Ft. Worth Daily Gazette
Wednesday,
July 1, 1885
pg. 4
SHERMAN
The court
organized a jury to try the sanity of the
insane stranger who was brought to Sherman a few
weeks ago from the Nation. He was
found in a raving condition and two men brought him
to Sherman to have him cared for.
There being no law for taking citizens of the Nation
in charge and providing for them in Texas,
the two men found themselves with an
elephant that they could neither hold nor
let go in any regular way, but they hauled the poor
fellow on north about a mile and left
him. Then our authorities were compelled to
notice the case and he was ordered to the
poor farm. The inquest today was held for
the purpose of proceeding regularly to
administer on his property consisting of a few
articles of household and kitchen goods
and a wagon and team, and also to secure a place
for him in the stat asylum.
Ft. Worth Daily Gazette
Thursday,
October 1, 1885
pg. 4
SHERMAN
...Some
time last June a man totally insane was
brought in a wagon by 2 attendants from the Indian
Territory to Sherman, to be provided for
by our court and sent to a place of safety.
Our officials informed them that Texas
laws only enabled them to provide for our own
citizens, and that they had no
jurisdiction over the people of the
Nation. The men in charge
started out on the Denison road, as if to
return from when they came, but, after getting
about a mile north of the city, they
fastened the poor unfortunate to the wheel with a
lock and chain and left for parts
unknown. Of course our authorities
had to take charge of him, and he was
sent to the county farm until the Terrell
asylum was completed, when he was taken
there for treatment. In his more
lucid moments he would talk
intelligently and gave evidence of culture
and refinement not at all in keeping with his rough
exterior and wild condition. The
interest taken in the "wild man from
the
Nation," as he was called here, had almost
been forgotten until a few days ago.
It was revived by his alighting from
the cars at the depot and making his way
to the court-house, where he showed up
like a prince compared with his first
appearance, and in a dignified and
respectful manner thanked our officials
for the kindly interest they had taken in
him and the great benefit they had
conferred upon him by their timely aid.
He also
remembered his gentle keeper, Mr. Wm.
Wells, at the poor farm and took a trip there to see
him and express his gratitude for the
attention he had bestowed on him while an inmate
of the place. His talk at that time
led Mr. Wells to think his name was
Freeman,
and it now turns out that it is J.W.
Freeman, who served as a private in the Sixteenth
Tennessee regiment during the war in the
Confederate army and that he is a native of North
Alabama. He says his affliction was
caused by a blow on the head by an enemy in the
Territory, that resulted in a protracted
spell of brain fever and subsequent insanity, and
that while he was in that helpless
condition some bad men divested him of a handsome
property that he had accumulated while he
lived there. He seemed not to harbor any
animosity against these men and will not
at present take any steps to get back what has
been taken from him. He left on the
east-bound train Tuesday for his native country.
A
little 8-year-old son of J.B. Tissington,
who lives on North Travis street, strayed
away
from home evening before last and had not
been heard from up to 4 o'clock yesterday.
Susan Hawkins
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