Democratic Sentinel, Volume 11, Number 7, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 March 1887 — Cleveland’s Lost Brother. [ARTICLE]

Cleveland’s Lost Brother.

A tragedy is connected with the principal hotel, the Royal Victoria, Nassau, which associates it with our own recent history. It is brought to miud by a notice found in the Nassau Guardian of fourteen years ago, to this effect: “Notice. — All persons having demands against the estate of the late Lewis F. Cleveland, deceased, are requested to render statements thereof, duly attested, on or before the first day of May next to John S. Darling, Esquire. “And all persons who are indebted to said estate are requested to make immediate payment to the said J. S. Darling. Grover Cleveland, W. W. Stephenson, “Jan. 20, 1873. Executors.” One of these executors has since been called to minister upon a larger estate. The occasion of his visit to Nassau in 1873 was the sudden and melancholy death of his brother, the lessee of the hotel. He was lost on the steamer Missouri, burned off Abaco Island on the morning of October 22, 1872. Another brother of President Cleveland, Mr. R. C. Cleveland, and a brother-in-law were also among the victims of this disaster. Lewis Cleveland was a man of strong personality, and stories told of him would indicate that some of the characteristics of his distinguished brother are family traits. An inexorable rule of his hotel management forbade the payment of fees. One waiter who accepted a Christmas gift was promptly dismissed. The lady whose gratitude for special services had thus found expression finally secured the reversal of the sentence on the condition that the gift should be returned. “I will not,” said Mr. Cleveland, “have those in my house who are unable or unwilling to fee the servants put to any disadvantage,” It is told of Mr. Cleveland that, as he was on his way to the steamer at New York, he said: "I do not know how it is, but I have an impression that I can not get rid of that this will be my last voyage.” So it proved, not only to him, but to sixtyeight others of the eighty-five persons who sailed in the Missouri as passengers and crew.— Century.