By permission of Henry H. Goddard
"A Misfortune at Birth"
Warren is feeble-minded. His family said it was due to "a serious fall of the mother."
[A] "The family history is, however, exceedingly interesting.
"The paternal grandfather, whom we have called Nick, was of good family, although he himself was totally different from the rest. He was weak in every way, and to be considered feeble-minded. He married into a family that was much lower socially than his own, although we have no proof that it was a defective family. The children of this couple were all mentally defective and low-grade, morally as well as intellectually.
"Warren's father, Jake, a thoroughly disgraceful character, married Sal, a woman somewhat older than he.
"The immorality of this family beggars description. A girl named Moll was fifteen years old when Jake brought her into his home: his wife, Sal, was so feeble-minded that she allowed the illicit relations between these two. Moll's child was born in the hospital after the mother had been sent away from one Home because of her horrible syphilitic condition—from which she finally died.
"Our boy Warren's sister Liz with whom the father lived in incestuous relations, was also allowed to live illicitly with a man who worked for her father. She was so simple that she talked openly about her relations with her father and with this man. When a child was to be born the man married her.
"This is not all, but enough: and sufficient to show what feeble-mindedness leads to when it takes the direction of sexual abuses."