Letter from Maria

Transcript adjusted to reflect correction sent by Rachael in comments
 

On December 11 this blog published a reproduction of a letter from Maria Russell that was being offered on eBay. Portions of the letter had been obscured so that it could not be read in its entirety. With grateful thanks to the generosity of the collector who purchased the “original” we are able reproduce below the contents in full.

It was written by Maria quite soon after she had traveled to congregations to defend CTR from accusations made by S D Rogers and others. (see: A Conspiracy Exposed and Harvest Siftings, extra number of ZWT for April 25, 1894, and subsequent correspondence in columns of ZWT). It was written from the home of Joseph L Russell his wife Emma, Maria’s sister, in Ashland, Virginia.

Ashland, Va.

July 19^th, 1894.

 

Mrs W N Fuller

Dear Sister in Christ

     Your welcome letter of June 27^th was duly received and the pamphlet requested was sent you and as I did not have time to reply before I left home I do so now from here where I am spending a short time with my sister for rest and change.

     We appreciate very much the sentiments of your letter and feel very thankful that the storm has passed and that so little damage has been done. God has wonderfully overruled in it all and made the wrath of man to praise him; and all has worked together for good to his saints – the called according to his purpose who still love and serve him. What could more increase our love and confidence in him.

     We do indeed feel sorry for the erring ones, but there is no sign of repentance on the part of any of them. Their only regret is that they have not succeeded in wrecking the work and ruining the reputation and influence of Bro. Russell. How sad and deplorable must be such a condition of mind and heart.

(page 2)

     I am glad to know that your interest in the truth continues to grow and that your faith and hope increases. I hear from you occasionally through Sister Vero. Yes, how precious the truth is to us and what could we take in exchange for it? It is dearer to me every day and all my ambition is to attain that whereunto I am called. I can never for a moment feel that I could be satisfied unless I win the prize of our high calling; and yet I constantly realize my unworthiness. In Christ alone is my hope.

     The good work both h at home and abroad still goes forward, and even though clouds and darkness are about how we blessedly realize that the Lord is present and doing his strange and wonderful work. How fast events are progressing toward the full establishment of his kingdom. Truly Zion hears and is glad and the daughters of Judah rejoice. My heart is full of joy and praise when I think of these things.

     Give our love to your dear mother and family. My sister here – Mrs J.L. Russell – also sends greeting to you in the Lord. She and her husband and little daughter are also in the same faith and hope. She and I came into the truth together. Hoping to hear from you again, I am as ever

              Yours in the Beloved

               Mrs. C. T. Russell.
 

Today's Mail

            The first of the bound volumes of Spirit of the Word arrived in this morning’s mail. I haven’t read it in depth yet, but I have read it. There are things in it we will use. Adams restates his rejection of Literalist belief because to take the Bible literally meant he could not sustain his new doctrines. There is a multi-issue discussion between Adams and an un-named tract writer. The un-named man was Paton. The tract was a reprint of an article in World’s Hope.

            Adams does not directly mention Russell, but he does comment on his doctrines. Adams could not refute Russell, so he stood on the back porch and whispered innuendo. I can see several references to Watch Tower theology. It will take some time to pin them to exact Watch Tower articles. We won’t peruse that until the current chapter is finished, at least in rough draft.

            There is a note on a page margin. It appears to be in Adams’ hand. This volume is stamped “office copy.” Later it belonged to someone living in Kentucky.

            Adams retracted something he wrote in 1882. I’ll have to find the original statement. We have his 1882 book, so that should be possible.

            There was significant cross-readership between Paton’s magazine and Adams’. Those letters that are signed are often from people who also read Paton’s World’s Hope. It will take a very careful reading of the four years we have to put this all together.

            Bruce asked someone who’s very adept at finding things to look for Zion’s Day Star. We still need to see the early issues.

Retitled as Christ's Resurrection and Used in Hymns of Millenial Dawn

Update

We've acquired the bound volume of Spirit of the Word. Our thanks to those who contributed to the effort. We used the small amount of excess to order some photocopies.

After we spent that, we were offered two more years of Spirit of the Word. Bruce bought them today, but spent money he could ill afford to spend. But we wouldn't have had access to them otherwise. So we have purchased (though not received yet) 1889, 1890, and 1891. When we receive these, we will be distracted for a while as we read them.

Thanks again for your help. We still need issues from 1886 to 1888. Keep on the watch.

