John Jacob Astor Bristed (1847-1880)

He was described by Mrs. Caroline Carson, an American artist living in Rome who knew the Bristed family well: "I knew John Bristed to be naturally good-natured and well disposed and I cannot think that he would have been guilty of the acts of violence, malice and eccentricity which I have known him to commit, if he had been in his right mind. As a little child, he was gentle and sweet-natured; but, as he grew older and ought to have become reasonable, he seemed to be bereft of reason. He would shriek like a wild Indian, and rush out of the house like a madman without any cause. He would play the piano for hours by day, and then get up in the dead of night and go on playing, always without sequence, like reading a newspaper sideways. On returning home at night, instead of ringing the bell, he would throw stones at the house. There were many other eccentricities too numerous to mention... I saw him in 1877, when he was acknowledged a lunatic. His talk was precisely the same I had always known it. He was sweet, kindly and perfectly inconsequent, as he had always been in his best moods." He left $500,000.