I GO WEST 
M 
fortune to be introduced to a most interesting family 
whose fascinating history, never before related, will, 
I am sure, interest the readers. 
In the late ’thirties there came to Missouri a young 
German immigrant by the name of Moritz Niedner, 
the son of a Lutheran minister and a printer by 
trade. After several ventures in the Southeastern 
section of the state he started a printing office at 
St. Louis which, in the course of the years, became 
a most prosperous business. In 1860 he began the 
publication of the State Journal, a daily newspaper 
which, becanse of its strong Southern leanings, soon 
became an influential organ with a circulation ex- 
tending throughout the entire South. Shortly after 
the breaking out of the Civil War an editorial ap- 
peared which the Federal authorities regarded as se- 
ditious. They suppressed the paper and completely 
destroyed its plant. Fearing for his life, the editor, a 
scion of the well-known Tucker family of Virginia, 
fled from St. Louis, and the publisher, Niedner, was 
held responsible. He was apprehended and by court 
martial sentenced to be shot, although he had no 
knowledge of the editorial before its publication. 
On the morning of the day when the sentence was 
to be carried out, the heart-broken wife of the unfor- 
tunate publisher appeared before General Fremont 
at his headquarters on Chouteau Avenue and 
pleaded on bended knees for the life of her hus- 
and. . 
“Please rise, Madam,”’ said the General, “I am 
happy to inform you that your husband was liber- 
ated a half an hour ago, after the real culprit had 
given himself up.” 
_ Mrs. Niedner, at that moment the happiest woman 
in all the world, hurried home and there found her 
husband awaiting her. No pen could describe the 
blissfulness of that happy reunion. It seems when 
Tucker learned that Niedner was to forfeit his life 
for something he (Tucker) had written, he hurried