Sincerely yours,
J. L. Sturtevant.
Touching the falsehood to which the furious John L. refers, I have this to say: My article was based upon a “special” sent out from Chicago which went the rounds of the Press, and which was not contradicted.
The “special” from which I took the facts, appeared, on December 19, 1905, in the Augusta Herald, one of the most reliable and conservative Democratic daily papers in the United States.
The indignant Sturtevant does not deny that the bank was looted of the sum stated by me, but because I said that “the people” lost the money he charges me with having made a statement that was “absolutely false.” Sturtevant alleges that the money was not stolen from “the people” but from “the stockholders!”
He is equally indignant because I said that the bank “burst.” He alleges that the stockholders were able to stand the theft of nearly a million and a half dollars, and that the bank didn’t burst.
An Editor of a Magazine is at a disadvantage when compared to the Editor of The Waupaca Post, of Waupaca, Wisconsin. Sturtevant evidently stands at the head-waters of information, and gets his news fresh from the spring. That’s one of the luxuries of living and editing at Waupaca.
A poor devil of a Georgia editor, like me, has to take his information second-hand. In spite of all that I can do, it is impossible for me to be there, all over the world, when things are happening.
Sturtevant was close to Milwaukee when Bigelow looted his bank, and therefore, knew at first hand what the facts were. On the contrary, I was thousands of miles off, and had to rely upon telegraphic despatches, published in reputable newspapers.
In the “special” from Chicago which appeared in the Herald, of Augusta, Ga., December 19, 1905, this language appears: