The Vermont Tribune, Ludlow, Friday, February 5, 1886 WAITE Not Yet Pardoned 2/5/1886 The Rumor of His Pardon, last Saturday, Premature at Least.--WAITE Interviewed. Brattleboro was tremendously excited, Saturday, over the story that Silas M. WAITE had been pardoned by President Cleveland. Local color was given to the rumor by a circumstantial report to the effect that WAITE had returned to his old home. The fact was that WAITE was and is in the House of Correction in Rutland, that he has not been pardoned, and is not likely to be. The report of the pardon came about in this way: Congressman GROUT wrote to the Department of Justice to learn the status of the WAITE case, and Attorney-General GARLAND hastily replied that a pardon had already been granted. Mr. GARLAND carelessly read GROUT's request and supposed that he referred to the case of one SWIFT, formerly a mail-clerk at Bangor, Me., who had been guilty of a technical violation of the law. It is believed at Washington that WAITE does not stand one chance in a thousand of getting off before the expiration of his sentence. It is but just to say that the reports of Judge WHEELER, who sentenced WAITE, and District Attorney HASKINS, called for by the Attorney-General, are understood to have contained nothing that could be construed as recommendations for pardon; but on the contrary, they simply related the facts in connection with WAITE's career, leaving the Attorney-General and President to form their own conclusions therefrom. WAITE was visited by a HERALD reporter at the house of correction, soon after the news of his pardon was received. In answer to an expression of congratulation upon his pardon he answered: "Well, yes, I am of course pleased, but I must take the good news humbly. The papers have had much to say about 'high-spirited and proud Mr. WAITE,' but I tell you, I know when I am beaten. I will never trouble Brattleboro people again. I have no interest in the place now, and few friends, and I don't believe they want anything of me. And yet I never stole their money. I am not a felon, nor an embezzler. I was dishonest and won't deny it. I played a dangerous game, and lost, but if I had won the world would never have known that I was a dishonest man, and I would never have come to this. They can call me high-spirited, but they don't know what such a fall means. Why, I have seen the time when I could borrow $50,000 in Boston on my personal note as easily as you can step into a store and buy a cigar, and look at me now. Homeless, penniless, and with nothing to look forward to or back on with pleasure. It's all right, though, and I have no fault to find. They have treated me well here, and some friends have not forgotten me. Do you want my story?" And WAITE talked on with feverish earnestness. "I was 60 years old last October. I have a brother two years younger, Alfred F. WAITE, a staid old farmer living in Brattleboro. A daughter is teaching in Morristown, N. J., and another graduates at Smith college at Northampton next June. My only son is a ranchman in Nebraska. I began banking business at Brattleboro in 1857, and in 1864 re-organized the old State bank and started the First National bank. The assets of the old bank were rated at $150,000, the most of which was in Western loans and soon proved worthless. There was $150,000 more stock subscribed for, making $300,000 in all,and the new stockholders were paid 31 dividends in 15 1/2 years, averaging 9 per cent on $300,000, or 18 per cent on what they actually paid in. It was flush times with us then, and when I found that half the assets of the bank were worthless I thought that if I could tide it over for a few years I could make it good myself and buy out the other stockholders. I owned a profitable gas concern and had just got judgment for $161,000 against the Estey company for an infringement of the patent reed board of the Burdette organ company of Chicago, of which I owned half. Well, I kept the bank on its legs 15 years. I lied in doing so, but hoped to make things all right. One thing after another prevented, however, until in June, 1880, the bank had to collapse and the whole thing came out. The organ case had been appealed to the United States Supreme court and the judgment of the lower court in my favor was reversed. I went West and was arrested in Omaha, September 19th, 1880. You know the rest of the story. The stockholders of the bank had to be assessed $20,000 to pay the depositors, but they had received in dividends more than the amount of their stock, and it has been shown that had my salary been allowed they would have been owing me when the failure came. But I do not want to make myself out innocent. I am guilty of fraud and deception, but I never made any money by it." Transcribed by Ruth Barton -- Ruth Barton [email protected] Dummerston, VT