A Secret Life_ The Lies and Scandals of President Grover Cleveland - Charles Lachman [12]
Beniski’s medical records show that he had apparently suffered a testicular torsion; his spermatic cord had twisted around his left testicle. Doctors now understand that a testicular torsion is an acute medical emergency that must be treated within hours, not weeks. Beniski was almost certainly liquored up before surgery, probably lasting no more than thirty minutes, to cut out his testicle. Primitive as it was, the procedure probably saved his life from the onset of gangrene, and Beniski was declared “unfit for duty.” For him, after just ten days of military service, the war was over. He was put on medical furlough and permitted to go home to recuperate.
Beniski returned to Buffalo—not the conquering hero, but a lonely convalescing soldier weighed down with worry about his future. Somehow, Grover Cleveland heard about the injury suffered by his substitute in war and stopped by to see how Beniski was doing. Certainly Beniski appreciated the gesture. At this point, no one really knew how much damage had been done to Beniski’s body, or whether the operation had rendered him sterile. He stayed in Buffalo for eight days then returned to David’s Island. From there, he was sent to Fort Wood on Bedloe’s Island in New York City Harbor, then back to Washington . An alarming word started making its way into Beniski’s medical records: invalid.
It is here that Beniski disappears from the annals of Grover Cleveland’s life story. But he would resurface many years later, with harsh consequences to Cleveland’s good name and place in history.
2
THE BACHELOR
MARIA HOVENDEN WAS a talented dressmaker with bright blue eyes, bow-shaped Cupid lips, a thin waist, and a full womanly figure. Statuesque, she stood just under five foot eight and carried herself with a proud and regal countenance. She lived with her family in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn, which was then an independent city on the other side of the East River from Manhattan.
Her father, Robert Hovenden, was an officer in the Brooklyn police department. Sometimes he would work sixteen-hour shifts, and one night, on routine patrol at two in the morning, he saw someone trying to break into a dry-goods store at Graham Avenue and North Second Street. Hovenden gave chase, but the out-of-shape cop was no match for the fleet-footed burglar. After two blocks, Hovenden did not have the energy to continue the pursuit. All he could make out was the thief’s coattails vanishing around the corner of Powers Street. It was just as well. In those days, police officers were not authorized to carry personal firearms. The only weapon Hovenden wielded was a twenty-six-inch-long nightstick made of solid oak, which could be used to bring down a perpetrator or to send a signal to other officers on patrol by rapping it against a curbstone.
Maria Hovenden’s beau was a young man from the neighborhood, Frederick Halpin, whose father, also named Frederick, was a portrait engraver from Worcester, England. The Halpins had immigrated to the United States in 1842, when Frederick Junior was seven, and had settled in Brooklyn. The elder Halpin was regarded as one of the finest engravers in America. He specialized in steel plate etchings, which even in the 1850s was considered a dying craft. His engraving of the great scholar Noah Webster remains an iconic image to this day. Halpin once presented Fletcher Harper, a founder of the Harper & Brothers publishing empire, with an engraving that he had stippled for a book Harper & Brothers was publishing. Harper, who supervised all illustrations for the company, was impressed. “It is a very fine piece of work, Mr. Halpin. What is your bill?”
Halpin hesitated a moment before finally saying, “One hundred and fifty dollars.”
“Is that all?” Fletcher