Mrs. Packard

“ She was married in March, 1872, to Samuel Adams Packard, who belongs to a well-known Maine family, and who is one of the oldest active practitioners of dentistry in Portland. Seven children have been born of their union, and six of them are living. Socially Mrs. Packard is a favorite, and takes an interest in all the questions of the day. She is a woman of attractive personality, and makes an excellent presiding officer. ”

“ Packard’s book through, and it is the most amusing thing I ever read.” “Calvinism is dead—dead as a herring.” “Mrs. Packard drives her own team, and she drives it beautifully, too.” “The Packard books are all over the world, Norway is full of them. They perfectly devour the Packard books in Norway.” “Mrs. Packard finds a great deal of fault with the Laws and the Government, and she has reason to.” “She defends a higher and better law than our government has, and she’ll be in Congress one of these days, helping to make new laws!” ”

“ Packard herself spoke with unexpected self-control, if not disdain.
“You are a very honest man, Mr. Steele. I commend the nicety of your scruples and am quite ready to trust myself to them. I own to no blot, in my past or present life, calling for public arraignment. If my statement of the fact is not enough, I here swear on the head of my child—”
“No, no,” he quickly interpolated, “don’t frighten the baby. Swearing is not necessary; I am bound to believe your word, Mrs. Packard.” ”

“ To a kind and sympathizing public:—
This is to certify that I am personally acquainted with Mrs. E. P. W. Packard, late an inmate of the Insane Asylum of the State of Illinois. That Mrs. Packard was a victim of a foul and cruel conspiracy I have not a single doubt, and that she is and ever has been as sane as any other person, I verily believe. But I do not feel called upon to assign reasons for my opinion, in the premises, as her case was fully investigated before an eminent Judge of our State, and after a full and careful examination, she was pronounced sane, and restored to liberty. ”

“ Packard is conversant. I don’t know anything about the servants. I do not interest myself much in matters purely domestic, and Mrs. Packard spares me. You will have to observe the servants yourself.”
I made another note in my mind while inquiring:
“Who is the young man who was here just now? He has an uncommon face.”
“A handsome one, do you mean?”
“Yes, and—well, what I should call distinctly clever.”
“He is clever. My secretary, Miss Saunders. He helps me in my increased duties; has, in a way, charge of my campaign; reads, sorts and sometimes answers my letters. ”

“ A clearly outlined phantom has been scarce. But Mrs. Packard has seen one, you say.”
“Thinks she has seen one,” I corrected. “Mayor Packard and myself both look upon the occurrence as a wholly imaginary one, caused by her secret brooding over the very manifestations you mention. If she could be convinced that these manifestations had a physical origin, she would immediately question the reality of the specter she now believes herself to have seen. To bring her to this point I am ready to exert myself to the utmost. Are you willing to do the same? ”

“ Mrs. Packard was well but preferred to eat up-stairs. I did not fret at this; I was really glad, for now I could think and plan my action quite unembarrassed by her presence. The opening under the vestibule floor was to be sounded, and sounded this very morning, but on what pretext? I could not take Mrs. Packard into my counsel, for that would be to lessen the force of the discovery with which I yet hoped to dissipate at one blow the superstitious fears I saw it was otherwise impossible to combat. I might interest Ellen, and I was quite certain that I could interest the cook ”

“ Packard? a woman of such strong good sense! I think you must have been misled by some foolish attempt at humor on her part. Does she know that you have come to me with this complaint?”
“She does not. She is not in a condition to be consulted on the subject. I am Mayor Packard’s emissary. He is very anxious about his wife.” Then as Mr. Searles continued unmoved, I added in a straightforward manner, and with all the earnestness I felt: “Mrs. Packard believes herself to have come face to face with an undoubted specter in the library of the house they have rented from you. ”

“ She wore a look of dismay which I felt fully accounted for when I looked inside. Disorder reigned from one end of the room to the other, transcending any picture I may have formed in my own mind concerning its probable condition. Mrs. Packard must have forgotten all this disarray, or at least had supposed it to have yielded to the efforts of the maid, when she proposed my awaiting her there. There were bureau-drawers with their contents half on the floor, boxes with their covers off, cupboard-doors ajar and even the closet shelves showing every mark of a frenzied search among them. ”

“ The letter is dated in December, 1863, at the State Hospital, Jacksonville, Illinois, and written to Rev. Theophilus Packard, wherein Dr. McFarland writes him that Mrs. Packard is hopelessly insane, and that no possible good could result by having her returned to the Hospital; that the officers of the institution had done everything in their power to effect a cure, and were satisfied she could not be cured, and refused to receive her into the institution. ”

“ And again, how could they imagine, that a man would wish to have the reputation of having an insane wife, when he had not? And could the good and kind Mr. Packard neglect even his poor afflicted wife? No, she must be in good hands, under the best of care, and it is her husband on whom we must lavish our warmest, tenderest, sympathies! Yes, so it was; Mr. Packard managed so as to get all the sympathy, and his wife none at all. He got all the money, and she not a cent. ”

“ So it came to pass that on the Sunday after the Packards' arrival, Miss Clarice Packard, 26 rustling into her father's pew in all the conscious glory of a flowered organdie muslin and the biggest hat in town, found in the corner of the pew something that made her open her pale blue eyes wider than usual. It was a large heart of red sugar, tied round with a true-lover's knot of white satin ribbon. Looking round, she became aware of a pair of eyes fixed eagerly on her, the brightest eyes she had ever seen. They belonged to a little girl—well, not so very little, either ”

