Evening Republican, Volume 23, Number 72, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 March 1920 — SPENT TEN YEARS IN ASYLUM THROUGH ERROR [ARTICLE]

SPENT TEN YEARS IN ASYLUM THROUGH ERROR

White Plains, N. Y., March 20.— Miss Phoebe Brush, I ’6B, and her sister, Ada, 56, once heiresses to property valued at $1,000,000 and who have spent the last ten years in the state hospital for the insane at Central Islip, when they should have remained there only ten days, were set free Thursday by Supreme Court Justice Arthur S. Tompkins. The two women were sent to the asylum early in June, 1910. The original papers were faulty, calling for temporary commitment, and since then no further action had been taken to make the commitment final and binding. , . The Misses Brush are reported to be descendents of an old colonial family that settled in Long Wand more than a century ago. wealth, it- is said, has dwindled to about $30,000. The strange case was .brought to court through the interest taken by Mrs. Ferguson, once a nurse at the hospital, in whose care Justice Tompkins entrusted them. The sisters said they were kidnaped and taken to the asylum.