Reporter—What do you assign, madam, as the primary cause of his insanity?
Mrs. H.—At the age of nineteen my son began attending lectures given by anti-meat eaters, spiritualists etc., and impressed with their nonsensical doctrines, he, about that time, quit eating meat and took to a vegetable diet, and I think those lectures, together with this diet, had much to do with it.
Reporter—I do not understand how a vegetable diet could cause insanity, when it is well known that Horace Greeley is a vegetintarian?
Mrs. H.—Well, isn’t he insane sometimes?
Reporter—Mr. Bennett, of the Herald, and Dana, of the Sun, say he is; but they think so because Mr. Greeley venerates a dilapidated white hat, wears shocking bad shoes, and is a member of the free love order.
Mrs. H.—Well, those lectures certainly had much to do with his insanity, for his disease began to develop soon after his attendance upon them.
Reporter—Some of the papers stated he was confined because of a desire on the part of his family to get $40,000, alleged to have been left him and to accomplish which, they further intimated that your husband did not die a natural death.
Mrs. H.—My son John never had any money in his own right; he has been kept, maintained and clothed by his brother Joseph ever since his affliction, and indeed long previous to it. As for intimations concerning my husband, the whole thing must have originated in the brain of a woman of fervid imagination, claiming to have some connection with the Sunday Dispatch. That lady called to see me, and with acts of kindness, such as throwing her arms around me, and informing me she would send a carriage to have me taken away for fear the crowd around the house would do me bodily injury, and with a promise to give a true account, she got a full and true statement of the case; but to my surprise and indignation, published nothing but a tissue of falsehoods. How a young woman professing to be a lady could so act towards me, an old woman of eighty, I cannot comprehend.
Mrs. Herriges then went on to tell us her poor afflicted boy had been the one care of her life; that she took him away from the insane asylum because she knew they did not know how to feed him, and that he would soon die there if allowed to remain; that she had ever watched over him with all the affection of a mother, never wearying in her attendance upon him.
When we asked, “What of your husband?” we were informed that many years ago he went to Oregon, took up a section of ground in Villamette valley, previous to which he had built himself a house in Oregon City. He died about twenty years ago, and the first knowledge we had of it was from a Caspar Rudolph, living in Oregon, and who was formerly from this city. A power of attorney was sent to Rudolph to enable him to settle the estate. Upon his taking the necessary legal steps he learned that Mr. Herriges had appointed William Glass and Dr. Theophilus Degan as his executors. He further learned these gentlemen had disposed of all his property, a short time after which they left Oregon.