EXECUTIVE MANSION, _July 5, 1888_.
_To the Senate_:
I return without approval Senate bill No. 432, entitled "An act for the
relief of Joel B. Morton."
Calvin Morton, the son of the beneficiary named in this bill, enlisted
in the volunteer infantry in 1861, and after his discharge again
enlisted in the United States cavalry, from which he was discharged in
1867.
It is alleged by his father that he was killed in the battle with the
Indians at Little Big Horn, called the "Custer massacre," June 25, 1876.
His name does not appear in any record of the soldiers engaged in that
battle. The casualty records of the affair are reported as very
complete, but they contain no mention of any soldier of that name.
His father claims in his application before the Pension Bureau to have
had a letter from his son in the fall of 1875, dated at some place in
the Black Hills, stating that he was a lieutenant in the army under
General Custer, but that the letter was lost. He also alleges that he
read an account of the massacre in a newspaper, the name of which he has
forgotten, and that his son was there mentioned as among the slain.
The report of the House committee states that the only evidence of the
death of this soldier is found in a letter of Anderson G. Shaw, who
writes that he was present on the field of the battle mentioned when the
killed were buried, and that one of the burial party called a corpse
found there Morton's. It is further claimed that the description of this
body agreed with that given by the father of his son.
Considering the complete list of the casualties attending this battle
now in the War Department, it must be conceded that the death of the son
of the beneficiary is far from being satisfactorily established.
The claim of the father is still pending in the Pension Bureau, and
perhaps with further effort more information on the subject can be
obtained.