Kansas Physician Confirms Howard Report

[TradeName]

Here's a more detailed article about the affidavits submitted in support of the plea for Frenchy's pardon. One of the witnesses was Jacob Riis, the Sun's police reporter and a friend of Teddy Roosevelt.

New York Sun, June 02, 1901, Page 1, Column 1

Shakespeare Murder Key

Found in a Housewife's Jewel Box at Cranford, N.J.

Another attempt to secure the liberation
of "Frenchy," otherwise the Algerian
Ameer Ben Ali, who was sent to prison
for life as the murderer of "Old Shakespeare"
in the East River Hotel, is now
being carried forward by persons actuated
only by the desire for what they belleve
to be justice. This is the third attempt
to secure the pardon of the Algerian.

Eight affidavits were sent to the Governor
at Albany yesterday by Lawyer
Ovide Robillard. An effort was made to
induce Gov. Black to pardon "Frenchy,"
but the Governor did not feel called upon
to act. When Gov. Roosevelt was asked
to grant a pardon to the Algerian he declined
on the ground that there was no
evidence to show that "Frenchy" was not
guilty. This objection of Gov. Roosevelt's
is met in the papers sent to Albany
by Mr. RoblDard, as the prisoner's friends
--who are altogether unknown to the prlsoner
himself--have been fortunate enough to
secure evidence that "Frenchy" did not
commit the murder and evidence that
another man, a Dane, did kill "Old Shakespeare."
As tangible evidence they have
the key to the room where the murder was
committed, which the murderer carried
away with him on the night of the murder
and which has been missing, so far as the
authorities are concerned, for ten years,
but the whereabouts of which during that
time is not known.

The key comes to light through George
Damon, a dealer in printers' materials at
44 Beckman street, who lives at Cranford,
N. J., with the history of its finding and
retention at his home on account of an
unwillingness to face the publicity of coming
forward with it at that time, a belief
that "Frenchy" was of a character such
that he should be In jail anyway, and a
fear of the big, ugly Dane who, Mr. Damon
believes, committed the murder.

Mr. Damon says that about a month
before the murder of "Old Shakespeare"
on April 23, 1891, having some grading to
do at his place in New Jersey, he went to
Castle Garden and hired a big foreigner
whom he knew only as Frank and whom he
took to be a Dane. After the grading was
finished the Dane was retained as an assistant
about the stable and grounds. Mr.
Damon's regular man being partly incapacitated
by reason of an accident, On
the morning of April 24, about 8 o'clock,
Damon went out to his stable and, not seeing
the Dane about, asked his other man where
Frank was. His man told him that the
Dane was upstairs asleep, that be had been
out all night and had come home very
ugly, and that Mr. Damon would be likely
to have trouble if he disturbed him. Mr.
Damon therefore didn't disturb him, but
came to the city as usual about 8 o'clock.

Between five and ten days later, Mr.
Damon say [sic], Frank left his employ abruptly.
He disappeared in the night and Mr.
Damon has never heard of him since. When he
came to Mr. Damon's he brought with him
only a small bundle of clothes. When he
went away he took this with him. When
Mrs. Damon sent one of her maid servants
to the barn to clean out the room Frank
had occupied the girl found there a bloody
shirt and a brass key, the only articles
the Dane had left in the room. The key was
attached to a brass tag on which was
stamped the number 31. This was the
number of the room in which "Shakespeare"
was murdered, and the key to which
had been taken away by the man who occupied
the room with her. The newspapers
had told all about the missing key. THE
SUN had published a picture of another
key belonging to the same hotel just like
the missing one.

The maid told Mrs. Damon of the finding
of the bloody shirt and the key in the barn
room and remarked that the number on the
tag attached to the key was the same as the
number of the room in which "Old Shakespeare"
had been murdered. When Mr.
Damon came home he was informed of
what had been found and the next day
when he came to the city he took one
of his employees and went around to the
saloon-hotel where the murder was done
and sitting down at a table ordered some
cigars. From the table they studied the
keys to tha other rooms of the hotel hanging
on the keyboard and saw they
were like the one found at Cranford.

While they were smoking a man came
downstairs from the hotel and laying a
key down on the bar went out. Damon
and his employee walked to the bar
and ordered some beer and while there
compared the key just laid down with
the one they had brought with them, and
found that the two were exactly alike.
Mr. Damon says that his familiarity
with type enables him to say the number
31 on his key was stamped on the brass
tag with the same die which had made
the numbers on the tag attached to the
other key and the numbers also on the
rest of the keys hanging up. The two
men left the hotel and for reasons already
mentioned Mr. Damon refrained
from coming forward and informing the authorities
of what he had found out. He did
tell his discoveries, however, to a friend,
John Lee, the well-known contractor, and it
was partly on Mr. Lee's advice, he says,
that he kept his information to himself
after that. An affidavit by Mr. Lee saying
that Mr. Damon told him of this ten
years ago has been sent with Mr. Damon's
to Gov. Odell, and there is among the papers
also an affidavit by Mr. Damon's employee,
Charles Brennan, corroborating Mr. Damon.
Brennan works for Mr. Damon as a truckman.

After making his affidavit Mr. Damon
went home and asked his wife if she could
swear to the number which the key her
maId found had borne, and she replied
that she could and that the key was up
in her jewel box, where it had been ever
since it was found. So the key was produced
and that too was sent on to Albany,
yesterday. The "1" of the "31" didn't
make a good mark when it was first stamped
on the brass tag, and a second impression
had to be made. The first blur and the
correction are both clear now.

Ever since the trial and conviction of
"Frenchy" there has been a widespread
conviction in this town that the Algerian
was "railroaded" to prison as a means to
stop the public clamor that some one should
be punished for the murder. "Frenchy"
has become insane in his imprisonment
and is now in the hospital for the criminal
insane at Matteawan, where Gov. Odell
saw him not long ago.

One of the points made by the police at
the time thay captured "Frenchy" and
identified him as the man who had done
the crime was the alleged discovery of "a
trail of blood" which led from the walls of
the room in which the body wes found
directly to the depraved Algerian. One
of the affidavits just sent to Gov.
Odell is that of Jacob A. Riis, who declares
that he was the first person from Police
Headquarters to enter the room after the
report of the finding of the body was made,
and that there were no spots of blood about
the room. F.C. Barber, who is now city
editor of one of the city papers was at
time a reporter for an evening paper and
was left at the scene of the murder, after
the other reporters had gone for the express
purpose of looking around the room
more carefully than they had the opportunity
to do in their hurry. He has
made an affidavit, which has been sent to
the Governor, saying also that there
no blood spots as the police declared
later they had found. H. Biebinich,
a clerk In one of the city departments, makes
affidavit that in an Eighth avenue place of
refreshment he had heard two men some time
after the murder declare that the alleged
blood spots spoken of by the police were
smears made on the walls by certain reporters
for the sake of doing duty as "clues."

Robert G. Butler of the editorial force
of one of the New York papers has made
an affidavit in which he nays Mr. Riis
and another reporter, W.J. Chamberlin,
told him at the time of the excitement over
the murder, that there were no blood spots
in the room, and he says that he told this
to Frederick House, who defended "Frenchy"
on his trial, but that Mr House did not
utilize the information in his trial of the
case. Another newspaper man, F.F.
Coleman, in his affidavit says that Dr W.
T. Jenkins told him that he had found in
"Shakespeare's" stomach evidence in the
condition of the food there that the woman
had eaten about an hour and a half before
she died, as it is known that "Shakespeare"
did eat, whereas "Frenchy" did not come
to the hotel until several hours after she
was known to have eaten this food. Mr.
Coleman says that Dr. Jenkins expressed
his willingness to go on the stand to testify
to this, that he, Coleman, wrote to Mr.
House informing him of this fact. Dr.
Jenkins was not questioned as to this reported
finding of his, however. Mr. Coleman
says that Mr. House sunsequently
acknowledged to him that he had received
the letter.

----end

[Mayerling]

Here's a more detailed article about the affidavits submitted in support of the plea for Frenchy's pardon. One of the witnesses was Jacob Riis, the Sun's police reporter and a friend of Teddy Roosevelt.

New York Sun, June 02, 1901, Page 1, Column 1

Shakespeare Murder Key

Found in a Housewife's Jewel Box at Cranford, N.J.

Another attempt to secure the liberation
of "Frenchy," otherwise the Algerian
Ameer Ben Ali, who was sent to prison
for life as the murderer of "Old Shakespeare"
in the East River Hotel, is now
being carried forward by persons actuated
only by the desire for what they belleve
to be justice. This is the third attempt
to secure the pardon of the Algerian.

Eight affidavits were sent to the Governor
at Albany yesterday by Lawyer
Ovide Robillard. An effort was made to
induce Gov. Black to pardon "Frenchy,"
but the Governor did not feel called upon
to act. When Gov. Roosevelt was asked
to grant a pardon to the Algerian he declined
on the ground that there was no
evidence to show that "Frenchy" was not
guilty. This objection of Gov. Roosevelt's
is met in the papers sent to Albany
by Mr. RoblDard, as the prisoner's friends
--who are altogether unknown to the prlsoner
himself--have been fortunate enough to
secure evidence that "Frenchy" did not
commit the murder and evidence that
another man, a Dane, did kill "Old Shakespeare."
As tangible evidence they have
the key to the room where the murder was
committed, which the murderer carried
away with him on the night of the murder
and which has been missing, so far as the
authorities are concerned, for ten years,
but the whereabouts of which during that
time is not known.

The key comes to light through George
Damon, a dealer in printers' materials at
44 Beckman street, who lives at Cranford,
N. J., with the history of its finding and
retention at his home on account of an
unwillingness to face the publicity of coming
forward with it at that time, a belief
that "Frenchy" was of a character such
that he should be In jail anyway, and a
fear of the big, ugly Dane who, Mr. Damon
believes, committed the murder.

Mr. Damon says that about a month
before the murder of "Old Shakespeare"
on April 23, 1891, having some grading to
do at his place in New Jersey, he went to
Castle Garden and hired a big foreigner
whom he knew only as Frank and whom he
took to be a Dane. After the grading was
finished the Dane was retained as an assistant
about the stable and grounds. Mr.
Damon's regular man being partly incapacitated
by reason of an accident, On
the morning of April 24, about 8 o'clock,
Damon went out to his stable and, not seeing
the Dane about, asked his other man where
Frank was. His man told him that the
Dane was upstairs asleep, that be had been
out all night and had come home very
ugly, and that Mr. Damon would be likely
to have trouble if he disturbed him. Mr.
Damon therefore didn't disturb him, but
came to the city as usual about 8 o'clock.

Between five and ten days later, Mr.
Damon say [sic], Frank left his employ abruptly.
He disappeared in the night and Mr.
Damon has never heard of him since. When he
came to Mr. Damon's he brought with him
only a small bundle of clothes. When he
went away he took this with him. When
Mrs. Damon sent one of her maid servants
to the barn to clean out the room Frank
had occupied the girl found there a bloody
shirt and a brass key, the only articles
the Dane had left in the room. The key was
attached to a brass tag on which was
stamped the number 31. This was the
number of the room in which "Shakespeare"
was murdered, and the key to which
had been taken away by the man who occupied
the room with her. The newspapers
had told all about the missing key. THE
SUN had published a picture of another
key belonging to the same hotel just like
the missing one.

The maid told Mrs. Damon of the finding
of the bloody shirt and the key in the barn
room and remarked that the number on the
tag attached to the key was the same as the
number of the room in which "Old Shakespeare"
had been murdered. When Mr.
Damon came home he was informed of
what had been found and the next day
when he came to the city he took one
of his employees and went around to the
saloon-hotel where the murder was done
and sitting down at a table ordered some
cigars. From the table they studied the
keys to tha other rooms of the hotel hanging
on the keyboard and saw they
were like the one found at Cranford.

While they were smoking a man came
downstairs from the hotel and laying a
key down on the bar went out. Damon
and his employee walked to the bar
and ordered some beer and while there
compared the key just laid down with
the one they had brought with them, and
found that the two were exactly alike.
Mr. Damon says that his familiarity
with type enables him to say the number
31 on his key was stamped on the brass
tag with the same die which had made
the numbers on the tag attached to the
other key and the numbers also on the
rest of the keys hanging up. The two
men left the hotel and for reasons already
mentioned Mr. Damon refrained
from coming forward and informing the authorities
of what he had found out. He did
tell his discoveries, however, to a friend,
John Lee, the well-known contractor, and it
was partly on Mr. Lee's advice, he says,
that he kept his information to himself
after that. An affidavit by Mr. Lee saying
that Mr. Damon told him of this ten
years ago has been sent with Mr. Damon's
to Gov. Odell, and there is among the papers
also an affidavit by Mr. Damon's employee,
Charles Brennan, corroborating Mr. Damon.
Brennan works for Mr. Damon as a truckman.

After making his affidavit Mr. Damon
went home and asked his wife if she could
swear to the number which the key her
maId found had borne, and she replied
that she could and that the key was up
in her jewel box, where it had been ever
since it was found. So the key was produced
and that too was sent on to Albany,
yesterday. The "1" of the "31" didn't
make a good mark when it was first stamped
on the brass tag, and a second impression
had to be made. The first blur and the
correction are both clear now.

Ever since the trial and conviction of
"Frenchy" there has been a widespread
conviction in this town that the Algerian
was "railroaded" to prison as a means to
stop the public clamor that some one should
be punished for the murder. "Frenchy"
has become insane in his imprisonment
and is now in the hospital for the criminal
insane at Matteawan, where Gov. Odell
saw him not long ago.

One of the points made by the police at
the time thay captured "Frenchy" and
identified him as the man who had done
the crime was the alleged discovery of "a
trail of blood" which led from the walls of
the room in which the body wes found
directly to the depraved Algerian. One
of the affidavits just sent to Gov.
Odell is that of Jacob A. Riis, who declares
that he was the first person from Police
Headquarters to enter the room after the
report of the finding of the body was made,
and that there were no spots of blood about
the room. F.C. Barber, who is now city
editor of one of the city papers was at
time a reporter for an evening paper and
was left at the scene of the murder, after
the other reporters had gone for the express
purpose of looking around the room
more carefully than they had the opportunity
to do in their hurry. He has
made an affidavit, which has been sent to
the Governor, saying also that there
no blood spots as the police declared
later they had found. H. Biebinich,
a clerk In one of the city departments, makes
affidavit that in an Eighth avenue place of
refreshment he had heard two men some time
after the murder declare that the alleged
blood spots spoken of by the police were
smears made on the walls by certain reporters
for the sake of doing duty as "clues."

Robert G. Butler of the editorial force
of one of the New York papers has made
an affidavit in which he nays Mr. Riis
and another reporter, W.J. Chamberlin,
told him at the time of the excitement over
the murder, that there were no blood spots
in the room, and he says that he told this
to Frederick House, who defended "Frenchy"
on his trial, but that Mr House did not
utilize the information in his trial of the
case. Another newspaper man, F.F.
Coleman, in his affidavit says that Dr W.
T. Jenkins told him that he had found in
"Shakespeare's" stomach evidence in the
condition of the food there that the woman
had eaten about an hour and a half before
she died, as it is known that "Shakespeare"
did eat, whereas "Frenchy" did not come
to the hotel until several hours after she
was known to have eaten this food. Mr.
Coleman says that Dr. Jenkins expressed
his willingness to go on the stand to testify
to this, that he, Coleman, wrote to Mr.
House informing him of this fact. Dr.
Jenkins was not questioned as to this reported
finding of his, however. Mr. Coleman
says that Mr. House sunsequently
acknowledged to him that he had received
the letter.

----end

There are a lot of holes in this story. The behavior of Mr. Damon for example makes little sense. He tested out the key, and found it might have been from the rat-trap hotel "Old Shakespeare" died in. But how we accept this? He never the key to the management of the hotel - nor ask if there was a missing hotel key to room 31. He claims he was afraid of "Frank the Dane", but if the key had proven to be the hotel's he could have returned to Cranford with something in writing for the local police chief, and they could have ARRESTED "Frank the Dane". Byrnes might have been a little put out that it wasn't Ali, but he would have taken "Frank" if offered. And had "Frank" been offered, given his disposition and manner, he would have gotten the death penalty. So no problem from "Frank" for Mr. Damon.

Instead he waits a decade (by which time Frank is no longer physically around) to come forward? And, in his interest in justice, gets Jacob Riis (who was a Danish immigrant, by the way - he might have known "Frank the Dane" - who happened to be an old friend of Governor Roosevelt who had turned down the pardon request). This may be partly true, but I don't believe it at all.

Jeff

[TradeName]

An image of the room key as published in the Sun's 1891 coverage.

New York Sun, April 25, 1891, Page 2





A summary of the case for the commutation of Frenchy's sentence from the Governor's papers.

Public papers of Benjamin B. Odell, jr., Governor for 1901-1904, Volume 2 (Albany: J. B. Lyon Company, 1907), Pages 272-277
By New York (State). Governor (1901-1904)

April 16, i902. George Frank. Sentenced July i0, i89i; county, New York; crime, murder, second degree; term, life; Sing Sing Prison.

Commuted to ten years, nine months and ten days, actual time.

This application is based solely upon the ground that the prisoner is innocent. It is insisted that the evidence upon which he was convicted was exceedingly weak and unconvincing so as scarcely to be legally sufficient, and that the doubt arising upon that evidence alone is such as to render the case a proper one for Executive intervention; and further that evidence recently discovered and now adduced is of such a character as practically to demonstrate his innocence.

