Navy Can't Identify This 'Man Who Was'.

New York Times 100 years ago today, May 4, 1913:
Operation May Restore Memory to Sailor Whose Mind Has Been Blank Seven Years.
Special to The New York Times.
    WASHINGTON, May 3.— The finger-print experts of the Navy Department have failed thus far to identify a man in the Minnesota State Hospital for the Insane, who has largely lost his memory, but who is believed to have once been in the Navy. The man was put off a railroad train at Waseca, Minn., seven years ago.
    He was either struck on the head by robbers or injured in falling from the car. He had lost all recollection of his past or even his identity. For two years this man was cared for at Waseca, and then he was sent to the State Asylum at Rochester, where he has been an inmate ever since. His right arm is paralyzed, and there is an indentation in his skull which surgeons believe has caused his loss of memory. All he can say is "He! Hi!"
    The hospital surgeons notified the Navy Department to-day that they had decided to trephine the patient's cranium and correct the indentation that seems to prevent him from telling his identity. The navy officials are satisfied he is not an officer. He is about 40 years old, 5 feet 5 1/2 inches tall, weighs 165 pounds, has brown hair and brown eyes. Two navy officers have disappeared within the last few years, but they were younger men.
    The man shows great interest when navy matters are talked about in his presence, especially vessels in the Pacific fleet six or seven years ago. When the motions of drawing a sword are gone through before him he expresses approval, and this has been taken to mean that he was an officer. When the blowing of a whistle is indicated, on the theory that he may have been a warrant officer or an enlisted man, he shakes his head.
    By long tests the doctors have determined that his initials are "J.G.R." In a faint way he has conveyed the story that he became entangled with a woman and was robbed of $500.