Mount Auburn Cemetery

354

Boston January 12, 1867

Hon E. B. French.

Sir,

In the case of W^m Gallagher Co K. 59^th Mass. Vols. Died Aug. 13. 1864, allow

Allow me to state why the claim should be taken from the suspended list, and settled in behalf of the claimant.

1^st There is no real contradiction in the two deposition of witnesses Conolly and Delaney when understood -

2^d The claimant and the witnesses are both of the highest respectability, so far as I can learn -

3^r The necessities of claimant's family urges haste.

Under the first head there cannot have been the slightest intention to vary from the truth. The term "perjury" is a cruel word in this case. The claimant and witnesses told a fair story, with all the appearance of truthfulness. She stated that her brother John was in the army, and she was ashamed to say deserted, that he was a "bad behaved boy," that he went away, and neither she nor her friends had heard from him for years, or I understood them. That they had seen an account of a destructive explosion and his name was among the names of the killed, and they verily believed that he was the person felt satisfied that he was. They had no doubt of his death, and as they were