The murder of which he was convicted was peculiarly atrocious and revolting. The victim was a dissolute woman about sixty years of age. About midnight, April 23, 1891, she and a companion, not the prisoner, retired together to a room to which they had been assigned on the upper floor of the East River Hotel, a low lodging house on Catharine Slip, New York City. As they failed to appear on the following morning the clerk opened the door with his pass key and discovered the woman lying dead on the bed. She had first been strangled and her body had then been horribly mutilated. Her companion was gone. Just when he left the evidence did not disclose; it was entirely silent on that subject. The key of the room was also missing. The prisoner had occupied a room directly across the hall and had left the house about five o'clock in the morning. The evidence to connect him with the crime was necessarily circumstantial. It was testified by experts that a chemical analysis of the scrapings of his finger nails showed substances similar to those found in the stomach of the murdered woman. Witnesses testified that, during the day following the murder, they found traces of blood leading from the room occupied by the deceased to that of the prisoner. As reported by the district attorney the proof on this subject was that three drops of blood were found in the hallway, a spot of blood on the lower panel of the door of the prisoner's room just under the lock, on the inside of the same door some spots, and some on the paper in the hallway which the police officers cut out.

Affidavits are now produced, made by persons of credit, some of whom had had experience in the investigation of crime, that they visited the scene of the murder shortly after its discovery and made a careful examination of the premises, and that they discovered no blood stains; at all events, none having a tendency to connect the prisoner with the homicide. One of these is by Mr. Jacob A. Riis. He says he arrived at the hotel about noon and examined the place carefully, viewing the room where the murder was committed and the other rooms on the same floor, and that he noticed no blood spots on the floor between the prisoner's room and that of the deceased, none on the door of the prisoner's room, inside or outside, and none in the prisoner's room, and that, to the best of his knowledge and belief, there were no blood spots on the floor of the hall or in or around the room occupied by the prisoner. It is insisted by the prisoner's counsel that these affidavits are strongly corroborated by the fact that no blood stains were found by any person on the knob or panels of the door of the murdered woman's room. Upon this point he says: "It was inferred against the prisoner that in the brief transit across the hall to his own room blood dripped on the floor, and that he daubed the walls in his groping, and soiled the panels of his door on both sides in opening it and again in closing it, while in unlocking and locking the door of the room in which the butchery had just been perpetrated, no sign of blood was left behind".

Near the scene a knife was found, probably the one used by the murderer; and evidence was given tending to show that, three or four months before, the prisoner was in possession of a knife of the same kind except that its blade was not broken or filed down to a point as was that of the knife found.

There was also some proof that, when arrested, blood stains were found on different parts of the prisoner's clothing. Some further facts were proved, but they had little if any bearing upon the question of his guilt.

It must be conceded that the evidence, even when wholly undisputed, was weak and inconclusive, and it is contended that the jury must have so regarded it; that there is no other way of accounting for the verdict; that there was no ground whatever for designating the crime as murder in the second degree, and that it could have been so found only on account of serious doubt existing in the minds of the jurors as to the prisoner's guilt.

But it is insisted that his innocence is now fully established by the new evidence. This consists of affidavits going to show that, on the morning after the murder, the key of the room in which the crime was committed was in the possession of a man who had been for some weeks in the employ of a resident of Cranford, New Jersey. He had been absent during the night and returned to Cranford in the morning. A few days afterwards he left without notice to his employer, and, upon cleaning up his room, the key was found, together with a shirt covered with blood stains. A brass tag was attached to the key bearing the number of the room which had been occupied by the deceased and her companion. It was afterwards compared with other keys at the hotel and found to be like them in every respect, and evidently part of the same set. The man referred to was a stranger at Cranford, having been brought there by his employer, and has never been heard of since he disappeared. These affidavits are all of them by persons of repute, the principal one being made by a gentleman who has been engaged in business in the city of New York for upwards of thirty years, and who is vouched for by Governor Voorhies as a man of excellent character. No motive to misrepresent is apparent; and unless the affidavits are a pure fabrication, there can be no doubt that the prisoner was wrongfully convicted. Whoever committed the murder must have had the key, and, if the key was found as alleged, the prisoner could not possibly have had it. Attention has been called to some further facts tending to establish the prisoner's innocence, but it is not necessary to refer to them particularly.

I appreciate fully the serious objections that exist to the retrying of cases upon applications for Executive clemency. As a general rule, and one to which there can be but few exceptions, the judgment of the trial court ought to be regarded as conclusive. But the present application is altogether exceptional. The evidence upon which the prisoner was convicted was extremely meager; some of it was, to say the least, of an exceedingly untrustworthy character, he was tried under very disadvantageous circumstances, and it is impossible to resist the conclusion that had the new evidence been produced upon the trial an acquittal must have resulted This evidence was not then accessible and its non-production cannot be justly attributed to lack of diligence.

To refuse relief under such circumstances would be plainly a denial of justice, and after a very careful consideration of all the facts I have reached the conclusion that it is clearly my duty to order the prisoner's release.

---end

[Mayerling]

Well the statement by Governor Odell certainly adheres to details given in the newspaper article about Mr. Damon - in particular about his suspicious candidate for the crime, the 'man in Cranford, N.J." and the fact that Jacob Riis has also made a statement regarding his observations at the time of the murder regarding blood (or it's non-appearance) in the room where Ali's bed was found. There is a solid consistency here, and (truthfully) had these facts been brought out Ali might not have been convicted. Fortunately he was not executed.

Jeff

[TradeName]

I noticed the article with the image of the room key also had a bit about a cross allegedly scratched on the thigh of the victim.

New York Sun, April 25, 1891, Page 2

On the left thigh was marked a cross made
by two long[?] bloody scratches. They had not
been cut, but just scratched with the point of
the knife apparently with sufficient force to
just break the skin. The London Jack the
Ripper left a cross chalked on the walls
beside his victims.

---end

Nathaniel Hawthorne's son, Julian, wrote a series of novels about Thomas Byrnes. Here's a link to one about an extortion case involving Jay Gould.
The book has its points of interest, but is padded out with fictional characters who are linked by a series of increasingly improbable coincidences to an extent that mortally wounded my credulity.

Section 558: or, The Fatal Letter: From the Diary of Inspector Byrnes (New York: Cassell, 1888), link
by Julian Hawthorne


A summary of the actual case.

Recollections of a New York Chief of Police (New York: Caxton Book Concern, 1887), Pages 368-372
by George Washington Walling

Although Jay Gould is perhaps the wealthiest man on this continent to-day, the criminal classes regard him as a person who has resources of such a peculiar character that it is well to let him alone. Once, however, his name appears as complainant on the records. In October. 1881, Colonel J. Howard Welles, a relation of Gideon Welles (once Secretary of the Navy), whose father was Richard J. Welles, a New York lawyer, conceived the plan of extorting money from the arch-financier. Colonel Welles believed that Mr. Gould could be frightened into paying a large sum of money to secure peace of mind. And so, on October 17, at the Windsor Hotel, he wrote the following letter and sent it to Mr. Gould:

"Dear Sir:—-It is my painful dutv to inform you that within six days of the date of this letter your body will have returned to the dust from whence it came. I, therefore, entreat you to make your peace with God, and prepare for the fate which awaits you. It is no wish of mine to take your life, but I am inspired and requested by the all-living God to do so as a public necessity, and for the benefit of the community at large. You must undoubtedly be aware that you have been a rogue of the first water all your life. Through your artful cunning you have ruined thousands of people of their birthright; you have had no mercy; you have robbed the rich and the poor, the father and the fatherless, the widow and the orphan, indiscriminately, of their last dollar; and through your villany have wrought ruin and destruction on thousands of families. All this you have done under a cloak, by circulating false reports, bribing newspapers, making false statements, committing perjury, and by artful cunning. In fact, you have robbed both great and small, and now the law says that you must pay for all with your death, as a public necessity, in order to save thousands of others from pain and destruction.

"Your death will be an easy one, for I propose shooting you through the heart, if possible, and if my first shot is not instant death, I will give you the coup de grace with the second shot, so that your death shall be quick and easy. Don't hold out the hope that this is a threatening letter, sent for stock-jobbing purposes, for I don't own a single share of stock of any kind, neither am I interested in any. This is simply the will of God, and he has chosen me to carry it out. He has appeared to me in a dream, and requested me to consult you as the party interested, and in doing so God has assured me that it is by Divine Providence I am chosen to do this act, and that by so doing I will become a public benefactor; and I have sworn and taken a solemn oath before the all-living God that I will put you to death. I intended to have shot you last Friday (yesterday), when I saw you with Harrow and Sage. I had my pistol, ready cocked, but a voice from the Lord sounded in my ear, saying: 'Hold on; give him time to repent, lest he be sent into everlasting punishment.'

"Now make your peace with God and prepare for the fate which awaits you, and may the Lord have mercy on your soul. I am only an agent of the Lord. The Lord appeared to me again last night and said: 'Jay Gould must surely die;' and when I reasoned with the Lord in my dream I told Him my life would also be required, and that I should be hung. The Lord answered me that no harm should come to me; the rope was not made, neither was the hemp grown to make the rope to hang me with, and that He would deliver me out of the hands of mine enemies. It is by the express will and command of God that I am chosen to put you to death, and I have sworn before the all-living God, the great Jehovah and the Redeemer of the world, and having taken a solemn oath I will carry it out within six days if the proper opportunity occurs. Therefore, be prepared to meet your fate at any moment, and may God have mercy on your soul.

"I remain, sir,

"An Old Victim."

This letter was read by a confidential employee who was not at first disposed to trouble Mr. Gould about it. But there was something in its tenor which indicated that the writer meant at least part of what he wrote, and that it would be just as well lo become acquainted with him. Mr. Gould was not in the imminent peril his correspondent indicated. For many years Mr. Gould rarely moved in this city when engaged on business without a confidential agent having him under surveillance. Mr. Washington E. Conner was immediately placed in charge of the case. He naturally went to police headquarters, and, as naturally, Inspector Byrnes was directed to do whatever might seem necessary in the premises. His first act was to put "shadows " on Mr. Gould, in order to watch any man who might be lying in wait for him, or dogging his footsteps.

Meantime, the "Old Victim " continued his correspondence and began to insert advertisements in newspapers. He also sent Mr. Gould, in order to carry on the advertising correspondence, a cypher key, in which familiar words were to represent certain stocks. Gradually, the plan of the "Old Victim" was developed. He said in one of his written communications that he had gambled in Wall Street and lost hundreds of thousands of dollars. He desired to recoup himself. In other words, he wanted "points" on the stock market direct from the bosom of Mr. Jay Gould. The matter ran on for three weeks, when " Old Victim," having received many "points" which did not appear to have been taken advantage of, addressed Mr. Gould the following letter:

"New York, Nov. 11, 1881. "Mv Dear Sir:—-I thank you for the two personals in to-day's Herald, though I expected none from you this morning, as I had no intention, when writing to you yesterday, of giving you the trouble of replying to my letter. I gave you the information asked for in your personal of yesterday, namely, the cost of the two stocks I had purchased through your advice; and if I asked too much in too short a time, as you say, it was owing to my anxiety on account of the decline of 'Salvation,' early yesterday afternoon. I had no intention, I can assure you, of advancing the price of 'Salvation' simply on my account, only I did hope, for the reason I gave, that you would not let it go below its cost to me. The 'Salvation ' my relative purchased for me on Wednesday was on the usual margin, but his brokers yesterday, as I mentioned, refused to carry any more for him under a 20 per cent, margin. This forced him to purchase for me five hundred shares of 'Salvation ' yesterday from another house, who bought it for him on the usual margin. I think commission houses are disinclined to purchase 'Salvation ' except for good parties with good bank accounts."

Now, it is necessary to explain that the cypher key previously mentioned makes "Salvation" the indicator for Manhattan Elevated Railroad stock, while the personals referred to were:

"Texas Correspondent.—-Up-town Salvation. Then let me know at once how you stand. Who is using the same heading? Are you trifling?"

"Up-town Salvation" meant "bull Manhattan Elevated," and the question about the two persons using the same heading arose from some one who was curious trying to solve the mystery by inserting misleading notices. The second personal was:

"Negotiate Salvation.—-Yes. Keep Windsor. Let go Concord. Give me the cost of Salvation."

This was in regard to a query by letter from the "Old Victim." It meant "Keep Western Union. Sell Pacific Mail." Then came the personal alluded to in the "Old Victim's" letter, which said he asked too much in too short a time. It added:

"Be more reasonable."

After that came:

"Negotiate.—-Can't understand how it costs so much. Give me particulars. Do not be alarmed."

This had reference to the complaint that exorbitant demands of the brokers forced "Old Victim" to take a twenty per cent, margin.

And so it went on—-letters and personals and the police playing at cross purposes, until it was discovered that 'the bulk of the letters addressed to Mr. Jay Gould by "Old Victim" came from Post-office Station E. Still, this afforded a small chance of reaching the writer, as some letters were posted in other districts. However, a watch was kept on the letter-boxes, and letters received at Station E for Mr. Gould were, by an arrangement with the postal officials, allowed to be scrutinized by Central Office detectives. This plan failed, because it was found necessary, in order to catch the correspondent, to have a watch kept on each letter-box, and arrest any man who put a letter in for Mr. Gould in the handwriting of "Old Victim" on the spot.

A plan was first devised to have employees of the Post-office work in concert with the detectives, but this did not appear feasible, as it would first have necessitated the giving away of the secret to men who might be "leaky," and they might not be sufficiently alert, or sufficiently expert in handwriting to be of service. Finally it was agreed that each box of the district should be watched by an employee of the Post-office and one or more detectives. If a letter was dropped into a box the Post-office employee would keep an eye on the depositor and also scan the letter. If it were addressed to Jay Gould he would be particularly careful to note whether there was any resemblance between the handwriting of the address and that of "Old Victim."

The day chosen was Sunday, November 13, 1881. The letterboxes were under surveillance from an early hour, and the plan worked well until about noon, when a patrolman of the Twenty-ninth Precinct, who was not in the secret and who had been watching the actions of two Central Office detectives who had charge of a box in company with a Post-office official, became suspicious. He was not satisfied with the explanation of one of the officers that they were detectives acting under orders from Inspector Byrnes, and was about to take one of them into custody when another detective passed who was acquainted with the patrolman, and the matter was explained. Fortunately the "Old Victim " did not choose that box as his depository. But at three o'clock a sprucely-dressed man with a military bearing went to the box at the corner of Thirty-fourth Street and Seventh Avenue, carelessly dropped in a letter, and walked off. John Healy, a postman, quickly opened the box and found a letter addressed to Jay Gould. Detectives Phil Riley and Wood were instantly informed of the fact, and a glance at the handwriting of the address satisfied them that the man who had dropped it in the box was worth detaining. He was halted, questioned, the letter was re-examined, and Detective Riley at once decided that he had Mr. Gould's tormentor in his grasp.

The prisoner was taken to police headquarters and proved to be Colonel Welles. When confronted with Mr. Washington E. Conner and other gentlemen in the interest of Mr. Gould he made some very lame excuses and shammed insanity. The same defence was made for him when he was arraigned at the Tombs police court. He was able to exercise the strangest kind of personal influence over Mr. Gould, and after passing a few weeks in prison was released and was never prosecuted.

It was not believed at any time that "Old Victim" had any accomplices. He coined the scheme without aid, and if he had been a sharper man he would have made money out of Mr. Gould, as it was in Mr. Gould's interest to humor him in the matter of giving "points." Many a stock gambler would have given Colonel Welles a check for $100,000 if he had known the plot, and that Colonel Welles had driven in an entering wedge by getting up a newspaper "personal" correspondence in which a cypher key was brought into requisition.

---end

[Mayerling]

I noticed the article with the image of the room key also had a bit about a cross allegedly scratched on the thigh of the victim.

New York Sun, April 25, 1891, Page 2

On the left thigh was marked a cross made
by two long[?] bloody scratches. They had not
been cut, but just scratched with the point of
the knife apparently with sufficient force to
just break the skin. The London Jack the
Ripper left a cross chalked on the walls
beside his victims.

---end

Nathaniel Hawthorne's son, Julian, wrote a series of novels about Thomas Byrnes. Here's a link to one about an extortion case involving Jay Gould.
The book has its points of interest, but is padded out with fictional characters who are linked by a series of increasingly improbable coincidences to an extent that mortally wounded my credulity.

Section 558: or, The Fatal Letter: From the Diary of Inspector Byrnes (New York: Cassell, 1888), link
by Julian Hawthorne


A summary of the actual case.

Recollections of a New York Chief of Police (New York: Caxton Book Concern, 1887), Pages 368-372
by George Washington Walling

Although Jay Gould is perhaps the wealthiest man on this continent to-day, the criminal classes regard him as a person who has resources of such a peculiar character that it is well to let him alone. Once, however, his name appears as complainant on the records. In October. 1881, Colonel J. Howard Welles, a relation of Gideon Welles (once Secretary of the Navy), whose father was Richard J. Welles, a New York lawyer, conceived the plan of extorting money from the arch-financier. Colonel Welles believed that Mr. Gould could be frightened into paying a large sum of money to secure peace of mind. And so, on October 17, at the Windsor Hotel, he wrote the following letter and sent it to Mr. Gould:

"Dear Sir:—-It is my painful dutv to inform you that within six days of the date of this letter your body will have returned to the dust from whence it came. I, therefore, entreat you to make your peace with God, and prepare for the fate which awaits you. It is no wish of mine to take your life, but I am inspired and requested by the all-living God to do so as a public necessity, and for the benefit of the community at large. You must undoubtedly be aware that you have been a rogue of the first water all your life. Through your artful cunning you have ruined thousands of people of their birthright; you have had no mercy; you have robbed the rich and the poor, the father and the fatherless, the widow and the orphan, indiscriminately, of their last dollar; and through your villany have wrought ruin and destruction on thousands of families. All this you have done under a cloak, by circulating false reports, bribing newspapers, making false statements, committing perjury, and by artful cunning. In fact, you have robbed both great and small, and now the law says that you must pay for all with your death, as a public necessity, in order to save thousands of others from pain and destruction.

"Your death will be an easy one, for I propose shooting you through the heart, if possible, and if my first shot is not instant death, I will give you the coup de grace with the second shot, so that your death shall be quick and easy. Don't hold out the hope that this is a threatening letter, sent for stock-jobbing purposes, for I don't own a single share of stock of any kind, neither am I interested in any. This is simply the will of God, and he has chosen me to carry it out. He has appeared to me in a dream, and requested me to consult you as the party interested, and in doing so God has assured me that it is by Divine Providence I am chosen to do this act, and that by so doing I will become a public benefactor; and I have sworn and taken a solemn oath before the all-living God that I will put you to death. I intended to have shot you last Friday (yesterday), when I saw you with Harrow and Sage. I had my pistol, ready cocked, but a voice from the Lord sounded in my ear, saying: 'Hold on; give him time to repent, lest he be sent into everlasting punishment.'

"Now make your peace with God and prepare for the fate which awaits you, and may the Lord have mercy on your soul. I am only an agent of the Lord. The Lord appeared to me again last night and said: 'Jay Gould must surely die;' and when I reasoned with the Lord in my dream I told Him my life would also be required, and that I should be hung. The Lord answered me that no harm should come to me; the rope was not made, neither was the hemp grown to make the rope to hang me with, and that He would deliver me out of the hands of mine enemies. It is by the express will and command of God that I am chosen to put you to death, and I have sworn before the all-living God, the great Jehovah and the Redeemer of the world, and having taken a solemn oath I will carry it out within six days if the proper opportunity occurs. Therefore, be prepared to meet your fate at any moment, and may God have mercy on your soul.

"I remain, sir,

"An Old Victim."

This letter was read by a confidential employee who was not at first disposed to trouble Mr. Gould about it. But there was something in its tenor which indicated that the writer meant at least part of what he wrote, and that it would be just as well lo become acquainted with him. Mr. Gould was not in the imminent peril his correspondent indicated. For many years Mr. Gould rarely moved in this city when engaged on business without a confidential agent having him under surveillance. Mr. Washington E. Conner was immediately placed in charge of the case. He naturally went to police headquarters, and, as naturally, Inspector Byrnes was directed to do whatever might seem necessary in the premises. His first act was to put "shadows " on Mr. Gould, in order to watch any man who might be lying in wait for him, or dogging his footsteps.

Meantime, the "Old Victim " continued his correspondence and began to insert advertisements in newspapers. He also sent Mr. Gould, in order to carry on the advertising correspondence, a cypher key, in which familiar words were to represent certain stocks. Gradually, the plan of the "Old Victim" was developed. He said in one of his written communications that he had gambled in Wall Street and lost hundreds of thousands of dollars. He desired to recoup himself. In other words, he wanted "points" on the stock market direct from the bosom of Mr. Jay Gould. The matter ran on for three weeks, when " Old Victim," having received many "points" which did not appear to have been taken advantage of, addressed Mr. Gould the following letter:

"New York, Nov. 11, 1881. "Mv Dear Sir:—-I thank you for the two personals in to-day's Herald, though I expected none from you this morning, as I had no intention, when writing to you yesterday, of giving you the trouble of replying to my letter. I gave you the information asked for in your personal of yesterday, namely, the cost of the two stocks I had purchased through your advice; and if I asked too much in too short a time, as you say, it was owing to my anxiety on account of the decline of 'Salvation,' early yesterday afternoon. I had no intention, I can assure you, of advancing the price of 'Salvation' simply on my account, only I did hope, for the reason I gave, that you would not let it go below its cost to me. The 'Salvation ' my relative purchased for me on Wednesday was on the usual margin, but his brokers yesterday, as I mentioned, refused to carry any more for him under a 20 per cent, margin. This forced him to purchase for me five hundred shares of 'Salvation ' yesterday from another house, who bought it for him on the usual margin. I think commission houses are disinclined to purchase 'Salvation ' except for good parties with good bank accounts."

Now, it is necessary to explain that the cypher key previously mentioned makes "Salvation" the indicator for Manhattan Elevated Railroad stock, while the personals referred to were:

"Texas Correspondent.—-Up-town Salvation. Then let me know at once how you stand. Who is using the same heading? Are you trifling?"

"Up-town Salvation" meant "bull Manhattan Elevated," and the question about the two persons using the same heading arose from some one who was curious trying to solve the mystery by inserting misleading notices. The second personal was:

"Negotiate Salvation.—-Yes. Keep Windsor. Let go Concord. Give me the cost of Salvation."

This was in regard to a query by letter from the "Old Victim." It meant "Keep Western Union. Sell Pacific Mail." Then came the personal alluded to in the "Old Victim's" letter, which said he asked too much in too short a time. It added:

"Be more reasonable."

After that came:

"Negotiate.—-Can't understand how it costs so much. Give me particulars. Do not be alarmed."

This had reference to the complaint that exorbitant demands of the brokers forced "Old Victim" to take a twenty per cent, margin.

And so it went on—-letters and personals and the police playing at cross purposes, until it was discovered that 'the bulk of the letters addressed to Mr. Jay Gould by "Old Victim" came from Post-office Station E. Still, this afforded a small chance of reaching the writer, as some letters were posted in other districts. However, a watch was kept on the letter-boxes, and letters received at Station E for Mr. Gould were, by an arrangement with the postal officials, allowed to be scrutinized by Central Office detectives. This plan failed, because it was found necessary, in order to catch the correspondent, to have a watch kept on each letter-box, and arrest any man who put a letter in for Mr. Gould in the handwriting of "Old Victim" on the spot.

A plan was first devised to have employees of the Post-office work in concert with the detectives, but this did not appear feasible, as it would first have necessitated the giving away of the secret to men who might be "leaky," and they might not be sufficiently alert, or sufficiently expert in handwriting to be of service. Finally it was agreed that each box of the district should be watched by an employee of the Post-office and one or more detectives. If a letter was dropped into a box the Post-office employee would keep an eye on the depositor and also scan the letter. If it were addressed to Jay Gould he would be particularly careful to note whether there was any resemblance between the handwriting of the address and that of "Old Victim."

The day chosen was Sunday, November 13, 1881. The letterboxes were under surveillance from an early hour, and the plan worked well until about noon, when a patrolman of the Twenty-ninth Precinct, who was not in the secret and who had been watching the actions of two Central Office detectives who had charge of a box in company with a Post-office official, became suspicious. He was not satisfied with the explanation of one of the officers that they were detectives acting under orders from Inspector Byrnes, and was about to take one of them into custody when another detective passed who was acquainted with the patrolman, and the matter was explained. Fortunately the "Old Victim " did not choose that box as his depository. But at three o'clock a sprucely-dressed man with a military bearing went to the box at the corner of Thirty-fourth Street and Seventh Avenue, carelessly dropped in a letter, and walked off. John Healy, a postman, quickly opened the box and found a letter addressed to Jay Gould. Detectives Phil Riley and Wood were instantly informed of the fact, and a glance at the handwriting of the address satisfied them that the man who had dropped it in the box was worth detaining. He was halted, questioned, the letter was re-examined, and Detective Riley at once decided that he had Mr. Gould's tormentor in his grasp.

The prisoner was taken to police headquarters and proved to be Colonel Welles. When confronted with Mr. Washington E. Conner and other gentlemen in the interest of Mr. Gould he made some very lame excuses and shammed insanity. The same defence was made for him when he was arraigned at the Tombs police court. He was able to exercise the strangest kind of personal influence over Mr. Gould, and after passing a few weeks in prison was released and was never prosecuted.

It was not believed at any time that "Old Victim" had any accomplices. He coined the scheme without aid, and if he had been a sharper man he would have made money out of Mr. Gould, as it was in Mr. Gould's interest to humor him in the matter of giving "points." Many a stock gambler would have given Colonel Welles a check for $100,000 if he had known the plot, and that Colonel Welles had driven in an entering wedge by getting up a newspaper "personal" correspondence in which a cypher key was brought into requisition.

---end

One name I can help you with - Sage, the gentleman mentioned as being seen with Gould and a third man. He's Russell Sage, the Wall Street banker who usually partnered or financed some of Gould's stock corners and acquisitions (such as Union Pacific Railroad, Missouri Pacific Railroad, Westen Union). He is remembered due to the well known "Foundation" his wife set up in his memory, "The Russell Sage Foundation" which has financed some programing on PBS among other things. Sage was an eccentric fellow who once was the victim of an extortion threat that was real. In 1891 while in his Wall Street office a man came in and threatened to blow himself and Sage up unless Sage gave him $100,000.00. Sage, one of the most penny pinching of the Robber Barons (Gould was quite the opposite - look at his still existing mansion on the Hudson, Lyndhurst) said "NO!", but grabbed an office employee and pushed him between the extortionist and himself. The bomb proved real killing the extortionist, but also seriously injuring the employee. Sage was not injured. The employee sued Sage under tort law for assault, but lost as he was considered to owe a duty to protect his employer when he took his job.

I have to see (if I can) if Gideon Welles had a son like the Colonel. Actor/Director Orson Welles used to claim Welles was his great grandfather, but genealogists have failed to find any family link between them.

Jeff

[Mayerling]

Some information on Col. J. Howard Welles

The Brooklyn Eagle turned out to be good as a source, and what it said actually supports the account of Chief Walling in his memoirs about the incident:

The critical newspaper for us is the edition of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle of Monday, 14 November 1881 which as the story three times (once in an editorial). The account of the arrest is on Page 2 (as is the editorial) column 8:

"Colonel J. Howard Welles, an elderly gentleman of high social and family relations and a hitherto unblemished reputation, was arrested in New York yesterday while posting a blackmailing letter to Mr. Jay Gould. COlonel Welles' position in society and in business was so high that the charge seemed almost incredible, but he not only confessed his guilt but threatened suicide. The second letter was written to Mr. Gould on October 117, the first having been received a month previously. The writer seemed to be feigning insanity and his statement was to the effect that God had deputized him to slay Mr. Gould. The matter was put into the hands of the police and yesterday he was arrested. Almost every day lately a fresh letter had been received, all mailed at Station E on Eighth Avenue and thirty-third street. Yesterday fifty men were detailed from the Post Office Department to watch the letter boxes and a number of detectives were placed on duty with them. Whenever a letter was dropped in any one of the boxes one of the Post Office men went immediately to the box and looked at the letter. A signal had been decided upon when a letter addressed to Jay Gould was dropped into the box. At 3 o'clock an elderly man carelessly dropped a letter in, and soon the signal was given. In an instant he was arrested. The man was stunned with amazement, and at the station house broke down, wept piteously, and threatened to kill himself."

Interestingly the arraignment is reported in a separate article in the same edition of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle for November 14, 1882, but on page 5. It stated that Major Welles went before Judge Bixby of the Tombs Police Court (the Tombs being the lower Manhattan prison that was used in 1882), accompanied by Inspector Byrnes, and Detectives, Radford, Reilly, and O'Connor. The indictment was for "endeavoring to extort blackmail from Mr. Jay Gould". This report of the arraignment added the detail that Welles was nabbed by the cops on Sunday November 13, 1881 on the corner of Seventh Avenue and 34th Street [the Section E post office no longer stands and the site of this (near where I once worked) is close to Macy's Department Store and the second Madison Square Garden.] Bixby granted Byrnes a remand as he wished to bring in evidence (apparently some documentary) to bolster the arrest and arraignment. From the brief description Byrnes sounds like he was so used to doing this that he was working as smoothly as a trained Assistant District Attorney would under similar circumstances today. A description of Major Welles is in this article. Besides reminding us he was the nephew of "ex-Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles" he is described as having a "severe cast of features", side whiskers, moustache, stands five foot eight inches, and is 53 years of age. He gave his address as No. 6 East 39th Street. [This address probably no longer exists too - that area is now the garment center.]

Back on page 2 there had been an editorial on the incident, and it too mentioned some information in columns 1 and 2. Most we have already, but it does show the amount of work Byrnes put into this case. He had been having that post office watched for 10 days before the arrest, and used the services of the letter carriers and an equal number of detectives watching the 118 post office boxes in the building. One thing is added that I was aware of but it was a separate incident. Earlier in 1880 there had been an incident in lower Manhattan involving Rev. Dr. Morgan Dix, the head of Trinity Church Parish (Episcopalian), and one of New York City's principle religious figures. Like Major Welles, Dix came from a prominent family, his father was General John Dix, who was active in the Civil War and Governor of New York State for awhile in the 1860s. in 1880 Rev. Dix, a man with little personal sense of humor, started getting deluged by people showing up with items like grand pianos, moving vans, dancing troups, opera singers, and other crazy types of people and items, all of whom had gotten letters supposedly from Dix to come to his home at an early hour as he wanted to have use of them or there services, or merchandise. He never sent any of these letters. This peculiar (but somewhat funny) situation continued until the letter writer (who was copying a similar joke created earlier in the 19th Century by humorist and novelist Theodore Hook) was accidentally exposed and arrested. There is a book about this incident "The Rector and the Rogue", which I read years ago. In that case the letter writer ended up in jail.

The odd thing about the information in this case is the Brooklyn Eagle does not reveal further details of the legal action. HOWEVER,

We jump ahead to the Brooklyn Daily Eagle for Thursday, May 8, 1913 (roughly 103 years ago last week). On Page 3 they have an article concerning the will of a wealthy merchant and three bequests which stirred up some scandalous discussion. On page 3, column 5, is an article entitled "No Romance Hidden in Will." It discussed the will of one Russell, a coffee importer connected to Williams, Russell, and Co., at 101 Front Street, Manhattan. This gentleman had died in March 1913 . He was born in 1854 in Brooklyn, the son of William S. S. Russell, one time Vice President of the Long Island Railroad. He had become very rich, but spent most of his life living in a townhouse in Manhattan with two sisters ( who survived him and inherited the bulk of his million dollar estate) and (when she lived) his mother. However he left $25,000.00 apiece to three children of an old friend of his, Mrs. James H. Welles. The three offspring were John Philip Turner Welles (age 30), Winifred Welles, and Russell (interesting name that) Welles, who was the youngest and matriculating at Cornell University. Apparently his motive was he was a friend of the family through the mother, and felt the children had need for money. [If you recall, when Col. Welles began his extortion plot he had chosen Gould because Gould's "tips" regarding stock investments had caused Welles to lose most of his money - hence his desire to get it back from Gould this way.]

He had met their mother Mary Waite when they were young people and they had been friends. She was the daughter of Congressman John Turner Waite, and her uncle was no less than Chief Justice Morrison Waite of the U.S. Supreme Court (1873 to 1888). Here though the article changed one name. Initially it said she was Mrs. JAMES H. Welles. Now it said she was married to John HOWARD Welles, and that they married in Washington. The article also states her husband was the nephew of Gideon Welles. It does not say that the marriage was in Washington D.C., or the state of Washington.

Because of the size of these bequests (in 1913 $25,000.00 was like $200,000.00 today) mere friendship just was too much for people to accept. Could the kids have been Mr. Russell's? Was there a love affair between Russell and Mrs. Welles? His friend and executor James H. Halstead denied any such thing. However, as mentioned before Russell died in March 1913. On April 22, 1913 Mrs. Welles died, only one month and three days after. Both were buried fairly close to each other in Norwich, Connecticut.

Anyway that is all the material I found on this subject.

Jeff

[TradeName]

Thanks, Jeff.

There were rumors that J. Howard Welles had embezzled money from the US Army during the Civil War.

Memphis Daily Appeal, November 17, 1881, Page 2, Column 3

The Wells Frauds

J. Howard Wells, the man arrested for
attempting to blackmail Jay Gould in New
York on Monday, is remembered by some
of the old army officers as an officer who defrauded
the Government of between $1,000,000
and $2,000,000 during the war, and departed
for Europe before his shortcomings
were brought to light. He was a captain
and commissary of subsistence, and was for
a long time in charge of the purchasing depot
in Baltimore. His time expired and he
was mustered out May 19, 1865. He was relieved
by an officer whose name cannot now
be given, but for the present purpose may be
called Johnson, an old gentleman who
had seen some hard service in the field as
commissary of subsistence, but the aggregate
of his transactions was small and his experience
was very limited in dealing with large
values. Through Congressional influence
the authorities were influenced to give him
an easy berth for the last few months of his
service, and he was ordered to Baltimore to
relieve Wells. Wells's accounts were found
to be in perfect order, and his cash
and bank account corresponded with his
books to a cent. There only remained the
property on hand, which was necessarily
very large in bulk and value, Baltimore
being one of the chief purchasing depots for
the army. There were six large warehouses
filled with supplies, and these Wells exhibited
to Johnson, explaining that it would
consume much time to chetk off the property
in detail, and assuring him that everything
was correct. Johnson thereupon receipted
for the entire amount, both of
money and stores, which Wells claimed to
have on hand. Wells started at once for
New York, and within three days sailed for
Europe. Johnson's term expired May 31,
1865, aud an officer of tbe regular army was
sent to relieve him. Johnson exhibited his
books, cash and bank account as Wells had
done, and then attempted to turn over his
stores in bulk.

"No," said the regular army officer, "that
is not the way I do business. We will check
off the stores."

"But," said Johnson, "that is the way I received
them. It will take a long time to
check them off."

"It must be done," rejoined the other, "if
it takes six years."

Johnson's time was therefore continued,
and he was not released from his obligations
until December of that year. Meanwhile an
investigation was in progress, which disclosed
the fact that Wells was short in his stores between
one and two millions in value. His
method of operations was similar to that
more recently adopted by Captain Howgate.
It may best be understood from an illustration.
He went to a dealer in flour, for example,
and purchased 1000 barrels, for
which he received vouchers in duplicate
when be paid the money. He filled out the
first voucher in full, but said to the dealer
that his clerk would fill out the duplicate at
his leisure. Wells was aware a purchaser,
and transactions of the kind were so common
that no question was made by dealers
of the propriety of the action. After getting
his duplicate vouchers. Wells filled
out the one signed in blank, making the
purchase appear as 10,000 barrels, and this
raised voucher he turned into the accounting
office. He carried the 10,000 barrels
on his property returns and books, and
made his books and accounts agree with
scrupulous exactness. It was, in fact, impossible
to detect his frauds, except by
checking off his stores, aud this was a work
of months. He doubtless intended, if that
work was ever begun, to leave the country
before its completion, but his successor's inexperience
opened a way for the formal settlement
of his accounts, so that his record
was made complete up to the time he was
mustered out. Some irregularities were
hinted at a day or two after his departure,
and a rumor found its way into the Baltimore
papers to the effect that all was not as
it should be. Thereupon Mrs. Wells came
to Washington very indignant that any suspicion
of her husband's integrity should be
entertaiund. She, however, left almost immediately
and took an early steamer for
Europe. Since that time nothing has been
heard of the pair until the developments
contained in the New York papers of this
Morning.

It was learned during the investigation
that Wells, when at Baltimore, was a heavy
operator in Wall street, keeping large sums
on deposit in New York, as margins for his
speculations. It was given out in Baltimore
that he was very successful in operations in
gold.

At the time he was known in Baltimore, he
spelled his name "Well." and his autograph
in full, round hand, ''J. Howard Wells, Captain,
etc., U. S. Volunteers," is well remembered
by the accounting officials of tbe Treasury
and the Commissary Department,

---end

The rumors do seem to date back to 1865.

Daily National Republican (Washington, D.C.), August 01, 1865, SECOND EDITION, Page 2, Column 7

Rumored Defalcation

The Pittsburg Commercial of Saturday contains the following:

"There Is considerable talk in reference to
a Government official in the Commissary Department
who not long ago was in the
Commissary Department in Baltimore, now
absent, he having resigned or been requested
so to do. Rumor has it he is a defaulter to
the Government in a large amount, probably
$300,000. It is hoped these reports may
prove untrue, and that the party in question
will be able to square up satisfactorily to
himself, his friends, and all others concerned.
One report is, that the party in question has
gone to Europe."

The last officer in charge of the Commissary
Department here, and who recently
resigned, was Capt. J. Howard Wells, formerly
of New York, who is said to have gone to
Europe. We know nothing connecting him
with tne alleged defalcation. Balt. Amer.

---end

Welles seems to have been promoted to colonel after leaving the army.

Journal of the Executive Proceedings of the Senate of the United States, February 6, 1867, Page 162
By United States. Congress. Senate

To be lieutenant-colonels by brevet.

Brevet Major J. Howard Wells, late captain and commissary of subsistence of Volunteers, for faithful services during the war, to date from March 13,1865.

[...]

To be majors by brevet.

J. Howard Wells, late captain and commissary of subsistence of volunteers, for faithful services during the war, to date from March 13,

----end

Thomas Byrnes testified about the Welles case before the state senate committee that was investigation the New York Police Department by way of explaining how Jay Gould had become his personal stock broker.


Report and Proceedings of the Senate Committee Appointed to Investigate the New York Police Department, Volume 5 (Albany: 1895), Pages 5717-5722
by New York (State). Legislature. Senate. Committee on Police Dept. of the City of New York, Clarence Lexow, Jacob Aaron Cantor

December 29, 1894

By Chairman Lexow:

Q. Just give us the details as rapidly as you can? A. I want to say that, in 1891 [sic; 1881], there was a man named Colonel Howard Wells, who was a colonel in the army; and I understood then, and do now, that he was the commissary in charge of New Orleans when Butler entered there, and had charge of the commissary's stores at New Orleans; he had been a rich man and he lost his fortune; he came on here to New York; he conceived the idea that he had lost his fortune, and he might have lost it in the Gould properties; after losing his fortune, he started writing a series of letters to Mr. Gould and Mrs. Gould, stating that he was dedicated by God to kill him for the Wge amount of destitution, etc., that he had brought on people, and giving some of the properties, the Gould properties, that he had lost his money in; and stated that if he was not reimbursed that he would kill Gould on sight; there were a series of those letters sent to Mr. and Mrs. Gould; the letters did not appear to annoy Mr. Gould; they did annoy Mrs. Gould very much; so much so that there was a meeting at their house and Mr. Connor was sent for, Washington E. Connor, who was Gould's partner at the time; Mrs. Gould was very anxious to ascertain who that man was, fearful relative to her husband; after that interview Mr. Connor sent for me, and I went to see him at his house; he was living at that time, I think, at Forty-fifth street, between Fifth avenue and Madison avenue; he explained the whole matter to me, and said that Mr. Gould was indifferent about the matter to an extent, but that the family was very much annoyed, and wanted to know if it was not possible to have this man arrested; I pursued the usual channel that I would do in a case of that kind; such a case as that, blackmail, or threatening to kill, for some days, and was unable to locate this man; I had a further interview with Connor, and in the meantime he had conceived the idea that they could trace who this man was through the stock market, by giving points how to buy and sell stock, for the purpose of reimbursing them for what he stated he had lost; the letters that came were all to be answered through the personals in the New York Herald; we talked it over, and Mr. Connor, through me, put a personal in the Herald, asking that this man should send a key to the stocks that he wanted to make money out of; he sent this key, that I will now read: it is dated November 13, 1881.

Q. Is that the original paper you hold in your hand? A. No, sir, it is not; it is a copy of the original.

Q. Made at the time? A. No; this has been made within three or four days.

Q. And what did you make it from? A. From the newspaper accounts of that time; as it was printed in all the newspapers for a week, probably, in and out; he called Western Union, "Windsor," and all that stock was to be sent up for his people; there would be a personal put in the New York Herald, "Windsor, uptown;" the day that that was put in the newspaper there were a few thousand shares of Western Union sold, and through Mr. Connor's knowledge of the market, through the knowledge of the Gould brokers on the floor, they were able to trace every share of that stock to the different offices, and who the purchasers were; it did not show that any man had bought any large quantity of that stock; Erie was called "Spoon;" Texas Pacific, "White;" Manhattan Elevated, "Salvation;" Northern Pacific, "Common Wheat;" Northern Pacific preferred, "Cohen;" Lake Shore, "Exchange;" Pacific Mail, "Concord;" now if there was a personal put in the paper, we will say for "Ooncord Downtown " he knew that that day that he could go and sell Pacific Mail, and it would be a sure thing for it to go down, and it did go down; there not one of them ciphers there in that key that I haven't put in the newspapers, and there is not one of them that the market has not either went up or down on that day; that knowledge that I had for three months, or for two months, if I was a dishonest man I could have made $500,000 out of it; I could have used that key; I could have took two or three men and sent them to different cities, or right here in New York, and had them bought two or three thousand stocks on that, either up or down, I had a sure thing, there was no chance in the world for me to loose [sic]; that is the only sure thing I ever had in my life; but I didn't do it, of course, I only say that; now, that ran along for some two or three months, and at no time during that period of time was Connor, or his associates in the board, able to trace any large quantity of stock to any one man, because if they had they might assume that was the man, and followed him up and got his handwriting, as we had a lot of his letters, because at that time Mr. Gould had Mr. James, who was postmaster-general to have Mr. Pierson give Mr. Connor and myself all his letters, and in running them over we could pick out his letters immediately, because it was a long scrawling hand that could be detected in a second; now, Connor had partially given up, and myself too, this fellow; I had went over these letters probably 150 times in the office, and there was one night I was going over them again, for I don't know, probably the fortieth or fiftieth time; and for the first time I discovered that every letter that was sent to Mr. Gould was posted in station E; station E has a boundary I think from Fourteenth street to Forty-second street, from Fifth avenue to the North river; I immediately had a diagram made of station E, and I found that there were 102 letter-boxes into it; I took the streets north and sorth and east and west, placed the letter-boxes on the corners where they belonged, and there I had station E, and concluded that we could carry out a scheme that I had formulated in my head that night going home, that we could get that fellow in one day; I went and saw Mr. Connor the next night and talked to him about it, and told him that if we could get the postmaster-general, or the postmaster of the city of New York, Mr. Pierson, on Sunday to give us 100 letter-carriers by paying for them—-he paying for them—-that I was satisfied we could get that man on Sunday, in one day; he asked me how; I said, well, I will put a long personal in the Herald on Saturday night upbraiding this man for giving away the information that we give him, or that Mr. Gould is giving him, he thought it was coming from Mr. Gould, to other persons for the purpose of making money; the moment he would read that personal it is the most natural thing in the world that he would hasten to write a letter to Mr. Gould on Sunday assuring him that he would not give that information away to anybody else, that he was simply utilizing it for his own benefit; Mr. Connor thought well of it, thought it was a feasible and practicable thing, and he made arrangements to get those letter-carriers on Sunday, as it was an off day; I then perfected a system—-

Q. Now, superintendent, pardon me, while of course this is extremely interesting, our time is drawing to a close and I have a series of questions; I would like that you would get to the point of your first investment with Mr. Gould, get to that point, if you please? A. My first investment with Mr. Gould was a short time after that, after this man was arrested and was put under bail, and Mr. Gould went to the Tombs and made a complaint against him; Mr. Gould sent for me and I went to his house, he wanted to make me a present of a large sum of money, which I declined to take, he was very much astonished but I declined to take it just the same; in a short time after that in his office he told me he was going to buy me some stock, didn't tell me what it was; I asked him about putting up a margin, etc.; well, he said, "He didn't think it was necessary;" I told him I would rather do it, that I had the money; he said, "All right," and I gave Mr. Gould $10,000; he operated in stocks for me whenever he went into an operation himself, and give me the benefit of profits that accrued from them until the time he died, which was about $185,000.

Q. Well, that $10,000 that you gave Mr. Gould at the commencement, did you draw that from bank? A. No; I don't believe I ever had a bank account at the time.

Q. Where had you the $10,000? A- Well, I don't know, I couldn't tell you; I don't believe I had it in the bank.

Q. Had you it in your house, had you it in safe keeping in any place? A. One moment, let me try to get at it Mr. Goff; I couldn't tell you truthfully where I had it.

Q. It is not so long ago superintendent? A- No; it is only 14 years ago.

Q. Ten thousand dollars is quite a large sum of money? A. Yes; but where ever I had it you can bet I was taking good care of it.

Q. I haven't any doubt about that; can you not tell us where you had it? A. For the moment I can not; I will tell you as I go along if I think of it.

Q. It was not in bank? A. I don't say it was not in hank; I don't think it was.

Q. Was it in the keeping of your wife? A. That I don't know.

Q. Was it in the keeping of your friend? A. I can not answer the question truthfully.

Q. Has it escaped your memory for the time being? A. Yes, sir; I may be able to tell you going along.

Q. Is it not remarkable that your memory would fail upon such an important point as that, as to where that $10,000 was? A. No; it is not remarkable; I have to think of so many things, and I travel along so quick, and it wouldn't be remarkable; but as I go along I will try and think of it and tell you.

Q. We will try and get at that later; we have it then that from that $10,000 that you first gave Mr. Gould there flowed to you a profit of about $185,000? A. Possibly, yes.

Q. And did that include the additional $40,000 that Mr. George Gould has made since his father's death? A. No; that is in addition to that.

Q. Now, did you ever invest money with any other person to apply to the purchase of stocks on margin except with Mr. Gould? A. Yes, sir

Q. Will you tell us with whom? A. Is that absolutely necessary; now, I want to say to you that in my position I have been brought in contact with a great many people, some of them are large operators and large investors in the stock market; sometimes business of a private nature where they have been benefited, I mean where there has been blackmailing letters and things like that sent to them, and where the ends of justice have been better served where they would refuse to make a complaint, and all that kind of thing, and they have from time to time advised and bought me stocks which I have made money out of.

Q. In other words that you have had by reason of your position as inspector of police, chief of the detective department, opportunities for winning the confidence or gratitude of men to whom you had rendered service in the nature indicated? A. You can put it in that way, yes, sir.

Q. You would not have had the opportunities were you not in that position? A. No, sir; I would not.

By Chairman Lexow:

Q. Do you mean, superintendent, that you were first brought in relation with them by reason of your official position? A. Yes, sir.

Q. And that afterward culminated in personal friendship? A. Yes, sir.

By Mr. Goff:

Q. Was your office, as chief of the detective bureau of New York, placed at the service of these persons? A. No, sir; it was not.

Q. Then how did you win their confidence? A. As I say, in many cases those people have had trouble by people attempting to blackmail them and doing many other things, and in that way I have been called in to it; my official position, so far as that is concerned, was placed at their disposal for the purpose of protecting their property and their business in and about the vicinity where it was conducted.

Q. But it was your duty, apart from all considerations of future profit, to protect that property? A. Yes, sir; and I did it very thoroughly, too.

Q. But were you moved to protect that property by the hope of gaining the friendship and gratitude of the powerful people in connection with the stock market? A. No, sir; I was glad to have their friendship and gratitude, but my first—-it was my duty first to do it.

Q. Is it not strange, superintendent, that in these various matters where you simply performed your duty as a public officer for the protection of personal property that such remarkable results should have followed? A. They did not follow for the protection of property by any means.

Q. But these successful speculations were not the result of your own judgment? A. The result of my own judgment—-I never bought a share of stock in my life on my own judgment that I didn't lose all I put up, on my own judgment.

Q. As matter of fact, there have been firms in Wall street in whose office you lost considerable money? A. Yes, sir.

----end

[Mayerling]

Thanks, Jeff.

There were rumors that J. Howard Welles had embezzled money from the US Army during the Civil War.

Memphis Daily Appeal, November 17, 1881, Page 2, Column 3

The Wells Frauds

J. Howard Wells, the man arrested for
attempting to blackmail Jay Gould in New
York on Monday, is remembered by some
of the old army officers as an officer who defrauded
the Government of between $1,000,000
and $2,000,000 during the war, and departed
for Europe before his shortcomings
were brought to light. He was a captain
and commissary of subsistence, and was for
a long time in charge of the purchasing depot
in Baltimore. His time expired and he
was mustered out May 19, 1865. He was relieved
by an officer whose name cannot now
be given, but for the present purpose may be
called Johnson, an old gentleman who
had seen some hard service in the field as
commissary of subsistence, but the aggregate
of his transactions was small and his experience
was very limited in dealing with large
values. Through Congressional influence
the authorities were influenced to give him
an easy berth for the last few months of his
service, and he was ordered to Baltimore to
relieve Wells. Wells's accounts were found
to be in perfect order, and his cash
and bank account corresponded with his
books to a cent. There only remained the
property on hand, which was necessarily
very large in bulk and value, Baltimore
being one of the chief purchasing depots for
the army. There were six large warehouses
filled with supplies, and these Wells exhibited
to Johnson, explaining that it would
consume much time to chetk off the property
in detail, and assuring him that everything
was correct. Johnson thereupon receipted
for the entire amount, both of
money and stores, which Wells claimed to
have on hand. Wells started at once for
New York, and within three days sailed for
Europe. Johnson's term expired May 31,
1865, aud an officer of tbe regular army was
sent to relieve him. Johnson exhibited his
books, cash and bank account as Wells had
done, and then attempted to turn over his
stores in bulk.

"No," said the regular army officer, "that
is not the way I do business. We will check
off the stores."

"But," said Johnson, "that is the way I received
them. It will take a long time to
check them off."

"It must be done," rejoined the other, "if
it takes six years."

Johnson's time was therefore continued,
and he was not released from his obligations
until December of that year. Meanwhile an
investigation was in progress, which disclosed
the fact that Wells was short in his stores between
one and two millions in value. His
method of operations was similar to that
more recently adopted by Captain Howgate.
It may best be understood from an illustration.
He went to a dealer in flour, for example,
and purchased 1000 barrels, for
which he received vouchers in duplicate
when be paid the money. He filled out the
first voucher in full, but said to the dealer
that his clerk would fill out the duplicate at
his leisure. Wells was aware a purchaser,
and transactions of the kind were so common
that no question was made by dealers
of the propriety of the action. After getting
his duplicate vouchers. Wells filled
out the one signed in blank, making the
purchase appear as 10,000 barrels, and this
raised voucher he turned into the accounting
office. He carried the 10,000 barrels
on his property returns and books, and
made his books and accounts agree with
scrupulous exactness. It was, in fact, impossible
to detect his frauds, except by
checking off his stores, aud this was a work
of months. He doubtless intended, if that
work was ever begun, to leave the country
before its completion, but his successor's inexperience
opened a way for the formal settlement
of his accounts, so that his record
was made complete up to the time he was
mustered out. Some irregularities were
hinted at a day or two after his departure,
and a rumor found its way into the Baltimore
papers to the effect that all was not as
it should be. Thereupon Mrs. Wells came
to Washington very indignant that any suspicion
of her husband's integrity should be
entertaiund. She, however, left almost immediately
and took an early steamer for
Europe. Since that time nothing has been
heard of the pair until the developments
contained in the New York papers of this
Morning.

It was learned during the investigation
that Wells, when at Baltimore, was a heavy
operator in Wall street, keeping large sums
on deposit in New York, as margins for his
speculations. It was given out in Baltimore
that he was very successful in operations in
gold.

At the time he was known in Baltimore, he
spelled his name "Well." and his autograph
in full, round hand, ''J. Howard Wells, Captain,
etc., U. S. Volunteers," is well remembered
by the accounting officials of tbe Treasury
and the Commissary Department,

---end

The rumors do seem to date back to 1865.

Daily National Republican (Washington, D.C.), August 01, 1865, SECOND EDITION, Page 2, Column 7

Rumored Defalcation

The Pittsburg Commercial of Saturday contains the following:

"There Is considerable talk in reference to
a Government official in the Commissary Department
who not long ago was in the
Commissary Department in Baltimore, now
absent, he having resigned or been requested
so to do. Rumor has it he is a defaulter to
the Government in a large amount, probably
$300,000. It is hoped these reports may
prove untrue, and that the party in question
will be able to square up satisfactorily to
himself, his friends, and all others concerned.
One report is, that the party in question has
gone to Europe."

