Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 36, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 May 1875 — A Stage-Driver’s Darling. [ARTICLE]

A Stage-Driver’s Darling.

G. S. Cathers is a stage-driver in Colorado. A bright little girl of six summers lives with him and calls him father. The old man and little girl have an extraordinary affection for each other. When they are together they are as angels; when separated they livein the prospect of meeting, and when they meet they behave like children of the same age. Their mutual idolization is well known in Denver, where their home is. About two years ago an officer of the law appeared in Denver with a requisition from the Governor of Pennsylvania for the arrest and delivery of old man Cathers on a charge of abduction. Cathers’ friends were so well convinced of his honesty that they warned him of the presence of the officer, and aided, in hiding both the old man and child until the officer had departed. Then Cathers explained that he was not the girl’s father, but her uncle, and gave a short family history. It was his dead sister’s child whom he was treating as his own, and better if possible. When his sister was dying she gave the little one to him and he promised to live for the child and guard her as his own. When his sister’s husband married again the father wanted to take the girl away from her uncle, but he fled with his little treasure to the far West. He stopped at DeHrer and became a stage-driver, and his love for his niece increased ten-fold. When an office? came armed with State weapons to wrest his darling from him Cathers and his babe hid until the danger was past. Lately another offier came with a requisition from Pennsylvania and sued out a warrant for Cathers’urrest. The Sheriff refused to serve it, and the Pennsylvanian went home empty-handed. Pennsylvania will have to go without that little girl while there are mountain caves in the West.