Reader Reviews for Separate Identity

If you read and liked volume one, please leave a review on the site from which you purchased it. Hopefully you will leave a nice review, but wht you say is always up to you.

You can also leave a review on google books. It would help if friends of our research would do so.

Visit this page:

https://books.google.com/books?id=p6XQoAEACAAJ&dq=%22separate+identity%22+schulz&hl=en&sa=X&ei=Cq2YVPecBoWlNqftg4gL&ved=0CCgQ6AEwAA

Click "Write a Review."

ADJ's last thoughts?

I notice that someone who obviously reads this blog has written a fanciful account of Albert Delmont Jones' thoughts looking back on his life on Rachael's personal blog. The word 'fanciful' needs to be stressed - it is obviously based on both fact and outright fiction - I think "faction" is the conglomerate word. As long as it is not confused with the serious history and facts discussed here, some readers might just find it of interest. It can be found at:

http://wardancingpixie.blogspot.com/

Yet more on the second Mrs Albert Delmont Jones

by Jerome

I know that the second Mrs Albert (Royal) Delmont (Jones) is really off the topic of Watch Tower history, other than a footnote. However, her assessment of men which you will find at the end of this short article is an interesting footnote in itself. I have tried to restrain myself from writing too much, but Isabel Mulhall (Delmont) was a fascinating character. Albert obviously thought so, as an earlier newspaper article in this blog tells how he was first smitten by her picture. It was downhill all the way from then on.

Albert and Isabel were divorced in 1903 and the Washington Post stated that this was after Albert met “financial reverses.” Isabel briefly went on the stage, before becoming Mrs Sidmon McHie.  Somewhere around 1906 she was in the news for accusing her chauffeur of blackmail, a man who was then employed by Mr McHie.  Sidmon was a Wall Street operator and publisher – and millionnaire – you could smell the money. At a hurried secret ceremony they married in 1909. (see Washington Post, August 1, 1909).

Isabel thereafter went by the name of either Isabel M McHie or Isabel D McHie, and one assumes the D stood for Delmont. She must have had financial assets of her own or been given some by Sidmon, because in 1919 she and her husband made wills leaving the other partner as main beneficiary. This became complicated when they separated acrimoniously in 1925. In 1926 an agreement was forged where Sidmon would give her certain assets and also pay her an allowance of a thousand dollars a month for as long as she lived. But there was a condition. The sixth covenant of the document said (quote) – It is agreed that the parties shall live apart and separate and shall not annoy or molest each other (end quote).

Salmon stopped paying the allowance in 1932 claiming in subsequent legal proceedings that Isabel had indeed continued to annoy and molest him. He divorced her in 1936 on the grounds of HER “cruel and inhuman treatment.” (see Fifth Avenue Bank of New York v. Hammond Realty Co., Court of Appeals for Seventh Circuit, October 30, 1942).

Isabel made the newspapers quite regularly. One occasion she was locked in the brig of a steamship for causing a disturbance. (According to the Milwaukee Sentinel, December 20, 1942 she tried to sue the Cunard Steamship Line for $100,000 over the incident, but the company successfully proved she had been “obstreperous”). When choirboys practiced at a church opposite her she played Caruso records at full blast! (same citation from Milwaukee Sentinel). A ruckus at a Baltimore hotel resulted in her being committed to an asylum but she escaped when a Brooklyn clergyman (or someone dressed as one) came to visit with a heavily veiled woman, who exchanged places. (That is if the Brooklyn Standard Union for May 13, 1931 is to be believed).

As noted in a recent post on this blog, in 1935 she was taken off a train after throwing large sums of money out of it.

Isabel died in 1939 at the age of 63, after an exciting if not exactly happy life. She had been living at the home of her mother, Susan Mulhall and her final resting place was the Fresh Pond Crematory and Columbarium, Queen County, New York.   (Check it out on Find a Grave)

Her paranoia was indicated by her will, which provided substantial funds for an autopsy and investigation in case she had been poisoned.

Then the fun started again. Who would inherit her sizeable fortune? Her father, who had deserted the family nearly 60 years before, suddenly reappeared to make a claim. A younger person called a protégé, made a claim. Ex-husband Sidmon, who was still alive, made a claim. And the squabble went on until 1943, when finally her wishes were granted. (See Bingham Press, February 15, 1943). So where did the rump of her fortune go? It was left to a dog’s home that trained guide dogs for the blind.

