Democratic Sentinel, Volume 16, Number 44, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 November 1892 — An Honest Servant. [ARTICLE]

An Honest Servant.

Ono of the first women who was assigned work in tho Treasury building was a colored woman, Sophie Holmes by name, says tho Chatauquan. One night when Sophie was sweeping tho refuse papers in nor room she found a box of greenbacks that had been cut, counted and packed to transfer to the vaults and had been accidentally overlooked. She did not dare call tho watchman for fear he would be tempted beyond resistance. She thought of her four small children at home alone with no one to give their supper or put them to bed, but the one duty thnt stared her in the face was to protect that money. She sat down upon the box ana quietly waited for |he hours to go by. At 1 o'clock in the morning she eard the shuffling step of General Spinner in the corridor, and heard him open the door to his room. Bhe quietly slipped along the corridor, knocked at his doos and told him what she had found. The general had tho box taken to his room and sent Sophie home in his carriage. The next morning when she returned she found the general still keeping guard. That night he sent for her and placed in her band her appointment papers given for honesty, ana for thirty years she has earned and drawn her SSO per month. Fifty thousand dollars was in this box. At another time she found SBO,OOO, for which tho testimony can be seen over General Spinner’s own handwriting.