“Nor had Mrs. Packard an attack of insanity before her marriage. The pious Packard has fabricated this story to order, from the circumstance, that when a young lady, Mrs. Packard had a severe attack of brain fever, and under which fever she was for a time delirious, and no further, has this a semblance of truth.”
This is the simple truth, which all my relatives are ready, and many of them very anxious to certify to; but the limits of this pamphlet will not admit any more space in answer to this slander.
Second Report.
“Mrs. Packard is very adroit in concealing her insanity.”
This report originated from the same source, and I will answer it in the words of the same writer, as found in his printed reply: “You say, ‘Mrs. Packard is very adroit in concealing her insanity.’ She has indeed been most adroit in this concealment, when her family physician of seven year’s acquaintance, and all her friends and neighbors, with whom she visited daily, and her children, and the domestics, and lastly, the court and jury had not, and could not, discover any traces of insanity; and the only persons who say they find her insane, were Dr. McFarland, your pious friend Rev. Packard, his sister, and her husband, one deacon of the church, and a fascinating young convert—all members of his church—and a doctor. These witnesses each and every one swore upon the stand, “That it was evidence of insanity in Mrs. Packard, because she wished to leave the Presbyterian church, and join the Methodist.” I quote the reasons given by these “Lambs of the Church,” that you may know what weight their opinions are entitled to. The physician, upon whose certificate you say you held Mrs. Packard, swore upon the trial, that three-fourths of the religious community were just as insane as Mrs. Packard.”
“All her family friends, almost without exception, sustain Mr. Packard in his course.”
Not one of my family friends ever intelligently sustained Mr. Packard in his course. But they did sustain him ignorantly and undesignedly, for a time, while his tissue of lies held them back from investigating the merits of the case for themselves. But as soon as they did know, they became my firm friends and defenders, and Mr. Packard’s private foes and public adversaries. I do not mean by this, that they manifest any revengeful feelings towards him, but simply a God-like resentment of his inhuman course towards me. All my relatives, without exception, who have heard my own statement from my own lips, now unite in this one opinion, that Mr. Packard has had no right nor occasion for putting me into an insane asylum.
But fidelity to the truth requires me to say in this connection, that among my family relatives, are three families of Congregational ministers—that each of these families have refused me any hearing, so that they are still in league with, and defenders of, Mr. Packard. All I have to say for them is, “May the Lord forgive them, for they know not what they do.”
But it may be urged that the published certificates of her friends contradict this statement. This is not the case. Those certificates which have appeared in print since my return to my friends, all bear date to the time they were given previous to my return.