be seemed to smile faintly. When I looked again he was dead—died without a struggle or a sign." That was the description given by his landlady, of the death of Charles William Halliday, the son of a reputed American millionaire, who died in a small tenement house at Southgrove, Mile End. The other side of the story is a more sombre one. Dr. Muir having told the coroner at the Stepney inquest that deceased's death was due to chronic alcoholic poizoning. And behind the two statements lies the history of two lives made wretched by the folly and harshness of one man, and the obstinacy and passion of the other. Halliday was not known either to the Chief Consul for the United States, nor to anyone at the American Embassy. His father was a member of a very important professional firm in the State of Jersey, and a man of great political and social influence. That he was wealthy and able to allow his son a very large expenditure there is ample evidence. Young Halliday's own story was that he used to spend £300 or £400 a week ir New York. In 1889 he was living at Lowell, in the State of Massachusetts, and there met a young Portuguese or Polish Jewess, who had recently arrived from England. She was on the stage, appearing at music halls, or, as it is there called, "vaudeville" entertainments, and was making something of a sensation. FATHKU SrURNS son's WIKK. That both were much in love their letters home and to friends used to indicate, and presently they were married. Life after that, for a long time, whs very sweet, Mr. Halliday used to tell his friends. Only one cloud darkened it. His father absolutely refused to recognise the marriage, denounced his son as '* an ungrateful young idiot." gradually deprived him of his accustomed income," and refused to meet the woman he had wedded. In his wrath Halliday cursed his father, and when they met later there was a quarrel that ended in final separation. Apparently the father carried out his threat to "leave him to starve," but from some other source canie a regular -emittance, amounting to a little less than £2 a week. The wife wis yearning to see her friends in England, and about 12 years ago they came to London. Whether it was frequently-recurring sickness, or love that had died, or the toogreat sacrifice that both had made financially, is not quite clear. But it is certain they drifted apart, until the husband was living at Bow Common Lane, in the East End, where his wife used to call for her share of his income, amounting to ].2s a- week. TRAGEDY OF DRINK. She became "a prey to rheumatism. The once shapely fingers were knotted and drawn by the disease, and the once beautiful face became thin and hollow-cheeked and lined by agony. Next the brain went, and the doublyafflicted woman had to go into an asylum. Apparently cured, a.fter a time she returned to her husband's abode, and begged to be taken in. She was very ill, and in a few weeks consumption compelled her to enter the infirmary, where she died without seeing him again. In the meantime Halliday, also, was getting a full share of suffering. First i. r all a stroke of paralysis held him prisoner, drawing the left corner of the mouth out of shape, and spoiling the handsome countenance that had done so much towards winning his wife's affection.

Next, he fell down glairs, breaking one arm in four or live places, and the limb was crippled^ Finally, a dry, hacking cough, a weak heart and failing strength compelled him to take to his bed. Solid food became abhorrent to him, and rum appeared the only thing that kept him alive. After hi« wife's death he took more a.nd more, adopting all kinds of manoeuvres to obtain it without the knowledge of Mrs. Graydon, his landlady, who nursed hixn like a sister.

One day she heard a noise in his room, and, going there, found he had fallen heavily. Next day he called her to him, and said —

•'lsn't it hard, me, the son of a millionaire, to be buried by the workhouse?— Sister Idawrite her—you have been a sister to me—she will respect, you for it— good-bye soon." That evening he died in the presence of Mrs. Graydon's mother, leaving only one relative, his sister, Mrs. Charlotte Ida Holton, of Jersey City, New York. A stranger has come forward to undertake the burying of the body, and the ConsulGeneral has wired to Mrs. Graydon that he will contribute to the cost, so that the last chapter of Halliday's history will not be quite so sad as he feared.