And here is the punch line. Maybe it was the absent father, maybe it was the two husbands (both old enough to be her father, and including of course our ADJ) – but she planned a sculptured bust of herself in her own memory, headed by the words which also adorned her stationery. It was a quote originally attributed to Mme de Sevigne (1626-1696):

THE MORE I SEE OF MEN, THE MORE I ADMIRE DOGS!

If any are interested in reading more, and seeing the sculptured bust of Isabel, plus a candid photo of her elderly mother yelling at her even more elderly father after sixty years of separation, when they met on the court steps, have a look at this full page story. It mentions ADJ. Of course, I wouldn’t necessarily believe ALL that you read in newspapers.

http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=wZJMF1LD7PcC&dat=19421217&printsec=frontpage&hl=en

(then go to page 78 of this document)

Isabel’s parents share a moment on the court steps in 1942.

The former second Mrs Albert Delmont Jones

 

From The New York Post for March 22, 1935.

 

The former Mrs Albert Royal Delmont Jones a little later on in life. It says she was "taken from a train" after these events.

 

Albert had lost all his money by the time he and Isabel were divorced.

 



Help!

We need to raise significant money to purchase a very rare magazine volume. We anticipate needing about 125.00. We have a paypal donation system. The button is on blog 2, but if you want to donate and do not have access to blog 2, email me and I'll tell you how.
R

We need this

This is for sale on ebay. It is a scanned copy of a letter from M. Russell to Mrs W. N. Fuller. [Personally, and without much proof, I think she meant Mrs. W. R. Fuller. But that doesn't matter.] As you see, the seller has blocked out portions of the letter. We're not inclined to buy from this seller, and the asking price is too high for us. Do any of you have a clear scan of this? Will you share it? You may need to click the image to view it.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/WATCHTOWER-HAND-WRITTEN-LETTER-FROM-MARIE-RUSSELL-/201238730477?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2edac356ed

More on Malcom Cameron Rutherford

 

In a sense this isn’t MORE, but material originally published in comments on a past post from 28 October this year.
 

Due to a mishap, some of these comments disappeared into cyberspace.  However, I have recently come across rough drafts of most of my own comments before they were posted. So I am republishing them here with a few extra observations to make this into a complete article.

 
 

The photograph that heads this article was taken on or after 5 June 1917.  It was taken in connection with Malcom’s draft board registration in 1917.  The original document found on genealogy sites show that Malcom was 24 at the time, born November 16, 1892, currently single, and living in Los Angeles. He gave his occupation as book-keeper and clerk for H G Pangborn and Co. in Los Angeles. A notable fact is that Malcom claimed exemption from the draft on the grounds that he was part of the International Bible Students Association.

 

(The earlier article detailed his activities prior to this as a Bible Student, including supporting his father as a stenographer in the Rutherford-Troy debate of 1915.)
 

There were actually three main registrations for the services in America. The first started on 5 June 1917, and was for all men between the ages of 21 and 31. As noted above, this is when Malcom had his photograph taken and made his request for exemption.
 

The second was a catch-up in early 1918 for those who had subsequently reached age 21.  And then as the war dragged on, there was a third and far more inclusive call up in early September 1918. This was for men aged between 18 through 45.

 

It was on this occasion that Malcom accepted the draft. His enlistment date was 10 September 1918 and he was assigned to the Army.
 

We do not necessarily have to read too much into this. As the Proclaimers book states on page 191:

 

During the war years, the circumstances in which individual Bible Students were thrust varied. The way they dealt with these situations also varied. Feeling obligated to obey “the powers that be,” as they referred to the secular rulers, some went into the trenches at the front with guns and bayonets. But having in mind the scripture, “Thou shalt not kill,” they would fire their weapons into the air or try simply to knock the weapon from the hands of an opponent.
 

Certainly by September 1918 things had changed in Malcom’s life. He was now a married man. He married Pauline Lucille Short on 19 March 1918 in Los Angeles. (She would be known as Bobby, and this is the name that appears on her grave marker). Also Malcom’s father was in jail accused of working against the American war effort with the book The Finished Mystery and the Bible Students Monthly tract The Fall of Babylon.

 

So that leaves the question, did Malcom see active service?

