[Footnote 32: See pp. 411-413.]
EXECUTIVE MANSION, _February 23, 1889_.
_To the House of Representatives_:
I herewith return without approval House bill No. 220, entitled "An act
granting a pension to John J. Lockrey."
It is stated that this beneficiary enlisted April 11, 1865, but it
appears from the muster roll of his company for May and June, 1865, that
he was a recruit assigned, but who had not joined. There is nothing
appearing on the record which positively shows that he ever reached his
regiment.
It is conceded that his real and nominal connection with the Army
extended only from April 11, 1865, when he was mustered in, until
August, 1865, when he was discharged for disability, consisting of a
disease of the eye, called in the surgeon's certificate "iritis with
conjunctivitis."
It seems that this claimant enlisted just at the close of the war, and
was connected in a manner with the Army for four months. It is not
probable that he ever saw any actual service, for none is stated in the
papers before me; and it does appear that he spent a large part of his
short term of enlistment in hospitals and under treatment for a trouble
with his eye. As early as May 23, 1865, he was admitted to hospital with
gonorrheal ophthalmia. His claim was rejected by the Pension Bureau on
the ground that this was the cause of his disability, and the inferences
from the proof presented make this extremely probable.
One of the witnesses who testified that the beneficiary caught cold in
his eye in April, 1865, on the Mississippi River is shown to have been
at that time with his regiment and company at Danville, Va.
The circumstances surrounding this case and the facts proved satisfy me
that the determination of the Pension Bureau was correct, and there is
certainly no sentiment in favor of the claimant which justifies the
indulgence of violent presumptions for the purpose of overriding such
determination.