349 West 38th St
Nov. 6th 1911
Dear [Mr.?] Krutchnitt
In researching to the old
New Orleans days you will
probably recall Dr Andrew W Smyth
of the Charity Hospital & in your
memory of him I wonder if there
lingers interest enough to
aid me in my struggle to redress
the wrong from which consequently his family,
here suffered so long? I believe
it was after your departure from
New Orleans that the incident of
the fire in the cashiers' vault at
the Mint occurred. After the trial
the cashier James Dowling, whom
the Treasury indicted in a criminal
prosecution but failed to convict.
Dr Smyth was held accountable as
Superintendent for certain missing
moneys. Dr Smyth as you may
remember was never a money
making man & though he had the
reputation of being a rich man
he was in reality poor. His sureties
paid for him the $22,000
exacted by the Treasury. Years passed of
poverty & deprivation on an Irish farm, to
which he had retired, then some
swamp lands drained by the new sewerage
system of New Orleans came into value &
I for the first time in all these years
was able to return so as to settle with
his sureties & if possible get Congress to
[----?] us who were repaid, to raise
the money, redress the wrong done to Dr. Smyth.
A mortgage was placed upon the land & it
is in the hope of having Congress repay the
amount received that I have come again this
year. Mr. Garland Dupre our Representative has
promised to introduce a bill in Congress in
Dec. & it is in reference to this that I
would interest you & begging you if in
your wide influence you might reach those in
power of me to do so for the sake of auld lang
syne. Dr. Smyth I believe was a friend of your
father's, your wife I knew as a girl & these
old associations combined with the justice of our
cause will I hope induce you to do what you can
to help us. I enclose a paper which will lay the
matter before you in its clearest light. One of
Dowling's brood was Judge Brannan's relative &
Judge Brannan's after record [?] has not I am
told proved my warning [?]. So you see. with wheels
within wheels Fate has ground us pretty closely. Far
away, years in exile in Ireland. I never had the
money to return to New Orleans.
With kindest regards to your wife & yourself
will I come to settle with Dr. S' [Smyth?] sureties
on the first available opportunity. Believe me
Yours sincerely
