EXECUTIVE MANSION, _April 16, 1888_.
_To the House of Representatives_:
I return herewith without approval House bill No. 445, entitled "An act
granting a pension to Laura A. Wright."
The beneficiary named in this bill is the widow of Charles H. Wright,
who was pensioned for a gunshot wound received in the military service
of the United States on the 19th day of September, 1864. He continued
in the receipt of such pension until June 25, 1884, when he committed
suicide by hanging.
It is alleged on behalf of his widow that the pain caused by his wound
was so great that it caused temporary insanity, under the influence of
which he destroyed himself.
There is not a particle of proof that I can discover tending to show an
unsound mind, unless it be the fact of his suicide. He suffered much
pain at intervals. He was a farmer in comfortable circumstances, and
according to the testimony of one of the physicians, filed in support
of the widow's claim, his health was good up to the time of his death,
except for the wound and its results. The day before his death he was
engaged in work connected with his farming occupation, though he
complained of pain from his wound. Early the next morning, still
complaining, as it is alleged, of his wound, he went out, declaring he
was going out to milk, and not returning in due time, upon search his
body was found and his self-destruction discovered. This was nearly
twenty years after the deceased received his wound, and there is not
a suggestion of any act or word of his in all that time indicating
insanity. It seems to me it can hardly be assumed in such circumstances
that the insanity and death of the soldier resulted from pain arising
from his wound, merely because no other explanation can be given. In
numerous cases of suicide no cause or motive for self-destruction is
discovered.
We have within our borders thousands of widows living in poverty, and
some of them in need, whose dead husbands fought bravely and well in
defense of the Government, but whose deaths were not occasioned by any
incident of military service. In these cases the wife's long vigil at
the bed of wasting disease, the poverty that came before the death, and
the distressing doubt and uncertainty which darkened the future have not
secured to such widows the aid of our pension laws.
With these in sight the bounty of the Government may without injustice
be withheld from one whose soldier husband received a pension for nearly
twenty years, though all that time able to labor, and who, having
reached a stage of comfortable living, made his wife a widow by
destroying his own life.