EXTRAORDINARY CASE OF CHANGE OF SEX.

Patea Mail, Volume V, Issue 49, 14 January 1880, Page 2

EXTRAORDINARY CASE OF CHANGE OF SEX.

WjiHiK sm.-li great interest exists in connection with the .sensational case of lie Lticv Evans, the fallowing startling statement of alleged fact from a New York paper will doubtless prove interesting lu our readers;— “ A correspondent writes ns from Waterloo, low.i, asking if wo knew of one Burnham, and of Ids history. Wo. do ; and it is a strange, true tale, known to hundreds. A e give it in the JJiUtoctnf as it is, and we imp,’ cunect sonic errors tliose who speak of him have fallen into. Eight, years .since, when wo were engaged us city editor of a Milwaukee paper, there lived in this State an editor named Powell, no tv connected with a Chicago paper, wo think. In ISG2 Powell was married to a Miss Ellen Burnham, of Brodhead, Wisconsin, alter a courtship of .some months. Miss Burnham’s parents wore residents of Brodhead, and of high respectability. The daughter taught music, had a large number of pupils, and was very attractive. Powell lived with'her as a husband for two years, she being all Unit time a good wife in all respects —presenting biigT with hut one child. At the of about two years Mrs Powell’s voic<. was changed, she grew light whiskers, and gradually changed her sex, developing into a man in all respects. The husband and wife separated when the wife became a man, and Mrs Ellen Powell look the name of Edgar Burnham, donned male attire, sought and obtained employment as a clerk in Chicago, and lived a single young man for one year. During this time lie fell in love with a niece of Senator Morgan, of New York, but did not marry her, for reasons not pertinent to this article. But about the end of the year he did marry a young lady of Brodhead, Wisconsin—a Miss Greta Everett, who was a music-pupil of his when lie was Miss Ellen Burnham, over three years previous to the marriage. This second marriage was about two years ago. Soon aiter this marriage ‘ Edgar’ Burnham and wife removed to Waterloo, lowa, where they now reside, or did not long since. The former girl is now a man, the former wife is now a husband, the former mother is 'now a father, the former young lady teacher of a young lady is now that, young lady’s husband. Truth is, indeed, stranger than fiction, and the above, sivojd/j statement of facts borders so upon the marvellous, we,-

could not believe it, did we not personally know all the parties. Anyone can bo convinced by writing to the parties in either of the places we have named, of the full and entire truth of this most wonderful transformation, which puzzles not onlv the medical, hut the entire scientific world, and which fact appears now, for the first time in print, though the particulars hove long been known to ns and to many other neWsp iper men and prominent citizens of this h’tate. as to nearly all the citizens of Brodhead, whore the parties so long resided,” We may add that Mr James Hos.s. of Melbourne, writes to the Herald confirming the tnuh of the above story. lie -says he knew Mrs Powell as a woman, and afterwards as a man.

TUP TAY BUIIKIF. Tiik above railway bridge, the partial destruction of which the other day was attended by such fearful loss of life, is the colossal work completed in PS77 by the North licitisb llailway Company, living direct communication between ■Buideo and the South. This bridge (according to a contemporary) formed a connection between the town and the North British railway system in Fife, and crossed the Firth of Tay about a mile and a half to the west of Dundee. The length of the bridge was So l d yards, and it was therefore the longest bridge in the world, it consisted of spans, their magnitude, commencing at the Fife end, being ; throe of GUIt, two of 8!)!t, ten of 120 ft, twelve of louft, thirteen of 230 ft, one of 100 ft, eleven of 120 ft, twenty-five of GOft, one of 105 ft, and six ot 27tt. The first loin teen were founded on rock. At one end the piers were of brick ; the remainder, iron cylinders, tilled with concrete, sunk into the river-bed ; and these cylinders supported wrought-iroa pillars about loin in diameter, on winch the superstructure rested. The bridge was high enough to allow of the passage under it of ships of heavy burden. It occupied nine years in building. A single line of railway traversed it, but the bridge was so constructed that a second line could have been added. Mr T. Bunch was the engineer. Although the bridge lias often’boon described as the lightest structure of the kind to he seen anywhere, there were used in its construction S2OO tuns of iron, $7,000 cubic feet of timber, 10,000 casks of cement, and 10,000,000 bricks. Owing to the great success uf the Tay bridge, it was resolved last year by the four great railway companies to take steps tor the construction of a similar bridge over the Forth, and we believe the wo rk was entrusted to the same engineer.