The last officer in charge of the Commissary
Department here, and who recently
resigned, was Capt. J. Howard Wells, formerly
of New York, who is said to have gone to
Europe. We know nothing connecting him
with tne alleged defalcation. Balt. Amer.

---end

Welles seems to have been promoted to colonel after leaving the army.

Journal of the Executive Proceedings of the Senate of the United States, February 6, 1867, Page 162
By United States. Congress. Senate

To be lieutenant-colonels by brevet.

Brevet Major J. Howard Wells, late captain and commissary of subsistence of Volunteers, for faithful services during the war, to date from March 13,1865.

[...]

To be majors by brevet.

J. Howard Wells, late captain and commissary of subsistence of volunteers, for faithful services during the war, to date from March 13,

----end

Thomas Byrnes testified about the Welles case before the state senate committee that was investigation the New York Police Department by way of explaining how Jay Gould had become his personal stock broker.


Report and Proceedings of the Senate Committee Appointed to Investigate the New York Police Department, Volume 5 (Albany: 1895), Pages 5717-5722
by New York (State). Legislature. Senate. Committee on Police Dept. of the City of New York, Clarence Lexow, Jacob Aaron Cantor

December 29, 1894

By Chairman Lexow:

Q. Just give us the details as rapidly as you can? A. I want to say that, in 1891 [sic; 1881], there was a man named Colonel Howard Wells, who was a colonel in the army; and I understood then, and do now, that he was the commissary in charge of New Orleans when Butler entered there, and had charge of the commissary's stores at New Orleans; he had been a rich man and he lost his fortune; he came on here to New York; he conceived the idea that he had lost his fortune, and he might have lost it in the Gould properties; after losing his fortune, he started writing a series of letters to Mr. Gould and Mrs. Gould, stating that he was dedicated by God to kill him for the Wge amount of destitution, etc., that he had brought on people, and giving some of the properties, the Gould properties, that he had lost his money in; and stated that if he was not reimbursed that he would kill Gould on sight; there were a series of those letters sent to Mr. and Mrs. Gould; the letters did not appear to annoy Mr. Gould; they did annoy Mrs. Gould very much; so much so that there was a meeting at their house and Mr. Connor was sent for, Washington E. Connor, who was Gould's partner at the time; Mrs. Gould was very anxious to ascertain who that man was, fearful relative to her husband; after that interview Mr. Connor sent for me, and I went to see him at his house; he was living at that time, I think, at Forty-fifth street, between Fifth avenue and Madison avenue; he explained the whole matter to me, and said that Mr. Gould was indifferent about the matter to an extent, but that the family was very much annoyed, and wanted to know if it was not possible to have this man arrested; I pursued the usual channel that I would do in a case of that kind; such a case as that, blackmail, or threatening to kill, for some days, and was unable to locate this man; I had a further interview with Connor, and in the meantime he had conceived the idea that they could trace who this man was through the stock market, by giving points how to buy and sell stock, for the purpose of reimbursing them for what he stated he had lost; the letters that came were all to be answered through the personals in the New York Herald; we talked it over, and Mr. Connor, through me, put a personal in the Herald, asking that this man should send a key to the stocks that he wanted to make money out of; he sent this key, that I will now read: it is dated November 13, 1881.

Q. Is that the original paper you hold in your hand? A. No, sir, it is not; it is a copy of the original.

Q. Made at the time? A. No; this has been made within three or four days.

Q. And what did you make it from? A. From the newspaper accounts of that time; as it was printed in all the newspapers for a week, probably, in and out; he called Western Union, "Windsor," and all that stock was to be sent up for his people; there would be a personal put in the New York Herald, "Windsor, uptown;" the day that that was put in the newspaper there were a few thousand shares of Western Union sold, and through Mr. Connor's knowledge of the market, through the knowledge of the Gould brokers on the floor, they were able to trace every share of that stock to the different offices, and who the purchasers were; it did not show that any man had bought any large quantity of that stock; Erie was called "Spoon;" Texas Pacific, "White;" Manhattan Elevated, "Salvation;" Northern Pacific, "Common Wheat;" Northern Pacific preferred, "Cohen;" Lake Shore, "Exchange;" Pacific Mail, "Concord;" now if there was a personal put in the paper, we will say for "Ooncord Downtown " he knew that that day that he could go and sell Pacific Mail, and it would be a sure thing for it to go down, and it did go down; there not one of them ciphers there in that key that I haven't put in the newspapers, and there is not one of them that the market has not either went up or down on that day; that knowledge that I had for three months, or for two months, if I was a dishonest man I could have made $500,000 out of it; I could have used that key; I could have took two or three men and sent them to different cities, or right here in New York, and had them bought two or three thousand stocks on that, either up or down, I had a sure thing, there was no chance in the world for me to loose [sic]; that is the only sure thing I ever had in my life; but I didn't do it, of course, I only say that; now, that ran along for some two or three months, and at no time during that period of time was Connor, or his associates in the board, able to trace any large quantity of stock to any one man, because if they had they might assume that was the man, and followed him up and got his handwriting, as we had a lot of his letters, because at that time Mr. Gould had Mr. James, who was postmaster-general to have Mr. Pierson give Mr. Connor and myself all his letters, and in running them over we could pick out his letters immediately, because it was a long scrawling hand that could be detected in a second; now, Connor had partially given up, and myself too, this fellow; I had went over these letters probably 150 times in the office, and there was one night I was going over them again, for I don't know, probably the fortieth or fiftieth time; and for the first time I discovered that every letter that was sent to Mr. Gould was posted in station E; station E has a boundary I think from Fourteenth street to Forty-second street, from Fifth avenue to the North river; I immediately had a diagram made of station E, and I found that there were 102 letter-boxes into it; I took the streets north and sorth and east and west, placed the letter-boxes on the corners where they belonged, and there I had station E, and concluded that we could carry out a scheme that I had formulated in my head that night going home, that we could get that fellow in one day; I went and saw Mr. Connor the next night and talked to him about it, and told him that if we could get the postmaster-general, or the postmaster of the city of New York, Mr. Pierson, on Sunday to give us 100 letter-carriers by paying for them—-he paying for them—-that I was satisfied we could get that man on Sunday, in one day; he asked me how; I said, well, I will put a long personal in the Herald on Saturday night upbraiding this man for giving away the information that we give him, or that Mr. Gould is giving him, he thought it was coming from Mr. Gould, to other persons for the purpose of making money; the moment he would read that personal it is the most natural thing in the world that he would hasten to write a letter to Mr. Gould on Sunday assuring him that he would not give that information away to anybody else, that he was simply utilizing it for his own benefit; Mr. Connor thought well of it, thought it was a feasible and practicable thing, and he made arrangements to get those letter-carriers on Sunday, as it was an off day; I then perfected a system—-

Q. Now, superintendent, pardon me, while of course this is extremely interesting, our time is drawing to a close and I have a series of questions; I would like that you would get to the point of your first investment with Mr. Gould, get to that point, if you please? A. My first investment with Mr. Gould was a short time after that, after this man was arrested and was put under bail, and Mr. Gould went to the Tombs and made a complaint against him; Mr. Gould sent for me and I went to his house, he wanted to make me a present of a large sum of money, which I declined to take, he was very much astonished but I declined to take it just the same; in a short time after that in his office he told me he was going to buy me some stock, didn't tell me what it was; I asked him about putting up a margin, etc.; well, he said, "He didn't think it was necessary;" I told him I would rather do it, that I had the money; he said, "All right," and I gave Mr. Gould $10,000; he operated in stocks for me whenever he went into an operation himself, and give me the benefit of profits that accrued from them until the time he died, which was about $185,000.

Q. Well, that $10,000 that you gave Mr. Gould at the commencement, did you draw that from bank? A. No; I don't believe I ever had a bank account at the time.

Q. Where had you the $10,000? A- Well, I don't know, I couldn't tell you; I don't believe I had it in the bank.

Q. Had you it in your house, had you it in safe keeping in any place? A. One moment, let me try to get at it Mr. Goff; I couldn't tell you truthfully where I had it.

Q. It is not so long ago superintendent? A- No; it is only 14 years ago.

Q. Ten thousand dollars is quite a large sum of money? A. Yes; but where ever I had it you can bet I was taking good care of it.

Q. I haven't any doubt about that; can you not tell us where you had it? A. For the moment I can not; I will tell you as I go along if I think of it.

Q. It was not in bank? A. I don't say it was not in hank; I don't think it was.

Q. Was it in the keeping of your wife? A. That I don't know.

Q. Was it in the keeping of your friend? A. I can not answer the question truthfully.

Q. Has it escaped your memory for the time being? A. Yes, sir; I may be able to tell you going along.

Q. Is it not remarkable that your memory would fail upon such an important point as that, as to where that $10,000 was? A. No; it is not remarkable; I have to think of so many things, and I travel along so quick, and it wouldn't be remarkable; but as I go along I will try and think of it and tell you.

Q. We will try and get at that later; we have it then that from that $10,000 that you first gave Mr. Gould there flowed to you a profit of about $185,000? A. Possibly, yes.

Q. And did that include the additional $40,000 that Mr. George Gould has made since his father's death? A. No; that is in addition to that.

Q. Now, did you ever invest money with any other person to apply to the purchase of stocks on margin except with Mr. Gould? A. Yes, sir

Q. Will you tell us with whom? A. Is that absolutely necessary; now, I want to say to you that in my position I have been brought in contact with a great many people, some of them are large operators and large investors in the stock market; sometimes business of a private nature where they have been benefited, I mean where there has been blackmailing letters and things like that sent to them, and where the ends of justice have been better served where they would refuse to make a complaint, and all that kind of thing, and they have from time to time advised and bought me stocks which I have made money out of.

Q. In other words that you have had by reason of your position as inspector of police, chief of the detective department, opportunities for winning the confidence or gratitude of men to whom you had rendered service in the nature indicated? A. You can put it in that way, yes, sir.

Q. You would not have had the opportunities were you not in that position? A. No, sir; I would not.

By Chairman Lexow:

Q. Do you mean, superintendent, that you were first brought in relation with them by reason of your official position? A. Yes, sir.

Q. And that afterward culminated in personal friendship? A. Yes, sir.

By Mr. Goff:

Q. Was your office, as chief of the detective bureau of New York, placed at the service of these persons? A. No, sir; it was not.

Q. Then how did you win their confidence? A. As I say, in many cases those people have had trouble by people attempting to blackmail them and doing many other things, and in that way I have been called in to it; my official position, so far as that is concerned, was placed at their disposal for the purpose of protecting their property and their business in and about the vicinity where it was conducted.

Q. But it was your duty, apart from all considerations of future profit, to protect that property? A. Yes, sir; and I did it very thoroughly, too.

Q. But were you moved to protect that property by the hope of gaining the friendship and gratitude of the powerful people in connection with the stock market? A. No, sir; I was glad to have their friendship and gratitude, but my first—-it was my duty first to do it.

Q. Is it not strange, superintendent, that in these various matters where you simply performed your duty as a public officer for the protection of personal property that such remarkable results should have followed? A. They did not follow for the protection of property by any means.

Q. But these successful speculations were not the result of your own judgment? A. The result of my own judgment—-I never bought a share of stock in my life on my own judgment that I didn't lose all I put up, on my own judgment.

Q. As matter of fact, there have been firms in Wall street in whose office you lost considerable money? A. Yes, sir.

----end

Well, to give Tom a cudo for at least claiming he could not recall how he got the $10,000.00 he invested with Jay Gould, it is a more convincing equivocation than the one some forty years onward in the Seabury investigation of the 1930s into the corruption during Jimmy Walker's mayoralty of New York City. One police captain there claimed (like the dumfounded "Inspector Clouseau" (Peter Sellers) in the trial at the end of "The Pink Panther") that his wife was very thrifty with the household money budget. Another in Seabury's investigation said every week he put aside a little cash in a "little tin box" and it just mounted up to thousands of dollars. In 1932, when this was in the news, the latter business brought a temporary derisive term for the corrupt cops as "the tin-box brigade". If you recall the 1960 Pulitzer Prize musical about LaGuardia, "Fiorello", there is a song in it about this type of testimony entitled, "A Little Tin Box", with the charming chorus, "Oh, a little tin box, yes a llttle tin box, which a little tin key unlocks...." Byrnes had more backbone and style with just claiming he couldn't remember.

There is a reference how Col. Welles (or Wells) embezzlement of government funds in 1865 resembled those of "Captain Howgate". Captain Henry Howgate of the U.S. Signal Corps was their quartermaster in Washington, D.C. from the late 1870s until 1882, when he disappeared as soon as it was apparent his books did not balance. Soon it turned out that he'd been doing what Welles had been doing a decade earlier, but in his case it was because of his special position in the Signal Corps in Washington. He and his pretty young wife were constantly in the center of the social world in the nation's capital, frequently throwing parties to get Congressmen to support military expenditures. As soon as he knew that he was found out (using government monies to maintain his image as a well-to-do socialite) he fled. However he was later recaptured and tried and convicted for a few years imprisonment.

Jeff

[TradeName]

Thanks, Jeff.

For some reason I read a couple more of the Julian Hawthorne/Inspector Byrnes novels.

Another's Crime starts out straightforwardly enough as a prodigal son is accused of filching bank notes from the married woman he is involved with in a not quite sinful way, but then descends into a series of improbable events and unlikely coincidences. Byrnes is a minor character, at best. I was unable to determine what true crime story, if any, inspired this novel.

Another's Crime: From the Diary of Inspector Byrnes (New York: Cassell, 1888), link
by Julian Hawthorne

You might think a novel called An American Penman would be mostly concerned with the doings of a forger from the United States, but instead the focus is on a newly impoverished Russian count who, down to his last two cents, is saved from ruin when Inspector Byrnes recruits him as an undercover agent to track down the titular criminal in Europe. Even the characters themselves are confused by some of the coincidences in this story. Again, I'm not sure which actual criminal may have inspired this tale.

An American Penman: From the Diary of Inspector Byrnes (New York: Cassell, 1888), link
by Julian Hawthorne


In 1913 Julian Hawthorne was convicted in a federal court of mail fraud in connection with the sale of mining stocks. It was reported that Hawthorne was run out of London by Labouchere.

A pamphlet credited to Hawthorne about a certain Biblical mine owner.

The Secret of Solomon (1909), link
by Julian Hawthorne

New York Sun, October 24, 1911, Page 11, Column 1

Julian Hawthorne Inquiry

Sale of $10,000,000 in Mining Stocks Scrutinized

The mining enterprises of Julian Hawthorne,
son of Nathaniel Hawthorne, to
which the SUN called attention a year
and a half ago, are under investigation
by the Federal Grand Jury sitting in Ihe
Post Office building. It was said yesterday
that a number of subpenas had been
issued calling for employees of
Hawthorne's companies and various persons
associated with him.

The Grand Jury proceedings have followed
an investigation by the Post Office
authorities. A rumor about the Federal
building yesterday was that action in
the case at the present time was a result
of an appeal made to Senator Elihu Root
by friends of his who had bought some of
Mr. Hawthorne's stock.

One of Mr. Hawthorne's associates
was sent for and had a talk with
Assistant United States Attorney Thompson
yesterday was Albert Freeman, who
has been peddling mining stock for years
and who next to Mr. Hawthorne has been
the chief figure in the Hawthorne Silver
and Iron Mines, Ltd., The Temagamini
Cobalt Mines, Ltd., and the Montreal-James
Company, to mention only a few.
Ex-Mayor Josiah Quincy of Boston is to
see Mr. Thompson to-morrow, but whether
he is to go before the Grand Jury or not
is not stated.

Mr. Quincy is a director of the King
Solomon Gold Mining Company one of
Freeman's early stock selling enterprises
which was going to pay 30 per cent. dividends
on a 10 cents a share basis, but
didn't. Mr. Thompson said yesterday
that he would like very much to see Mr.
Hawthorne himself, but thus far had not
succeeded in getting him. A son of Hawthorne
was one of his callers yesterday,

A iittle over a year ago after THE SUN
called attention to the outpouring of
stock from the Cambridge Building,
which had been going on for several
yeas. Mr. Hawthorn removed to London.
There he opened elaborate offices
and With the prolific pen which he had
diverted from other forms of literature
to mining prospectuses he began painting
for Englishmen the opportunities to
get rich through the purchase of Hawthorne
silver mines stock, Business
seemed to flourish there for a while until
Mr. Labouchere of Truth informed his
compatriots of what THE SUN had had
to say about the enterprises. After that
the stock sales fell off.

The office of the Hawthorne Silver
and Iron Mines, Limited is no longer in
the Cambridge Building where the Hawthorne
typewriters once clicked so merrily.
The name of Albert Freeman,
however, appears on the door of room 518,
Mr. Freeman was somewhere behind the
door yesterday. A girl in the office said
that the Hawthorne company's offices
was now at Kingston, Ont., and was in
charge of J. B. Hanna. For four years
Hawthorne and Freeman have been scattering
stock far and wide from their
headquarters in the Cambridge Building.
The stock selling stopped about
four months ago and with it the output
of literature describing the properties
up in Canada. Mr. Freeman says that
Mr. Hawthorne has sold his interest in
the companies to Hanna.

The Hawthorne Silver and Iron Mines
Limited. the last creation of the outfit
in the Cambridge Building, was represented
to own in Canada 12,000 acres
rich in iron, silver and gold. There
were two square miles of almost solid
silver, it seemed. It was to yield certainly
20 per cent., and with the expenditure
of capital, Mr. Hawthorne said,
it could easily be made to yield 100 per
cent. dividends in a year's time. There
were 15,000,000 $1 shares in this company
sold at the bargain price of 30 cents a
share at first and raised in price occasionally
to make them look more attractive to
the sucker list. There haven't been any
dividends in this or any other companies
described by Mr. Hawthorne's pen.

