Mr. Morgan's Misery

Rumor that a special train with a private car was going to pick up a wedding party at Prides Crossing, Mass, brought idlers to the station of that socialite village north of Boston near dusk one afternoon last week. They wanted to see the throwing of rice and shoes, the shouting of good wishes at newlyweds who could afford a honeymoon in a private car. The train arrived, waited. The sun neared setting. The air cooled. At a few minutes before 8 o'clock an ambulance drove up to the rear platform of the private car. Gawpers saw a heavy-set old man on a stretcher whisked out of the ambulance, into the car. A younger man, obviously a doctor, got aboard. The train chuffed off toward Boston.

Next morning the world learned for the first time that John Pierpont Morgan was a sick man. Two weeks before he had suffered a mild heart attack and a severe attack of neuritis while visiting his late wife's sister, Mrs. Stephen Van Rensselaer Crosby, whose home is near Prides Crossing. Dr. George Parkham Denny, Bostor internist, had pulled Mr. Morgan through the heart attack, had started him toward recovery from the neuritis which had so weakened the muscles of his legs that they had to be spared the weight of his 200 pounds.

By the time the world had learned these facts, Patient Morgan, Dr. Denny and party had traveled through Boston and Manhattan and were approaching the Mill Neck, L. I. station about four miles from the Morgan estate at Glen Cove. Mr. Morgan was looking out the window when his train rolled to a halt. Gawpers rushed up to peer in at him. Mr. Morgan pulled down the shade.

Sons Junius Spencer Morgan, 44, and Henry Sturgis Morgan, 35, were on the station platform, smoking pipes. Also on hand was a gang of reporters and cameramen. The sons showed themselves affable to the newsmen, tried uselessly to persuade them to take no pictures.

An ambulance which had been hidden behind bushes slipped up to the train. Mr. Morgan in a dark blue silk lounging robe, white flannel trousers, a white silk scarf, was wheeled to the railroad car's rear door. Four men lifted Mr. Morgan & chair to the ground. The ambulance's stretcher on wheels was ready. Mr. Morgan, his legs dangling, partially helped himself to the stretcher, partially was lifted. Soon as he arranged himself comfortably, bearers swung the stretcher into the ambulance, bounced the patient against the ambulance roof. He uttered no sound.

A photographer pushed his camera to the ambulance window for a last snapshot. Henry Morgan's face paled with fury, his hands clenched, but he made no move. A Morgan estate guard hit the photographerin the jaw. The ambulance sped away to the rigid privacy of the Morgan estate.

A flyer, later that day, spied Mr. Morgan lounging in a wheel chair on a sunny terrace, reading a newspaper. That day also, J. P. Morgan & Co. and Drexel & Co. issued a joint statement of their banking conditions as of June 30. Their total assets: $541,073,953.65.

Soon as Mr. Morgan was at home, Dr. Denny, who accompanied him from Boston, turned him over to his personal physician, Dr. Everett Colgate Jessup. They, the Morgan family and the 17 Morgan Partners feared false rumors. Junius Spencer Morgan acknowledged the report of his father's heart attack. But, declared he: "Reports of his being paralyzed are entirely erroneous. He has suffered a slight upset and doctors have prescribed a rest. The worst is over. He is rapidly getting better. ... I believe he will go abroad. He usually does so at this time of year anyway."

Mr. Morgan's neuritis was real misery. In this ailment the nerves become inflamed. Those most often affected are the great nerves in arms and legs. Sharp pains dart along them, causing intense agony. Muscles may lose their tone, permit the limbs to dangle. The diagnostic problem is to discover and treat the original cause of the neural inflammation. This may be some toxin absorbed by the system, such as poisonous metals (lead, arsenic, bismuth, mercury) or carbon compounds (alcohol, Jamaica ginger, carbon monoxide, ether). Toxins may be generated, among other ailments, by childbed fever or diabetes. Neuritis may be the result of infections like diphtheria, typhoid, scarlet fever, measles, rheumatism, mumps, gonorrhea, smallpox, pneumonia, blood poisoning, malaria, tuberculosis, syphilis. It may be due to chronic anemia, senility, cancer, arterial disease.

What had caused the trouble in Mr. Morgan's case was Drs. Denny and Jessup's problem. With his patient secluded and at ease in his own home, Dr. Denny cheerily declared: "Mr. Morgan is improving. He should be all right in about two or three weeks."

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