The newspapers knew exactly who they wanted to blame for this “ridiculous farce.”10
“The effect of Mrs. Packard’s law is to excite the patients and make unnecessary trouble,”11 complained the Jacksonville Sentinel. “The reports put in circulation by Mrs. Packard charging gross mismanagement, false imprisonment and oppression on the physicians and attendants at the Hospital, have been proven by strict investigation to be utter groundless—a phantasy of the diseased brain of a former patient… Such disgraceful libel on one of our best State Institutions would seem to demand punishment.”12
But for Elizabeth, the lack of any sane verdicts was punishment enough.
The only sliver of good news was that Sarah Minard at least had her liberty. She’d been discharged without a trial on May 1, 1867. Though she was freed under the usual asylum processes, Sarah herself still asserted that it was as a result of her friend’s personal liberty bill.
Although the trials had not brought the results Elizabeth had anticipated, she tried not to let that—nor the vicious newspaper attacks—derail her. All was not yet lost. She looked now in only one direction: toward the investigating committee.
General Allen C. Fuller
“The name of General Fuller,” crowed The Bench and Bar of Illinois, “is a synonym for honor, integrity and fair dealing.”13
As a character reference for the newly appointed chairman of the committee went, it was pretty darn compelling.
General Allen C. Fuller, forty-four, was such a stalwart of Illinois politics that a historian in his own time said, “The history of Illinois could not be written with the name of Allen C. Fuller left out.”14 It was almost quicker to list the jobs he hadn’t done for the state, but his positions included speaker of the house of representatives, judge, and adjutant general; he’d even deputized for the governor during the Civil War. In every role, he’d proved himself public-spirited, energetic, and methodical, with “every detail…attended to with scrupulous exactness.”15 He wore his balding hair neatly clipped and his fuzzy, pointed beard a good two inches below his chin. He looked out at the world with almost troubled, hooded eyes, as though he’d seen too much of man’s dark side. Of his manner, he was known to be “kind, courteous, able and impartial [with] his general…demeanor the perfect model of a gentleman.”16 In all his dealings with his fellow men, he was renowned for treating them with “absolute justice.”17
Even Andrew McFarland, who was now to be investigated by this titan of Illinois, conceded the committee were “pretty able”18 men.
Fuller headed up a team of five: two senators, including himself, plus three from the house. All were prominent in the affairs of the state, “of well-known ability and character”;19 three were “astute lawyers.”20
As they began their work in May 1867, there was an immediate shock for the hospital’s trustees. The resolution that had formed the committee stated that it was to “confer with the Trustees in regard to the speedy correction of any abuses found to exist.”21 The trustees had assumed this meant the two bodies would work hand in glove on the forthcoming investigation: two dance troupes bouncing to the same beat, with not a member out of step.
Yet the committee determined to be completely independent. “The action of the committee at the start,” complained the trustees, “evinced a purpose to bestow no recognition on the Board as a co-operative body.”22 Instead, they were kept at arm’s length.
But in a way, the trustees were under investigation too. After all, if these reported abuses were found to have existed, what exactly had they been doing for the past several years, when they’d found only praise for their friend McFarland and his work?
On May 14, 1867, the committee convened its first meeting at the Dunlap House, a hotel in Jacksonville. Probably as a result of the recent heated newspaper coverage on the issue they were investigating, the committee decided their sessions should be private, with no publication of proceedings until their final report, though all evidence taken would be transcribed. This method aimed to balance transparency with avoidance of a media frenzy.
They also made a series of other calls. First, not to allow McFarland to attend the hearings, a decision perhaps made to avoid the intimidation of witnesses, deliberate or otherwise. He himself was not on trial, after all—it was his hospital they were investigating—so they felt he did not need to be present; the trustees were permitted to attend. They also decided to accept the testimony of former patients.