The following year, when he discovered post funds missing from his quarters, he attempted to conceal the loss until he could find or replace the money. When Shafter learned of the discrepancy, he immediately filed charges against him.
A divided court-martial acquitted Flipper of charges of embezzlement but pronounced him guilty of "conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman.
Accounts of the court-martial proceedings may be found in the San Antonio Express , November 2-December 14, President Chester A. Arthur made a final confirmation of the verdict on June 24, Flipper maintained his innocence until his death and waged a lifelong battle for reinstatement in the army.
He went to El Paso after his dismissal and remained there until , when he went to work as an assistant engineer for a surveying company composed of former Confederate officers. He assisted the company in surveying public lands in Mexico and helped run a boundary line between the states of Coahuila and Chihuahua in Between and he worked in Chihuahua and Sonora as a surveyor for several other American land companies. In he opened a civil and mining engineering office in Nogales, Arizona.
Flipper served as the government's only witness, and his testimony resulted in the grant's being declared invalid. The ruling saved the property of hundreds of landowners. Flipper's activity in the community led to his appointment as a special agent for the United States Court of Private Land Claims. In that position he worked on court materials, served as an expert on penmanship, and surveyed land grants in southern Arizona. He offered to serve in the Spanish-American War in , but bills in the United States House of Representatives and in the Senate to restore his rank both died in committee.
He served in the court of private land claims until Beginning in Flipper spent eleven years in northern Mexico as an engineer and legal assistant to mining companies. He joined the Balvanera Mining Company in and remained as keeper of the company's property when it folded in William C.
Greene bought the company in , renamed it the Gold-Silver Company, and placed Flipper in the legal department, where he handled land claims and sales and kept mining crews out of trouble with the local authorities. Still known as "Flipper's Ditch," the ditch is commemorated by a bronze marker at Fort Sill and the fort is listed as a National Historic Landmark.
A court-martial found him not guilty of embezzlement but convicted him of conduct unbecoming an officer and ordered him dismissed from the Army. After his dishonorable discharge, Flipper fought to clear his name as he pursued a career as an engineer and an expert on Spanish and Mexican land law.
In , a bill reinstating him into the Army and restoring his rank was introduced in Congress on his behalf. To bolster his case, he sent Congressman John A. These included serving as surveyor, civil and military engineer, author, translator, special agent of the Justice Department, special assistant to the Secretary of the Interior with the Alaskan Engineering Commission, aide to the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, as well as an authority on Mexican land and mining law.
He wrote and published several works. Throughout the balance of his life, Henry Flipper maintained that he was innocent of the charges that resulted in his court-martial and dismissal from the Army and made numerous attempts to have his conviction reversed. He died in Georgia in The Board, after stating that it did not have the authority to overturn his court-martial convictions, concluded the conviction and punishment were "unduly harsh and unjust" and recommended that Lieutenant Flipper's dismissal commuted to a good conduct discharge.
The Assistant Secretary of the Army Manpower and Reserve Affairs and The Adjutant General approved the Board's findings, conclusions and recommendations and directed that the Department of the Army issue Lieutenant Flipper a Certificate of Honorable Discharge, dated 30 June , in lieu of his dismissal on the same date. On October 21, , a private law firm filed an application of pardon with the Secretary of the Army on Lieutenant Flipper's behalf.
0コメント