Before launching the Hawthorne silver
mines the outfit had launched the
Temagamini Cobalt Mines Ltd., capitalized
at $3,000,000; the Elklake-Cobalt
Mines with a capitalization of $1,000,000.
and the Montreal-James Company. All
were based on those acres and acres up
in Canada, to reach which you get off at
Temagamini and walk or ride the rest
of the way through the wilderness. Land
up that way, THE SUN showed, could
be bought at $1 an acre and leased for
much less, the reason being that the
experts employed by the big Cobalt silver
companies had decided that the silver
that was in workable quantities up that
way was in the few square miles of the
Cobalt cap and nowhere else. Small
surface showings sufficient to use for
stock selling purposes could be found
easily in divers places, however.

As each company of the Hawthorne-Freeman
string was pushed off the ways
the author seized his pen and described
glowingly the prospects of dividends
and ore shipmentS. Stock in the first
company was sold because, said Mr. Hawthorne,
they wanted to begin shipping
ore in ninety days. It was to rival the
big Cobalt producers. That was four
years ago. Next the Elklake-Cobalt was
to begin shipping ore on February 1, 1909.
There were hurry up letters from Freeman,
written from the camp, to help
along the big boost. And so it went.

Stock of the par value of something like
$10,000,000 has been successfully distributed
in return for real money.

----end

A sampling of NYT articles about the mining case. (Look for "download a high-resolution PDF" link on the abstract page.)

New York Times, October 24, 1911, link

Federal Probe into Hawthorne Mines



New York Times, January 06, 1912, link

Hawthorne Accused of $3,000,000 Fraud



New York Times, December 03, 1912, link

Hawthorne Wanted to be an Altruist



New York Times, December 04, 1912, link

Judge Hears Enough Hawthorne Letters



New York Times, December 13, 1912, link

40,0000 Hawthorne Letters



New York Times, March 15, 1913, link

Convict Three men in Hawthorne case



New York Times, October 16, 1913, link

Hawthorne out of Prison

[Mayerling]

Thanks, Jeff.

For some reason I read a couple more of the Julian Hawthorne/Inspector Byrnes novels.

Another's Crime starts out straightforwardly enough as a prodigal son is accused of filching bank notes from the married woman he is involved with in a not quite sinful way, but then descends into a series of improbable events and unlikely coincidences. Byrnes is a minor character, at best. I was unable to determine what true crime story, if any, inspired this novel.

Another's Crime: From the Diary of Inspector Byrnes (New York: Cassell, 1888), link
by Julian Hawthorne

You might think a novel called An American Penman would be mostly concerned with the doings of a forger from the United States, but instead the focus is on a newly impoverished Russian count who, down to his last two cents, is saved from ruin when Inspector Byrnes recruits him as an undercover agent to track down the titular criminal in Europe. Even the characters themselves are confused by some of the coincidences in this story. Again, I'm not sure which actual criminal may have inspired this tale.

An American Penman: From the Diary of Inspector Byrnes (New York: Cassell, 1888), link
by Julian Hawthorne


In 1913 Julian Hawthorne was convicted in a federal court of mail fraud in connection with the sale of mining stocks. It was reported that Hawthorne was run out of London by Labouchere.

A pamphlet credited to Hawthorne about a certain Biblical mine owner.

The Secret of Solomon (1909), link
by Julian Hawthorne

New York Sun, October 24, 1911, Page 11, Column 1

Julian Hawthorne Inquiry

Sale of $10,000,000 in Mining Stocks Scrutinized

The mining enterprises of Julian Hawthorne,
son of Nathaniel Hawthorne, to
which the SUN called attention a year
and a half ago, are under investigation
by the Federal Grand Jury sitting in Ihe
Post Office building. It was said yesterday
that a number of subpenas had been
issued calling for employees of
Hawthorne's companies and various persons
associated with him.

The Grand Jury proceedings have followed
an investigation by the Post Office
authorities. A rumor about the Federal
building yesterday was that action in
the case at the present time was a result
of an appeal made to Senator Elihu Root
by friends of his who had bought some of
Mr. Hawthorne's stock.

One of Mr. Hawthorne's associates
was sent for and had a talk with
Assistant United States Attorney Thompson
yesterday was Albert Freeman, who
has been peddling mining stock for years
and who next to Mr. Hawthorne has been
the chief figure in the Hawthorne Silver
and Iron Mines, Ltd., The Temagamini
Cobalt Mines, Ltd., and the Montreal-James
Company, to mention only a few.
Ex-Mayor Josiah Quincy of Boston is to
see Mr. Thompson to-morrow, but whether
he is to go before the Grand Jury or not
is not stated.

Mr. Quincy is a director of the King
Solomon Gold Mining Company one of
Freeman's early stock selling enterprises
which was going to pay 30 per cent. dividends
on a 10 cents a share basis, but
didn't. Mr. Thompson said yesterday
that he would like very much to see Mr.
Hawthorne himself, but thus far had not
succeeded in getting him. A son of Hawthorne
was one of his callers yesterday,

A iittle over a year ago after THE SUN
called attention to the outpouring of
stock from the Cambridge Building,
which had been going on for several
yeas. Mr. Hawthorn removed to London.
There he opened elaborate offices
and With the prolific pen which he had
diverted from other forms of literature
to mining prospectuses he began painting
for Englishmen the opportunities to
get rich through the purchase of Hawthorne
silver mines stock, Business
seemed to flourish there for a while until
Mr. Labouchere of Truth informed his
compatriots of what THE SUN had had
to say about the enterprises. After that
the stock sales fell off.

The office of the Hawthorne Silver
and Iron Mines, Limited is no longer in
the Cambridge Building where the Hawthorne
typewriters once clicked so merrily.
The name of Albert Freeman,
however, appears on the door of room 518,
Mr. Freeman was somewhere behind the
door yesterday. A girl in the office said
that the Hawthorne company's offices
was now at Kingston, Ont., and was in
charge of J. B. Hanna. For four years
Hawthorne and Freeman have been scattering
stock far and wide from their
headquarters in the Cambridge Building.
The stock selling stopped about
four months ago and with it the output
of literature describing the properties
up in Canada. Mr. Freeman says that
Mr. Hawthorne has sold his interest in
the companies to Hanna.

The Hawthorne Silver and Iron Mines
Limited. the last creation of the outfit
in the Cambridge Building, was represented
to own in Canada 12,000 acres
rich in iron, silver and gold. There
were two square miles of almost solid
silver, it seemed. It was to yield certainly
20 per cent., and with the expenditure
of capital, Mr. Hawthorne said,
it could easily be made to yield 100 per
cent. dividends in a year's time. There
were 15,000,000 $1 shares in this company
sold at the bargain price of 30 cents a
share at first and raised in price occasionally
to make them look more attractive to
the sucker list. There haven't been any
dividends in this or any other companies
described by Mr. Hawthorne's pen.

Before launching the Hawthorne silver
mines the outfit had launched the
Temagamini Cobalt Mines Ltd., capitalized
at $3,000,000; the Elklake-Cobalt
Mines with a capitalization of $1,000,000.
and the Montreal-James Company. All
were based on those acres and acres up
in Canada, to reach which you get off at
Temagamini and walk or ride the rest
of the way through the wilderness. Land
up that way, THE SUN showed, could
be bought at $1 an acre and leased for
much less, the reason being that the
experts employed by the big Cobalt silver
companies had decided that the silver
that was in workable quantities up that
way was in the few square miles of the
Cobalt cap and nowhere else. Small
surface showings sufficient to use for
stock selling purposes could be found
easily in divers places, however.

As each company of the Hawthorne-Freeman
string was pushed off the ways
the author seized his pen and described
glowingly the prospects of dividends
and ore shipmentS. Stock in the first
company was sold because, said Mr. Hawthorne,
they wanted to begin shipping
ore in ninety days. It was to rival the
big Cobalt producers. That was four
years ago. Next the Elklake-Cobalt was
to begin shipping ore on February 1, 1909.
There were hurry up letters from Freeman,
written from the camp, to help
along the big boost. And so it went.

Stock of the par value of something like
$10,000,000 has been successfully distributed
in return for real money.

----end

A sampling of NYT articles about the mining case. (Look for "download a high-resolution PDF" link on the abstract page.)

New York Times, October 24, 1911, link

Federal Probe into Hawthorne Mines



New York Times, January 06, 1912, link

Hawthorne Accused of $3,000,000 Fraud



New York Times, December 03, 1912, link

Hawthorne Wanted to be an Altruist



New York Times, December 04, 1912, link

Judge Hears Enough Hawthorne Letters



New York Times, December 13, 1912, link

40,0000 Hawthorne Letters



New York Times, March 15, 1913, link

Convict Three men in Hawthorne case



New York Times, October 16, 1913, link

Hawthorne out of Prison

Hello TradeName,

I had heard that Julian Hawthorne got into legal trouble over a stock swindle, so thank you for bringing out what it was. The fact that he used ex-Mayor Josiah Quincy of Boston as one of his corporate directors was not uncommon in that period. Whitaker Wright, whose London and Glove Corporate Swindle of 1902-03 was a major disaster on the London 'Change, put the former Viceroy of India, the Marquis of Ripon into the post of Chairman of the Board (although Wright was what we'd term the C.E.O. and center of the firms). Ripon was so humiliated in the wake of the disaster at being used that his own life was shortened, and he died in 1902.

Quincy was of the "Boston Brahmin" group who directed the affairs of Boston and Massachusetts for much of the late 18th and 19th Centuries, so his addition to Hawthorne's business boards was on par with Wright using Ripon.

You would have to give more of the plots of both Hawthorne-Byrnes novels for one to ascertain the basis for the stories, and given how bad they are it probably doesn't matter.

Jeff

[Mayerling]

A slight error

Whitaker Wright did not put the former Viceroy of India, the Earl of Ripon, into the chairmanship of the London and Globe firm. It was the Marquis of Dufferin and Ava who was put into that position, and he had too had been Viceroy of India.

Jeff

[TradeName]

Thanks, Jeff.

In "An American Penman" the only real specifics about the gang of forgers is that they specialize in forging letters of credits and securities and cheating ar cards.

In "Another's Crime" a pickpocket lifts a purse from a woman in a jewelry store, removes some bank notes and then plants the empty purse on the woman's companion , who just happens to need money to pay off a gambling debt.

Julian Hawthorne claimed to have been acquainted with William Thomas, the "Bremen dynamite fiend," who Jeff mentioned earlier. It seem plausible that he knew him in Dresden, but his account seems inaccurate at points, and he seems to have depicted Thomas as having more successful than he was in order to set up the punchline for one of his anecdotes.

A review of a book about Thomas gives a summary of the case.

New York Times, June 29, 2005, link

BOOKS OF THE TIMES; A Man of Many Facets, All of Them Monstrous
By WILLIAM GRIMES

The Dynamite Fiend
The Chilling Tale of a Confederate Spy, Con Artist, and Mass Murderer
By Ann Larabee
Illustrated. 234 pages. Palgrave Macmillan. $24.95.


A brief bio of Julian Hawthorne gives some dates.

A Supplement to Allibone's Critical Dictionary of English Literature, Volume 2 (Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott, 1899), Page 792
By John Foster Kirk, Samuel Austin Allibone

Hawthorne, Julian, b. 1848, in Boston, Mass.; son of Nathaniel Hawthorne, infra; went to Europe with his parents in 1853, and after their return entered Harvard in 1863, but did not graduate. He began the study of civil engineering at the Lawrence Scientific School of Harvard, and was a student in Dresden, Germany, in 1868-70. From 1870 to 1872 he was employed as a hydrographio engineer in the department of docks in New York. In 1872 he went abroad, Spent two years in Dresden, and from 1874 till 1881 resided in London, where he was for two years on the staff of the Spectator and contributed to reviews and magazines. In 1882 he returned to New York. [...]

----end

Hawthorne mentions the Dresden story in an interview.

The Illustrated American, Volume 19, April 4, 1896, Pages 438-439

A Chat With Julian Hawthorne.

JULIAN HAWTHORNE, author of more than two dozen novels, two hundred shorter tales, many poems and a drama, has the figure of an athlete, the eye of a pioneer, the carriage of a soldier and the manner of a farsighted business man. He speaks in a low tone and is very quiet and unassuming in appearance. He is well-informed in affairs of general interest and is a most entertaining talker, but he never “talks shop" or mentions his own writings and literary career unless specially urged and questioned.

I had the pleasure of a chat with him the other day, and was of course curious as to his first venture in literature. In answer to a question he said:

"In 1865, while I was at Cambridge, I was very much interested in natural history and wrote a few articles on the subject for the Waver Magazine, though I never expected to see them in type, and was far too modest to sign my name. But they were printed, and I never recovered from that initial weakness."

You studied civil engineering, didn't you?"

“Yes; and in 1868, after I graduated, I went to Dresden, where I continued my studies for two or three years longer. It was there I met my future wife, who was from New Orleans, so you see we had a narrow escape from not meeting. On my return to New York I secured a position on the Dock Department under General McClellan, who had just taken charge. I was employed in taking hydrographic surveys, taking sounding off the docks, and sometimes sitting for hours at a time in a small boat in the middle of the river, ascertaining with the aid of instruments the exact speed of the current. It was winter time, and 1 don't believe Peary or Nansen ever got into colder quarters. The ferry-boats seemed to be charging at us from every direction, and we were frequently soaked when we reached shore. I was finally ousted by politics, and then was given a commission to go to New Orleans to build a canal.

“I afterward returned to Dresden, where I wrote ‘Saxon Studies,' one of my first successes. About this time I became acquainted with a man named Thomas, whom I met in Dresden. He was a most delightful fellow personally, and we became very intimate. Just before my return to America Thomas gave a dinner in my honor, making a farewell speech and bidding me good-bye with tears in his eyes. I afterward learned that he had intended placing an infernal machine on the ship in which I sailed, and was discouraged by his failure to secure what he considered sufficient insurance on his little ‘box." His amiable intention may have had something to do with his tearful farewell. He sent a machine out whenever he needed about $300, insured it well, and afterward collected. He finally made a miscalculation, with the result that his ‘box' exploded prematurely, causing the loss of a number of lives. He then blew his brains out, and I never knew of his rascalities until I saw his picture printed."

“Thomas : Do you mean Thomassen, whose infernal machine at a Hamburg dock made so great a sensation a few years ago?"

“The same."

[...]

----end

The long version of the story.

Cosmopolitan, Volume 45, September, 1908, Pages 431-439

A Great Criminal of the Last Generation
by Julian Hawthorne

THE CAREER OF ALEXANDER THOMAS REVEALED A MAN OF TERRIFIC PROPORTIONS AND PURPOSES--A MR. HYDE SUCH AS THE BRAIN OF STEVENSON NEVER DARED CONCEIVE

When I was about half my present age I was for four years intimate with one of the greatest criminals of his time—-of any time, perhaps; such, at least, was afterward his rating. I will add (for the peace of mind of the reader) that I did not suspect him while the friendship was going on, nor for a year or two afterward, when the truth was revealed to my incredulous eyes by a paragraph in a London paper. I said to myself, when I had read the item, “Of course that can’t be Tom!” and although the details fitted painfully well, I still withheld my belief until a portrait of him was published in (I think) Harper's Weekly, and further doubt became impossible.

Since then there have been several great criminals, whose careers I have studied; but I question whether, taking them all by and large, any of them quite measured up to my friend. He was of his own sort, of course; no one had before or has since done just the kind of thing that he did. He was, in his calling, an inventor, and perhaps a genius; one is apt to feel enthusiastic about a person of that caliber, and standards are scarce to compare him by. Hundreds of people, including his own wife and children, knew him as intimately, almost, as I did, and to not one of them did he ever for one moment reveal his secret; nay, that he had any secret to reveal. He was not of a species that anyone would suspect of having a secret, or of being capable of having one. We men and women of the world imagine that we know a man when we see him, and can assign him his proper place in our little gallery of types of human nature. But Tom went his way, looking us all smilingly in the face, opening to us his entire way and principle of existence (as we believed), and never a man or woman of us all had the glimmering of a notion as to what he really was, or would have believed an accuser who should have arisen and denounced him.

The whole civilized world was amazed and horrified when the truth about him came out; but its emotions were pale compared with those of us who had been his personal friends and were utterly convinced that, be his faults what they might (and he had many), he was at least as honest, as humane, and as simple and artless a human creature as had ever been created in this world. What was the effect of the revelation upon his other friends I do not know, for I never happened to speak with any of them on the subject; but upon myself it was so impressive that for many years I never mentioned his name at all, or thought of him when I could help it; and though I have, in the thirty years since then, told his story a few times to persons I knew well, and who, I thought, could appreciate it, yet this is the first time I have ever written about him; and, so sincere was my affection for him, it seems almost disloyal to disclose the facts about Tom even now. He did not cause me to lose my faith in human nature, as the phrase is, because he seemed so astounding an exception to human nature itself; but he did cause me to lose a great deal of my faith in myself—-in that cheerful cocksureness about things in general which appertains to so many of us. I have never since believed that I could see through millstones.

