The Use and Need of the Life of Carrie A. Nation [35]
The person that told me of him, said that he asked Mr. Grogan if he sold
liquor. His answer was: "No, I got enough of that in Medicine Lodge."
This Mr. Smith became a wreck for a time, and lost his business in Sharon.
After I came out of jail in Wichita the third time, I met a man on the
street and he made himself known as the Smith of Sharon. He looked
quite well and said he had quit drinking entirely and was a real estate
dealer in Wichita.
I soon heard of its being told around in Medicine Lodge that I drank
beer in a dive. So I went to Hank O'Bryan's restaurant and said: "Some
of these jointists are telling that I drank in a dive. Now if it comes to the
ears of the public, I will have to go on the witness stand and tell where I
drank beer." Hank turned pale, looked comical and I never heard any
more of that.
There was a saloon keeper in Kiowa, named "Billy" Morris and living
with him as his wife was a girl whose name was Cora Bennett. This
poor girl had been living an irregular life, but was true to this man, who
had promised her time after time to marry her, but was only deceiving
her. She entered his bar room one day and told him he must fulfill his
promise to her now, or she would kill him. He tried to laugh at her. She
fired a shot and killed him on the spot; then the poor girl fell on his dead
body screaming in a distracted manner. She was arrested and brought to
jail at Medicine Lodge; and was there six months. Being Jail Evangelist I
went to see her, sometimes twice a week. When I first saw her she was
reticent, and did not seem glad to see me. She was so nice, that I fell in
love with her and I asked the ladies of the W. C. T. U. to visit her, but
they thought her a hopeless case. She bought a Bible and we would read
and pray together and talked about the need of Christ in our lives. She
was a woman of great sympathy. I asked her once: "Did you ever love
anyone." She wept bitterly and said: "Yes, the man I killed."
Toward the last she seemed perfectly delighted when I came to her
cell. She, consented to go to a home where she would have friends who
would keep her, to make a change in her life. The morning she left I
went to the jail and rode with her in the hack to the depot and then to a
town about twenty miles east of Medicine Lodge, called Attica. On the
train from Medicine Lodge to Attica, the deputy sheriff had some man
to give this girl a letter from him, telling her to meet him at Wellington.
The girl's father lived at Attica, and an older sister of her's met us. I
could see the sister was not a good woman, and she took Cora to a room
and exchanged the modest hat and dress for a showy hat and elaborate
silk dress; and when I saw her it almost broke my heart. I said to her:
Oh, Cora, all my work to save you is in vain." I had rather have seen
her drop dead, and I grieved all the way home. From Attica she went to
Wellington, instead of Olathe, Kansas, where she was to enter this home.
James Dobson was sheriff of Barber County and his brother kept a
saloon in Kiowa, the first saloon I ever smashed. ,
I heard no good news of Cora for some years; she led a bad life.
Five years later, through a W. C. T. U. lecturer, I heard that she was
married and living in Colorado; and she was an efficient worker as a W.
C. T. U. woman; among fallen women. She told of her past life and of a
Mrs. Nation visiting her. This woman said it was so incredible to believe
that Cora could have been so bad, and had taken a human life, that she
was anxious to see the place in Kiowa and to see Cora's prison cell and
myself. I was then in Oklahoma, and I certainly rejoiced over this news
from her I had learned to love. I saw in this wayward girl certain qualities
that would be a power for good, if once God could have His way
with her life.
There are diamonds in the slush and filth of this world. Happy is he
who picks them up and helps to wash the dirt away, that they may shine
for God. I am very much drawn to my fallen sisters. Oh! the cruelty
and oppression they meet