“ Packard’s trial on the question of her sanity, is no doubt perfectly reliable and correct. That the Judge before whom she was tried, is a man of learning, and ability, and high standing in the judicial circuit, in which he presides. That Mrs. Packard is a person of strict integrity and truthfulness, whose character is above reproach. That a history of her case after the trial, was published in the daily papers in Chicago, and in the newspapers generally, in the State; arousing at the time, a public feeling of indignation against the author of her persecution, and sympathy for her ”

“ Sherman, I have nothing to fear from the manliness of my printer, for this is my sole and only protection—but as one man to whom I trusted even myself, has proved a traitor to his manliness, is there not a possibility another may. I should not object to a double guard, since the single guard of manliness has not even protected me from imprisonment.”
“Well, Mrs. Packard, you shall have my protection; and I can also assure you the protection of my counsel, also. If you get into trouble, apply to us, and we will give you all the help the laws will allow.” ”

“ In determining the truth of the statements of any number of persons relative to any given subject, it is always profitable to inquire who the persons that make the statements are, what is their relation to the subject-matter, and what their means of information.
I entered upon the defence of Mrs. Packard without any expectation of fee or reward, except such as arises from a consciousness of having discharged my duty toward a helpless and penniless woman, who was either indeed insane, or was most foully dealt with by him who had sworn to love, cherish and protect her. ”

“ In short, what I want is, protection in my home, instead of a divorce from it. I do not wish to drive Mr. Packard from his own home, and exclude him from all its rights and privileges—neither do I want he should treat me in this manner, especially so long as he himself claims that I have always been a most kind, patient, devoted wife and mother. He even claims as his justification of his course, that I am so good a woman, and he loves me so well, that he wants to save me from fatal errors! ”

“ McFarland’s published letters on this subject, showing, from his own words, his ground of self-defense.
The Doctor says: “All Mrs. Packard’s wrongs, persecutions and sufferings, of every description, are utterly the creation of a diseased imagination.”
Now, I ask, is this so? Can facts be transmuted into fiction by the simple assertion of one man? And is it a mere creation of a diseased imagination that has torn me from my helpless babe and deprived my darling children of a fond mother’s tender care? ”

“ Packard more than knows of his presence. She does not come to this room.”
“And he does not sit at your table?”
“No; I must have some few minutes in the day free from the suggestion of politics. Mr. Steele can safely be left out of our discussion. He does not even sleep in the house.”
The note I made at this was very emphatic. “You should know,” said I; then quickly “Tuesday was the day Mrs. Packard first showed the change you observed in her.”
“Yes, I think so; but that is a coincidence only. She takes no interest in this young man ”

“ And this act of practical manliness on his part, awakened, as its response, my full and hearty forgiveness of all the wrongs he had hitherto heaped upon me; and these wrongs had not been “like angels visits, few and far between.” But I had, in reality, much to forgive. At least, so thought my personal friends at the Asylum, if their words echoed their real feelings. Their feelings on this subject were not unfrequently uttered in very strong language like the following: “If Mrs. Packard can forgive Dr. McFarland all the wrongs and abuses he has heaped upon her she must be more than human.” ”

“ Knowing his work, one has similar visions of the tales he has written unlocking themselves and stepping, full-statured, into his mind. Mr. Packard, one of the most disconcerting of men, would not be himself disconcerted by such apparitions. His is a personality full of outward contradictions and inward reconcilements. There is something gruff, even ferocious, in his speech and manner on many occasions; it melts every other moment into a really exquisite urbanity. He is alarmingly direct, dreadfully uncompromising—and he is the soul of hospitality and gentleness, a person of stainless honor. ”

“ We are anxious to know what they have to say in the premises. If Mrs. Packard is insane because she rejects Calvinism, then we are insane, liable to arrest, and to be placed in an insane asylum! We have a personal interest in this matter.
2. Read carefully Judge Boardman’s statement as to the bearing of “common law” on Mrs. Packard’s case. If a bad man, hating his wife and wishing to get rid of her, is base enough to fabricate a charge of insanity, and can find two physicians “in regular standing” foolish or wicked enough to give the legal certificate, the wife is helpless! ”

“ He has large self-will, and his stubbornness is only exceeded by his bigotry.
Mrs. Packard is a lady of fine mental endowments, and blest with a liberal education. She is an original, vigorous, masculine thinker, and were it not for her superior judgment, combined with native modesty, she would rank as a “strong-minded woman.” As it is, her conduct comports strictly with the sphere usually occupied by woman. She dislikes parade or show of any kind. Her confidence that Right will prevail, leads her to too tamely submit to wrongs. ”

“ The interest in her look was not the simple one to be expected. In another person in other circumstances I should have characterized her glance as one of inquiry and wonder. But neither inquiry nor wonder described the present situation, and I put myself upon my guard.
Seeing me look her way, she flushed, and, throwing wide the door, remarked in the pleasantest of tones:
“This is your room. Mrs. Packard says that if it is not large enough or does not seem pleasant to you, she will find you another one to-morrow.” ”

“ Packard is a sane woman.
[Pg 40] Thus has resulted an investigation which Mrs. Packard has long and always desired should be had, but which her cruel husband has ever sternly refused her. She has always asked and earnestly pleaded for a jury trial of her case, but her relentless persecutor has ever turned a deaf ear to her entreaties, and flagrantly violated all the dictates of justice and humanity.
She has suffered the alienation of friends and relatives; the shock of a kidnapping by her husband and his posse when forcibly removed to the Asylum ”

“ Packard. I am merely showing you how hampered a man is, whatever his feelings, when it comes to a question of facts known only to a lady with whom he has not exchanged fifty words since he came into her house. If Mrs. Packard will be good enough to inform me just how much and how little is true in the paragraph we are considering, I shall see this rascally reporter again and give him a better answer.”
Mayor Packard looked unappeased. This was not the way to soothe a woman whom he believed to be greatly maligned. ”