“Alexander Thomas” was the name he wrote down, in his sprawling, heedless handwriting, in the book of the names of members of the American Club in Dresden, Saxony, a pretty city in which I spent four happy years. There may have been a middle initial, but I have forgotten what it was. We called him Tom, and Old Tom, and made ourselves mightily free and easy with him. He was perfectly modest and unassuming in his bearing and conversation, and never did anything but chuckle good-naturedly—-there was never anything else so inexhaustible as Tom's good nature—-when some one or other broke a jest at his expense. He was an enormous creature, weighing at least three hundred pounds, though under six feet in height; with a big, clumsy head on a short thick neck and mighty shoulders; with rough red hair, a straggly red beard, and merry, sharp little blue eyes. He wasn't a mere hogshead of fat, though; he was hard all over, of tremendous strength, and of no little activity and lightness on his feet, so that I have seen him walk ten or fifteen miles on a hot summer's day, and run a hundred-yard sprint at the end of it, with less effort than most of us would have to make. He was always jolly, always chuckling, and he had a trick of running the tip of his tongue out of his mouth and curling it along his upper lip, just as you might See a fat, mischievous, harmless boy do it. It was a remarkably pointed tongue, and very mobile; and it, and this trick with it, may have been an index to his character, but I had not the skill to interpret it. He trod about the rooms of the club with a tread ponderous but light, as Count Fosco, a much less remarkable villain, might do; and he would sit and swap yarns with us for hours at a time, or he would take a hand at cards from noon till midnight, winning or losing the trifling sums that were hazarded in our club in those days, when no one was rich and we played for the fun of it. Tom was always strictly honest about settling up, however; and though we all regarded him as poor, even according to the standard that obtained among us, yet none of us would have hesitated to accept Tom's word for as good as his bond.

It is to be noted, in this connection (cardplaying, I mean), that we sometimes sat up at it rather late; and it happened quite often that, soon after midnight, the club waiter would approach Tom mysteriously and whisper something in his ear. Whereupon Tom would change countenance, throw down his cards, mumble some excuse, and leave the room; and we would see no more of him that night. What had happened? Was this, you may ask, a clue to his mystery? By no means; and you are forgetting that there was no mystery about Tom, that we knew of, to make a clue to. No: Tom's sudden defections were due to Mrs. Tom, who was a pretty woman, a bit of a shrew, very fond of her big husband, but withal very strict with him; and when he overstayed the midnight hour at the club she was in the habit of coming over and sending up word that she was waiting for him, and he must come home with her at once. He never kept her waiting on these occasions. He was devoted to her and their two children-—quite a fool about them, we used to say; and it was not because they “knew anything about him,” for they knew nothing, any more than anyone else did. It was pure affection, there is no doubt about that. But it amused us much that big Tom should be a henpecked husband, and we made great fun of it, both among ourselves and to him. He only chuckled, rather foolishly, and never resented it; and it was actually for the sake of this good little woman and her two children that his crimes were committed, and they lived on money that was obtained by the murder of hundreds of their fellow Creatures.

THE “BREMEN FIEND"

And I may as well say here that my friend Tom, whose name was written by himself in the club book as “Thomas,” was none other than the “Bremen Fiend,” and variously referred to afterward, by investigators who attempted to trace his career, as “Thomassen,” “Thompson,” “Alexander,” and I know not what besides. The enormity of his crimes stimulated an immense curiosity, speculation, and professional and amateur sleuthing on his behalf, the police of Germany comparing notes with those of the rest of Europe and America, and turning up every stick and stone that seemed in the least likely to reveal a criminal behind it. This quest was kept up for a year or more; but the results of it were out of all proportion meager. It was not found possible to determine even his nationality: one report had him a resident of Brooklyn, another of Nova Scotia, another of the Southern states, and so on. No one was able to prove anything on that poinr, and the truth as to his birthplace will never be known; for he had covered his trail too well. It was asserted that he had been a blockade-runner during our civil war, and that, after the war, in 1866, he had been charged with scuttling an English steamer on which he had shipped "goods," and insured them to the amount of twenty-four thousand pounds sterling. Whether or not this enterprising individual was our Thomas, at all events he escaped conviction, and disappeared. If it was he (and very likely it may have been), the adventure taught him prudence; and at the time I knew him he was doing business on less hazardous lines, and with better chances of immunity.

His method was as follows: He would ship a wooden case, delared as containing merchandise, on some steamer, generally a transatlantic liner, though his field may have been a wider one than this, for at about the time that the revelation concerning him took place, ten steamers and fifteen thousand lives were reported lost along our Pacific coast, whether or not through Tom's agency cannot now be ascertained. This packing-case of his would contain, not the merchandise that he declared, but enough dynamite or other high explosive to blow any ship to pieces, and an ingenious and powerful piece of clockwork mechanism to explode it withal. The mechanism slowly forced back a strong steel spring contained in an iron cylinder, the process being timed to last four or five days. At the expiration of the period a catch would be automatically released, setting free the spring, which would thereupon strike with great impetus against a sort of ramrod with a sharp point at its outer end (also contained in the cylinder), and this sharp point would be driven into the explosive, setting it off and sending the ship and every thing and person on it to the bottom of the sea. In course of time the ship would be reported at Lloyd's as “overdue,” then as “missing,” and finally as “lost”; after which Thomas would apply for his insurance, and get it; for the amount he claimed was never more than four or five hundred dollars. Not that he would not have liked to insure for more, but that, had he done so, his box of “merchandise” would have been liable to examination by the insurance agents, with results, of course, that would have brought Thomas's industry to an abrupt end. In order further to avert suspicion, he would ship on many different lines and insure in many different companies, none of which, for a sum so insignificant as that involved, ever thought it worth while to make an investigation, or ever regarded the unfortunate shipper as a suspicious person. No one, as I have intimated, not even an insurance agent, could look in Tom's ingenuous countenance and believe him capable of plotting evil against any living Creature.

ONE DOLLAR FOR EVERY HUMAN LIFE

If he succeeded in destroying as many as ten or a dozen ships a year, his winnings could not, therefore, have been more than five or six thousand dollars annually at most; and the scale on which he lived in Dresden would correspond to about that figure. The crew and passengers of each vessel might average five hundred persons; so my friend's livelihood would cost the world something like one human life for each dollar that went into his pockets. But he enjoyed every cent of it, and kept his wife and children in good style on it, besides being always ready to take his turn in standing drinks for the crowd, or participating in any reasonable “lark.” I remember, on one occasion, by the way, I was going to Berlin on a visit, and fixed upon Tom as my companion for the trip. When I proposed it to him, he said: “My dear boy, that would suit me up to the neck: we would have the time of our lives; but the truth is, I'm flat broke, and sha’n’t have a cent inside the next month. But if you can wait till then I'll get hold of three hundred dollars, and we can do the thing to the queen's taste.” However, I went without him. It turned out later (when the truth about him came out) that this three hundred dollars, which he duly received at the date he mentioned, must have been derived from the destruction of a vessel with one of his boxes on board. He was prepared to spend that money on a spree, and would, I doubt not, have enjoyed it with all the gaiety and recklessness that were innate in him.

It was stated that, as a precautionary measure, he was in the habit of assembling the materials for his shipments from various quarters—-the dynamite from America, the wooden and metal cases from Dresden, the clockwork from Vienna, Bernburg, or Leipzig. I know that he used to make occasional journeys to Leipzig, and that he employed an artisan there to make his clockwork. Thomas, it was afterward found, had told this man that the machines were for use in a silk-mill, and were intended to sever a thousand threads at one stroke. He once paid him a bonus of ten dollars for an extra good piece of work.

How many ships Thomas destroyed, how many lives he sacrificed, can only be conjectured: hypothetical lists were made out at the time, but the secrecy with which all his operations were carried out renders all such estimates little better than guesses, and it would not be worth while to recapitulate them here. When the catastrophe which I shall immediately describe took place, it was stated that Thomas had twenty machines in process of manufacture. This would indicate that he meant to enlarge his business—-perhaps to make one grand coup, and then to retire with the fortune accruing from it. He was of course well aware of the risk he was constantly running, from which no precautions could protect him; and he cherished dreams, perhaps, of a quiet old age with his wife and children, afar from the anxieties and uncertainties inseparable from the human struggle for wealth. But he awoke from his dream at the sound of an explosion which also made the world sit up and wonder and afterward shudder as at a revelation from the depths of hell.

The thing came about thus: Thomas had sent a box to be shipped at Bremen on the steamship Mosel, and a day or two before the date of sailing, he left Dresden and journeyed to Bremen, in order to see that all went right. This had been his habitual practice; and it showed that he recognized the constant peril of accident, and also that he had made up his mind what to do in the event of any accident taking place. He had decided that discovery of his guilt must follow sooner or later, and was resolved not to undergo the tedium of trial and imprisonment, followed by execution for murder. He knew a shorter way out of the difficulty, and was prepared to take it at a moment's warning.

On the afternoon of the 11th of December, 1875, a sunny day, mild enough to admit of sitting out of doors with comfort, Thomas was drinking beer with an acquaintance at a table on the sidewalk outside a saloon near the wharf. As he sat, he faced the wharf, and could see the Mosel lying there, while the stevedores were lowering freight into her hold with the aid of a derrick. His friend, opposite him, had his back to the scene. Thomas was, as usual, in jovial spirits, his broad face ruddy and his small blue eyes sparkling with conviviality behind his spectacles. A slight protuberance under the right-hand skirt of the blue sack coat he wore might have indicated, to an observant eye, the presence of a revolver in his hip-pocket; but he was not the object of observation or of suspicion. He was apparently at peace with all the world; no one wished him ill, and he wished ill to none. And yet he was at that moment deliberately condemning several hundred human beings to a violent and terrible death.

The stevedores hitched up their tackle round a medium-sized box, and up it swung into the air. Thomas watched it, and probably knew it as his own. Up it went; and in a couple of minutes more it would be safe in its place in the steamer's vitals, there to remain until, four days later, the steel spring should be released, and, with a tearing and deafening roar, as of fiends escaping from the Pit, the vessel should burst asunder in the sea, fifteen hundred miles from any land, and then, with all her contents, be engulfed forever. Thomas's eyes twinkled, and he raised his schoppen of beer to his lips.

THE FATE OF THOMAS

He set down the schoppen untasted. The box, just as it turned to swing over the vessel's hold, slipped from the chain loop, and fell from a height of thirty feet to the stone wharf. It broke to pieces. Instantly followed an explosion—-the very crack of doom. It was a noise too outrageous and intolerable for mortal nerves. It rent the massive granite wharf into powder; it drove in the whole side of the ship and scattered it in splinters. It shattered every window-pane within a radius of half a mile. In the smoky dust which went up from it were hurtled abroad the unrecognizable shreds of what, an instant before, had been two hundred living human bodies. It knocked the companion of Thomas off his chair, and left him dazed. But Thomas remained firm in his seat. With his left hand he grasped the edge of the table; his right went to his hip-pocket. As his friend picked himself up, he saw the big man in the blue suit draw a shining revolver and put the muzzle of it between his teeth. His finger tightened on the trigger, and a bullet tore through his brain. He did not fall, but retained his position, and did not die until the following day. Meanwhile, he was questioned by the police, but to no purpose, and it is probable that he uttered no word of any kind. Certainly he revealed nothing, and it was only later that his connection with the event was established. The explosion was at first supposed to have been an accident. Afterward it was surmised that Thomas was one of a group of malefactors; but this hypothesis was never substantiated. He shared his crime with no one; and what his part had been, and what the secret meditations of his heart, will never be known in this world.

A rumor was circulated, at the time, that another of the Thomas boxes had been shipped on the steamer City of Boston; but this was not confirmed, and the steamer made her trip safely. The Salier was another steamship for which fears were expressed for a while. Indeed, there was a panic among all ship-owners and insurance companies with whom the dead man had had dealings. As I have said, a number of other ships did mysteriously disappear soon after his death. But no one applied for insurance money on any “case of merchandise, contents unknown”; and slowly the fear died away. But for nearly a year afterward, paragraphs referring to Thomas appeared occasionally in European and American papers and periodicals. A generation has passed away since then; but still one will occasionally meet men of thirty or forty who have heard something about the “Bremen Fiend.”

THE MAN AND HIS CRIMES

Thomas, I am inclined to think, had the pride of an artist in his work, a secret enthusiasm in his trade. And one of the most wonderful things about him was that he kept that terrific secret so deep down within him that its existence was never suspected by his most familiar intimates. Yet was Tom, in his ordinary walk and conversation, the least secretive man I have ever met. He would blurt out anything, things to his own disadvantage as readily as anything else. He would get drunk at the club and talk with the loosest tongue imaginable; he had no reserves, no bit or bridle of any sort. He used to do many things which propriety forbade; and he would blab of them, in the confidences of intoxication, till you were certain you had seen to the very bottom of his foolish soul. And yet, all the while, that blackest and most hideous of secrets was lying within there, and he was so secure about it that he had no fear that the veil would be pushed aside. It was so deep down, perhaps, that he could not have reached it if he would. How could the least guarded of men be at the same time the most abysmally impenetrable? Was there a whole man, of diabolic and terrific proportions and purposes—-a Mr. Hyde such as even Stevenson never dared imagine—-whom we never caught one glimpse of, or dreamed of, hidden somewhere in that huge body? Was the man we saw, and thought we knew, only an actor's part, consummately and unremittingly played? It must have been so; and yet, I don't know. Somehow, I cannot think of Tom as insincere. His crimes were in some way distinct from himself; as Byron says of man's love—-that it is “a thing apart.” The devil had a part in him; but it had been agreed between them, when the bargain was made, that Tom, so long as he lived, was to retain his care-free and lighthearted disposition unaffected by the awful compact. Besides, I have little doubt that Tom was a thoroughgoing fatalist. He believed that it is appointed unto all men once to die, and that if he so arranged things that the death should be the occasion of profit to himself it altered nothing in the course of destiny. I have a special ground for this conviction, which I will now relate.

At one period of my Dresden sojourn, I had occasion to visit London to get out the English copyright on one of my books. I planned to leave on a certain steamer that called at Southampton on its way to New York. I did not expect to return to Dresden, but to take up my residence in England. When I told Tom of this, he expressed great and, as I felt at the time and still believe, sincere regret at losing an old and loved friend. He inquired with (as I thought) somewhat singular particularity the name of the vessel on which I intended to leave. When I told him, he sat silent for a time, and his ruddy and jovial countenance expressed, or seemed to express, genuine trouble; so that I felt that here was a man who truly cared for me. Finally he said: “Well, old man, partings are bad things; but they have to come, and we must make the best of 'em. No telling, you know, when you say goodby to a friend, whether you'll ever see him again. I’m sorry you're going; but if you must, why, you must, that's all! So I'll tell you what I’ll do; we'll get our crowd together, and I'll give you a good-by dinner–-a bang-up one, with all the fixings. If there's a man there that goes to bed sober, he'll be no friend of mine afterward. We'll drink your health, my boy, with all the honors; and whatever happens, don't you forget that Tom was your friend, and will see you through to the last-—don't you forget it!” And thereupon he shook my hand with the grip and emphasis of the giant that he was, and at once set about the preparations for the dinner.

Well, what of it? Only this, that there was a box of Tom's scheduled to be shipped on the very steamer which was to carry me to Southampton and also, according to Tom's calculation, to another world. He knew, when he made that speech to me, that I was doomed to die by his means, and that, when he bade me farewell, it would be forever. He was sorry—-why should I doubt it?—-and was ready to spend a part of the money my death would bring him in giving me a “bang-up” farewell banquet. He was a fatalist, and the creed of fatalism was in the words he spoke to me. The dinner was given, and no expense was spared, as the penny-a-liners say; and Tom made the speech of farewell, and tears ran down his cheeks as he made it. He embraced me, and we were all very much affected; and why should he have gone to this trouble and expense if he had been pretending? I feel sure that he meant every word and dollar of it; though I am not quite so sure that he also meant all the pleasure that he expressed when, a few days afterward, circumstances caused me to alter my plans so that I went by another boat. He had made his little fatalistic poem about me-—his elegy, so to say—-and may not have been altogether gratified when the emotion and the money turned out to have been wasted. But that is only my surmise; who knows anything about a man like this?

I have said that we had no cause for suspecting that everything about Tom was not open to the fullest inspection; but this is perhaps not quite accurate. I have alluded to the rumor that he had been a blockade-runner during the Civil War; there was a certăin flavor of the sea about him, though not such as to appear to any extent in his language. But he was fearless, reckless, powerful; and one could imagine him captain of a privateer, or perhaps even of a pirate, except that we could not have pictured Tom as making anybody walk the plank. He would have been certain to spare him at the last moment, and to invite him to take a drink and eat something. Whether or not he actually had been a pirate or a blockade-runner I cannot say; but obviously, if he had been, those industries must have seemed tame to him in the retrospect, when he contrasted them with the monstrous occupation which he followed during the latter years of his life. What would I not give for a complete biography of Tom, from the cradle upward, subjective as well as objective!

There was one other thing that might have afforded us a gleam of light on his character, had our eyes, seeing, been able to see. One afternoon, in the club, a smart young snippet of fashion, whom I shall call Fred, had been showing off some tricks of legerdemain, and amusing us by producing handkerchiefs out of our hats and silver coins from our ears and noses. Finally he came round to where Tom sat, ponderous and placid, looking out of the window abstractedly with his little twinkling eyes, and thinking, it may be, of the scene on the ship when his next machine went off. Fred began to extract inexplicable purses and bank-notes out of Tom's inner pockets and hat-linings, while the big, red-haired fellow sat inert; when all of a sudden a startling change took place in him. He sat erect, and a dark look frowned over his broad visage; he grasped the slender wrist of the prestidigitator, and almost crushed it in his massive grip.

“You quit!” he said, in a snarling, rasping voice, quite new to us. “I’ve seen men shot dead for less than that!”

Those words have never left my memory; they came like the explosion of a cannon in the reposeful midst of us. Though not very loud, there was such force behind them that they seemed to be driven clean through the slender frame of the unfortunate youth thus addressed, who staggered back appalled. And they left with the rest of us, who were astonished spectators of the incident, a vision of scenes of violence and passion in the past such as we had never before connected with our ideas of Tom. He appeared to recognize that he had thrown a sinister light upon himself; he lapsed into sullen silence, and soon rose and left the room. But after he had gone, we presently recovered our spirits, and told each other that poor Tom must have got out of bed wrong foot foremost that morning; that his wife had probably been scolding him, and other inanities of the kind. None of us imagined that we had had a glimpse of the true nature of one of the great wholesale murderers of mankind.

