HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

57TH CONGRESS, 1st Session
Report No. 1060

ANDREW J FELT


March 18, 1902 – Committed to the Committee of the Whole House and ordered to be printed.


Mr Calderhead, from the Committee on Invalid Pensions, submitted the following

REPORT

(To accompany S. 2371)

The Committee on Invalid Pensions, to whom was referred the bill (S. 2371) granting a pension to Andrew J Felt, have examined the same and adopt the Senate report thereon and recomment that the bill do pass.


[Senate Report No. 689, Fifty-seventh Congress, first session.]

The Committee on Pensions,  to whom was referred the bill (S. 2371) granting a pension to Andrew J Felt, have examined the same and report:

This bill proposes to grant a pension of $24 per month to Andrew J Felt, late of Company B, Seventh Regiment Iowa Volunteer Infantry.

The military records show that Andrew J Felt served from July 8, 1861, to December 30, 1862, when he was honorably discharged; that he received treatment for diarrhea from October 31 to November 2, 1861; that he was taken prisoner November 7, 1861, at Belmont, Mo., and held as such until October 17, 1862, when he was paroled, and that he was in hospital at Camp Parole, Maryland, and Benton Barracks, Mo., under treatment for diarrhea from the time of his parole until his discharge.

Mr Felt is 67 years of age.  On April 1, 1899, he made claim under the general law, alleging that about December 20, 1861, while at Memphis, Tenn., and afterwards while a prisoner of war, he contracted rheumatism, disease of kidneys, and general debility.  This claim was rejected January 19, 1900, after a medical examination held June 7, 1899, by a board of surgeons at Seneca, Kans., on the ground that no pensionable degree of disability was shown since date of filing claim.

On April 30, 1900, Mr Felt made application to have his claim reopened and reconsidered and for another medical examination, and accompanied his application with the evidence of several witnesses who had known him for many years.  The rejection, however, of the claim was adhered to September 21, 1900, on the ground that the new evidence did not warrant the reopening of the claim, because it did not outweigh the report of the former medical examination.

The only medical examination to which Mr Felt was subjected was made at Seneca, Kans., June 7, 1899.  It shows no signs of rheumatism or kidney disease, but does show general debility, which is rated at $8 per month.  The certificate of examination recites that: "Two of the board have known applicant intimately for eighteen years last past, during which period he has been unable to perform any manual labor.  He was a skeleton when discharged.  His health has gradually improved from that to the present time.  Is emaciated and feeble."

He then measured 5 feet 5 1/2 inches in height and weighed but 115 pounds.

The evidence of seven or eight witnesses, comrades and neighbors, on file in his claim shows that Mr Felt was sound and healthy when he entered the service and performed faithfully and willingly all his duties until taken prisoner in November, 1861; that on his release from prison he was nothing but skin and bones, greatly debilitated, and in fact a physical wreck and has remained so with little improvement to the present time.

He has always complained of rheumatism and disease of kidneys, but his trouble seems to have been, and now is, a general breaking down of his system and a complete general debility, the result of starvation and of the exposure and hardships of prison life.  During all the years since his discharge he has never been physically able to perform any manual labor.  This has been his condition, as shown by the evidence of those who served with him in the Army and by evidence of his close neighbors, and it is exemplified in the findings and report of the examining surgeons as mentioned above.  Among the papers in Mr Felt's claim is a letter from Senator Allison, from which the following extract is made:

"Although I have not seen Mr Felt for a good many years, he having lived in Kansas, I think, now for twenty-five years, I knew him well after his return from the civil war and also before he enlisted.  He was well when he enlisted and always in bad health after his return until he went to Kansas."

While the action of the Pension Bureau in rejecting the claim for rheumatism and disease of kidneys was probably correct, it would seem that the claim for general debility as a result of prison life was entitled to favorable consideration.

The history of the case as disclosed by the papers on file shows very clearly that Mr Felt has been debilitated, physically prostrated, and not able to perform manual labor since his release from prison after nearly a year's confinement, and your committee are of opinion that he has fairly and justly established his right to a pension at the rate provided by the general law for nearly total incapacity to perform manual labor.

The bill is reported back favorably with the recommendation that it pass.



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