Lost and Found; Or, the Abduction and Recovery of Ray Elliot. A full and true account of the Kidnapping, the Search, and the Restoration of the long-lost boy, with testimony, court records, decisions, and decrees to date, in the famous criminal trial and habeas corpus case
Davenport, IA: Egbert, Fidlar, & Chambers, 1895.
First Edition. 260 pp, illustrated with portraits of various people associated with the case. Bound in original grey cloth boards with title stamped in black. Pages toned, handwritten note on front pastedown ("Facts known + written by a neighbor at Sigourney, Iowa"), all else very good. Three copies located in OCLC. In 1893, three-year-old Ray Elliott disappeared while playing near his home in Marengo, Iowa. Fourteen months later, a boy matching Ray's description was abandoned in the town of Waterloo, about 60 miles away. Although this boy failed to recognize his father and said his name was Roy Burke, Mr. Eliot was convinced he was Ray, and brought him back to Marengo, where he was said to have instantly recognized Mrs. Elliot as his monther. But the joy of reunion was short lived. Members of the Burke family soon appeared and instigated habeas corpus proceedings for the recovery of the boy. Lengthy court proceedings ensued. Although the evidence apparently never fully resolved the matter, the child was awarded to the Elliots, who were perceived to be of better moral character than the Burkes. According to a later newspaper account, "the town was divided over the matter, some contending the boy returned was Ray Elliot, others, as long as they lived, stoutly maintained that the real Ray Elliot was never found and that the returned boy was Roy Burke." In 2002, a writer working on a play about the case located descendants of both families and paid for DNA testing. The results--which were dramatically revealed at the end of the play--showed that the child raised by the Elliots was, in fact, their own.
Item #19781
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