A spring offensive by the Germans in 1918 made General Pershing push for more American troops to be sent to France without their own equipment for the sake of speed – the equipment then being supplied by the French and British once they were there.  In just two months, June and July of 1918, 584,000 Americans were sent over, presenting a logistical problem for the merchant marine to get them all there. By August 1918 there were nearly 1,500,000 American troops in France.

Then came this new American draft in the first half of September, when Malcom enlisted. By the time of the armistice of November 11, the number of American troops had passed the two million mark. This suggests that Malcom could well be among the half a million extra recruits shipped over to Europe in that time.

General Pershing commanded more than a million American and French combatants in the Meuse-Argonne Offensive, which only ceased with the armistice.  Training for new recruits only lasted six weeks, so maybe Malcom was involved at some point in that campaign.

Once the armistice was signed, troop numbers in Europe decreased, although some American troops were involved in expeditionary forces in Italy and Russia. Americans were shipped back home and that would fit in with Malcom’s discharge on December 24, 1918. However, he stayed on the records, as all this information about his war enlistment comes from the US Department of Veteran Affairs BIRLS deaths file, 1850-2010.  This is the file that records that he was assigned to the ARMY and gives both his date of birth (10 November 1892)  and date of death (22 June 1989). He enlisted on 10 September 1918 and was discharged on 24 December 1918. Unfortunately, 80% of US army records for World War 1 were destroyed in a fire in 1973, and the 20% surviving are not readily accessible.

 

Note from an official site: The BIRLS (Beneficiary Identification Records Locator Subsystem) Death File is a Veterans Benefits Administration database that lists the names of deceased individuals who had received benefits from the Veterans Administration while they were alive. These include veterans who received educational benefits and veterans’ survivors who applied for benefits.

I do not know what benefits Malcom may have received during his lifetime.

One of our readers in the UK could help with this ...

http://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/C2657246

We need a copy. Much less expensive if someone in the UK orders and scans it. Anyone?

The Many Wives of Albert

by Jerome

The St. Paul Globe for September 15, 1903.

We have all heard of the many wives of Solomon, or the many wives of English King Henry VIII. We don’t know for sure how many times our boy Albert Royal Delmont Jones attempted matrimony, but the title still has a certain ring.

Wife number one was Caroline (Carrie) Bown. She had four children with Albert. One died in infancy, the other three all married and had families of their own. Carrie was buried in the Bown family plot in Pittsburgh when she died in January 1933. After her marriage ended she made her home with her daughter, Ella and family.

Wife number two was described as society beauty Isabel Agnes Mulhall. The newspaper cutting above, written in what we would call in the UK “tabloid style,” describes the history and subsequent demise of their relationship. How accurate the details are I do not know, but it makes entertaining reading. Isabel subsequently led a flamboyant life. She made the newspapers in 1935 by eccentrically throwing money out of a train. However, she appears to have really liked money, and really liked Albert when he had some. She died in 1939.

Wife number three – Bambina – now there’s a name! Her history has been detailed in the article In Search of Delmont Jones posted on 23 November 2014. Sometimes she is Maud Bambina Delmont, and sometimes she is Bambina Maud Delmont. Sometimes Maud has an E on the end, and sometimes not.

After her divorce from Albert – assuming there ever was a divorce – Bambina married John Hopper in 1912. Neglecting to divorce Mr Hopper she committed bigamy by then marrying a Cassius Wood. In the 1920 census she is down as a corsetiere with her own shop; other reference works give less flattering occupations. She latched onto vivacious, promiscuous starlet Virginia Rappe at the infamous 1921 party Roscoe (Fatty) Arbuckle attended. When it all went bad and Virginia died in hospital, Bambina was initially the star witness against Arbuckle - until it was established that at the time she claimed to see and hear certain events, she was otherwise occupied in another bedroom. The LA District Attorney Matthew Brady had political ambitions riding on this case, which was basically an excuse to put the whole of Hollywood on trial. He ensured that Bambina never went anywhere near the witness stand during three trials, in spite of repeated requests from the defense.  As soon as the first trial went to the jury (a hung jury of 10-2 for acquittal) Bambina was done for bigamy. There may have been some sort of deal to get her off with probation. See the news item below.

December 11, 1921 Oakland Tribune

Wife number four? There is a question mark over this one, but see post entitled Another Sighting - or Is It? published on 25 November for a possibility.

Albert’s slippery slope gained a certain momentum as the years rolled by. For those of an artistic bent, have a look at William Hogarth’s 18^th century series of paintings called The Rake’s Progress.