All the same, none of us afterward felt quite the same toward Tom as before; though our relations with him continued outwardly unaltered there was the perception of some cloud over them. I left Dresden not long after, and never saw him again. Two years, or less, later came the revelation. But I feel that it was only a superficial revelation, after all.

----end

A description of Thomas at the American Club in Dresden,

The New York Herald, December 23, 1875, Page 3, Column 4

The Dynamite Assassin

WHO WAS HE WHEN IN LIFE?--HAS HIS IDENTITY BEEN ESTABLISHED?--CURIOUS INCIDENTS OF BLOCKADE RUNNING DURING THE WAR

To the Editor of the Herald:--

From the editorials and communications in the
HERALD I am led to believe that Thompson, aliaS Thomas,
aliaS Thomasaen, is or was a person whose identity IS
not yet fully established. The writer was in Dresden
during the winter of 1869-'70. The American Club
was then in Its second year, and one of its chief
supporters and leading members was "Father Thomas," a
short, thick set, genial person, with full red beard. he
lived well, entertained handsomely and wAs regarded
by the resident Americans as a liberal gentleman. No
subscription for the relief of ibe poor was without
his name. In one instance two young American ladies
started a school which proved unsuccessful. He called
upon them, handed them $1,000 to furnish their rooms
and commence again, saying that if successful they
could repay him and if not they should not regard it as
a debt.

"Father" Thomas told the writer that he was in the
Confederate service during tne entire war, first as a
blockade runner, then as a soldier in Lee's army and
afterward again a blockade runner. His last service
was as caterer to Lee's army when it should arrive in
Philadelphia. He received instructions from the
government to go to Nassau, N. P., thence to
New York and Philadelphia, and in the latter
city make arrangements for Lee in his
Northern march. For this purpose he
received from the Confederate government a draft on
their English bankers for $36,000. In due lime he
arrived at Philadelphia and awaited Lee's advance. The
battle of Gettysburg convinced him that the rebellion
was soon to end. He saw that the North was prosperous
while the South was bankrupt. As he had lost
about $7,000 in the Confederate service he thought it
was not rubbery to repay himself in the best way he
could. He therefore came to New York and asked the
advice of a prominent banker, who told him to invest
in anything but United States government bonds. After
further inquiries he sold his bill of $35,000 and bought
United Stales securities and sailed lor Europe. Upon
the interest of United States bonds he inlormed me he
was then living.

One day Commodore Worden was in the club, when
"Father" Thomas said to him:--"Commodore, you
ruined me once. The Tennessee (I believe that was
the name of the blockade runner) was loaded with
cotton in Mobile Harbor, ready to run out by the first
opportunity; but you kept too strict watch, and one of
your mortar boats sent a shell through her, which
destroyed her and the whole cargo. Half thai cotton was
mine," The Commodore listened attentively and then
replied:--"Thomas, if ever I catch you in such bad
company again I should take as much pleasure in putting
a bullet through your heart as 1 did in putting that
bomb through the Tennessee."

Thomas straightened himself, and, throwing open his
coat, said:--"Commodore, if you ever do I shall
thereat open my coat thus and tell you to fire, for I
should deserve it then, as 1 now deserve it for what I
have already done. I am a thoroughly reconstructed
rebel."

Mr. Curtin was then then United States Minister at
St. Petersburg. His family were spending the winter in
Dresden, and he came dowu und remained there several weeks.
Just beforo be left he gave a dinner to the
members of tho club. At this dinner "Father" Thomas
was seated on ex-Governor Curtin's right hand. Mr.
Curtin's speech was delivered in one of bis humorous
veins, and, in paying a high compliment to Thomas, he
proposed the toast of "Our reunited country," and
called upon Thomas to reply. Thomas rose, cried like
a baby, finally commanded himself, spoke like a man
and won the hearts of all present.

The above incidents do not show him to be the devil
which tbe originator of this dynamite plot most
assuredly was. It is hard to believe that be sank so low
in six years. Yet, from the descriptions given in the
HERALD, "Father Thomas" resembles him strongly in
everything but character.

----end


he New York Herald, December 19, 1875, Page 5, Column 5

The Dynamite Demon

[...]

Yesterday morning a Herald reporter met an old associate
of the dead Captain, and in the conversation
that ensued obtained the following facts:--"His real
name was William King Thompson; he was a man
about forty-five years old and wore a full red beard; his
eyes were very small and quite blue; his temperament
was of the nervous sort, and at times his anger was
terrible in its expression. He wore glasses over his
eyes whenever I saw him, and I think he wore them
habitually, because he was so nearsighted. 1 should
think, from what I remember of his size, that he
weighed fully 27S pounds, I was intimately acquainted
with him during his residence in Leipzic in the fall of
1871 and until the summer of 1873, when he lived
there with his family. After that be moved to Strehla,
near Dresden, and I lost track of him. In conversation
he often told me of his friends In America, and
said that he was born in Brooklyn, L. I. I know very
well of his marriage. He wedded a beautiful woman
from Louisiana, I think, a native of. New Orleans. She
is living yet, and has four children to care for. I hope
that the sins of tho father will not fall upon their heads
for they are innocent. The Captain resided in Virginia
from 1862 until 1865, and his rapid accumulation of
wealth by blockade speculations was very familiar to
me."


[...]


----end

[Mayerling]

I recommend that book "The Dynamite Fiend" about Alexander Keith (who is also to be found in Wikipedia.

Keith did make a large amount in financing and setting up blockade runners, but he was always looking out for the main chance. He really had no sense of loyalty to the Confederacy, and after the war he swindled an acquaintance who was a Confederate veteran. He may have practiced an early form of his "infernal machine" barratry in 1864 on a ship that was supposed to take a valuable cargo of costumes and belongings of a stage star to Halifax, and then be sent to Boston to be collected. The ship that was carrying this was sunk under murky circumstances. The cargo belonged to (of all people) John Wilkes Booth.

Hawthorne's account of the possible connection between Keith/ "Thompson" and the ship "City of Boston" is wrong. First of all, the steamship "City of Boston" was lost on a voyage in 1870 without any survivors. It was one of the great sea mysteries of that period, and Hawthorne mistakenly says it made it's voyage safely. At the time of the disaster nothing was certain if it sank in a bad storm, or hit an iceberg, or what. After the incident at Bremenhaven, it was recalled that Keith had possibly sent some cargo on it to Halifax (the city where Keith actually did come from). This was carefully reinvestigated by the New York City police, but it turned out that the lost cargo sent by a "Mr. Thompson" was sent by a real Mr. Thompson to Halifax, and was a cargo of furs. So whatever happened to the "City of Boston" in 1870 had nothing to do with the activities of Alexander Keith.

Jeff

[TradeName]

Russell Sage Bombing

The New York World stole a march on Inspector Byrnes when it tracked down the identity of a Boston man who set off a bomb in the office of railroad magnate Russell Sage.

Everybody's Magazine, Volume 4, May, 1901, Pages 473-475

Adventures in News-Getting

The Mystery of Russell Sage's Assailant

About two o'clock one wintry afternoon in December, 18—-, when Wall Street babel echoed loudest, Russell Sage, the eccentric multi-millionaire, was much astonished, on looking up from his desk, to find himself confronted by a stranger who had entered his private office unannounced. The man was thin and nervous, but withal so commanding in attitude that the door-keeper had credited his statement of having an especial appointment at that hour.

Striding toward the desk, his eyes glittering with a strange wildness and one hand held back with aggressive uncertainty, the intruder demanded $1,500,000 in cash. The alternative, he assured Mr. Sage, was immediate death. The amazed banker knew that he had to deal with a desperate man; he felt that the quiver of an eyelash might for him beckon eternity, but still he hesitated. The sum was large. Let him consider.

Rising from his chair, he stood uncertain what to do, while a messenger-boy whistled in the hallway, and a few errant puffs—-advance-guard of a gale at sea—-rattled the windows, and the boisterous shout of curbstone brokers reached his ear as from a distant shore. His face must have betrayed his intention, for the madman suddenly drew out an ominous-looking parcel, flourished it about his head, and hurled it to the floor.

In the ghastly explosion that followed Mr. Sage, it may be remembered, suffered no injury, while a third person present, the unfortunate Laidlaw, was painfully hurt. As for the would-be murderer, he was so completely annihilated that nothing remained by which he might be identified.

From a newspaper man's view-point this attempt on Russell Sage's life was the most important event of a year. It was a dire tragedy, it concerned the rich, and mystery swathed it in heavy folds. Who was the man, and what were his motives? Was he, as Mr. Byrnes, then Chief of Police, asserted, one of a band of anarchists who had plotted to kill all the millionaires in New York, or simply some crazed soul with a "mission"?

Mr. Byrnes chose to adopt the former theory, and with the assistance of three hundred detectives he gathered in a houseful of suspicious characters. The finding of a man who declared that he had been asked to ally himself with such a plot lent color to this impression, and added to the consternation that already had its abode among wealthy folk. The mystery, however, declined to be resolved along these lines, and seven days elapsed only to find the police still groping for a clew.

At this crisis the city editor of one of the largest New York dailies [Wolrd], perceiving public interest to be more fervid than ever, called up a dozen of his cleverest reporters and assigned them to this one story. "Boys," he said, "we've got to find out who that man was. The boss says it must be run down, and you know what that means. It's an ugly story, that's sure, for the police have nothing to give you; but get out and hustle, and see if you can't make Byrnes look cheap." He then put one man in charge, outlined a scheme of procedure, and the reporters stepped out on their difficult assignment.

Among the number was a young man named Isaac D. White, who particularly wished to succeed in this assignment, because he had already earned some reputation for analytic ability and close observation. White appreciated, what every reporter soon learns, that a good mystery-story takes precedence over any other in a newspaper, because increased sales are invariably registered in the business office while the perpetrator of a celebrated tragedy is still unknown. It is the sort of thing that appeals to the public, and the paper merely reflects the universal craving for enlightenment.

Such a story, too, is the most difficult to cover, because persons to whom any revelation may be undesirable are certain to place obstacles in the way of investigation; and the only aid that a newspaper man might expect—-that of the police—-is oftentimes withheld from motives of jealousy or indifference. The reporter, therefore, must depend largely on his own resources, and the one who succeeds is reckoned valuable to any paper. His reward for merit by an outsider would be considered ridiculously inadequate, consisting, as it does usually, in a gruff acknowledgment from the city editor that he wrote "a good story." But that to a reporter is worth any trouble, even worth risking his life if necessary.

White first visited the wrecked apartment, which he found a mass of debris, with one end entirely blown away. No vestige of a clew appeared until, after one hour's tireless scrutiny, the reporter discovered two links of the dead man's watch-chain embedded in the wall. Nothing else was to be had, and tucking the links in his pocket he went uptown to the morgue and deposited them with the other remnants. These were limited to the unknown's head, a piece of his black diagonal coat, portions of underclothing, and a charred button, about which were collected some reporters and detectives, arguing on the impossibility of identification with such meagre material.

On looking over the articles a second time, White discerned something on the back of the button that urged him to make a more rigid examination. His heart beat wildly when the scraping with a knife revealed the name of a Boston clothier, a clew that had escaped every other eye. Fearful lest he attract attention, he did not trust to jotting the name down, but, with the words seared on his memory, replaced the button and made some irrelevant remarks to sidetrack suspicion. Once out of the building he sped away, sick with excitement.

Now had this reporter been a novice he might, on arriving at the office, have cast himself upon the city editor's neck from pure joy. But the seasoned man makes no such mistake. While working for a newspaper one should contain himself in the most dramatic circumstances. White only had to mention his clew to acquaint the city editor with its significance, but he also, being trained in the same school, made no demonstration. What he did was to take out his watch, glance quickly at a timetable, and turn in his chair to remark shortly:

"Next train leaves for Boston in forty minutes. Go and get that cloth and the button without fail, take 'em along with you, and—have your copy in early!"

Upon that he turned away wearily, vexed, to all appearances, at being disturbed. In reality his mind dilated with hope; he could think of nothing else. And the reporter! He reeled with the breath of life; but he knew his business.

In Boston White pounced on a directory, found his clothing-store on Milk Street, and was assured there by the manager that the button had been attached to one of their suits. A clerk soon dragged from the top shelf a roll of cloth whose texture corresponded with that of the fragment, and the cutter now came forward to identify the workmanship. "The shoulder," said he, "is the most difficult part to fit, and the arrangement of the seams complicated. Every cutter has his own particular style, and that's a sample of mine." White now felt so certain of success that when the name of Henry L. Norcross, a note broker on an adjacent street, appeared on the books as purchaser of the only suit made from that roll, he telegraphed to his paper:

"I have the man. Preserve me three columns."

And he was right. In a few hours he had found the dead man's family and positively identified him, after a heart-rending scene with his mother, who then learned her son's fate for the first time.

Next morning Simla and Buenos Ayres knew that Henry L. Norcross, a man born of humble parents, discontented with his station in life, and rendered desperate by reading books on socialism, was he who had attempted the murder of Russell Sage. But only two persons knew that a New York reporter with the aid of a single button had saved Norcross from a nameless grave, and solved a mystery for the whole world.

On the following day White was busy reporting an elopement.

[...]


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An account of Sage being asked to identify the remains of the bomber.

The New Broadway Magazine, Volume 20, May, 1908, Pages 133-140

Sherlock Holmes in Mulberry Street

by Alfred Henry Lewis

Page 139

[...]

Books could be written, books full of thrill and interest, of the dramatic, not to say dread, doings of detectives when they aim to startle some stubborn one into loquacity. Norcross sought to blow up Russell Sage, and blew himself up. There was something more in Mulberry Street than just a police theory that Norcross was not quite the stranger to Mr. Sage that Mr. Sage pretended. It was deemed advisable to make Mr. Sage “talk.”

To that end, a high police official—-I shall not name him—-carrying a huge basket on his arm, called upon Mr. Sage. That finacier was in bed, nerves a-tangle; for it is no laughing matter, nor conducive to steadiness, to have an assassin explode a bomb at your horrified feet.

The visiting officer stood at the foot of the bed, putting questions to Mr. Sage, who feebly bleated his replies. Suddenly, without warning, the officer reached into the basket, which Mr. Sage had as yet not beheld.

“Did you ever see this man before the day he tried to kill you?” demanded the officer; and, with the word, he held aloft the gory head of Norcross.

The test was a failure. Mr. Sage did not “talk"; his sole response was a screech, and next he fainted away.

[...]

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A summary of the lawsuit brought against Sage by a clerk, Laidlaw, who claimed that Sage had deliberately placed Laidlaw between Sage and the bomb just before the explosion.

The Art of Cross-Examination (New York: MacMillan, 1903), Pages 269-283
By Francis Lewis Wellman

The Cross-Examination of Russell Sage by Mr. Joseph H. Choate in the Laidlaw-Sage Case

One of the most recent cross-examinations to be made the subject of appeal to the Supreme Court General Term and the New York Court of Appeals was the cross-examination of Russell Sage by Mr. Joseph H. Choate, in the famous suit brought against the former by William R. Laidlaw. Sage was defended by the late Edwin C. James, and Mr. Choate appeared for the plaintiff, Mr. Laidlaw.

On the fourth day of December, 1891, a stranger by the name of Norcross came to Russell Sage's New York office and sent a message to him that he wanted to see him on important business, and that he had a letter of introduction from Mr. John Rockefeller. Mr. Sage left his private office, and going up to Norcross, was handed an open letter which read, "This carpet-bag I hold in my hand contains ten pounds of dynamite, and if I drop this bag on the floor it will destroy this building in ruins and kill every human being in it. I demand twelve hundred thousand dollars, or I will drop it. Will you give it? Yes or no?"

Mr. Sage read the letter, handed it back to Norcross, and suggested that he had a gentleman waiting for him in his private office, and could be through his business in a couple of minutes when he would give the matter his attention.

Norcross responded: "Then you decline my proposition? Will you give it to me? Yes or no?" Sage explained again why he would have to postpone giving it to him for two or three minutes to get rid of some one in his private office, and just at this juncture Mr. Laidlaw entered the office, saw Norcross and Sage without hearing the conversation, and waited in the anteroom until Sage should be disengaged. As he waited, Sage edged toward him and partly seating himself upon the table near Mr. Laidlaw, and without addressing him, took him by the left hand as if to shake hands with him, but with both his own hands, and drew Mr. Laidlaw almost imperceptibly around between him and Norcross. As he did so, he said to Norcross, "If you cannot trust me, how can you expect me to trust you?"

With that there was a terrible explosion. Norcross himself was blown to pieces and instantly killed. Mr. Laidlaw found himself on the floor on top of Russell Sage. He was seriously injured, and later brought suit against Mr. Sage for damages upon the ground that he had purposely made a shield of his body from the expected explosion. Mr. Sage denied that he had made a shield of Laidlaw or that he had taken him by the hand or altered his own position so as to bring Laidlaw between him and the explosion.

The case was tried four times. It was dismissed by Mr. Justice Andrews, and upon appeal the judgment was reversed. On the second trial before Mr. Justice Patterson the jury rendered a verdict of $25,000 in favor of Mr. Laidlaw. On appeal this judgment in turn was reversed. On a third trial, also before Mr. Justice Patterson, the jury disagreed; and on the fourth trial before Mr. Justice Ingraham the jury rendered a verdict in favor of Mr. Laidlaw of $40,000, which judgment was sustained by the General Term of the Supreme Court, but subsequently reversed by the Court of Appeals.

Exception on this appeal was taken especially to the method used in the cross-examination of Mr. Sage by Mr. Choate. Thus the cross-examination is interesting, as an instance of what the New York Court of Appeals has decided to be an abuse of cross-examination into which, through their zeal, even eminent counsel are sometimes led, and to which I have referred in a previous chapter. It also shows to what lengths Mr. Choate was permitted to go upon the pretext of testing the witness's memory.

It was claimed by Mr. Sage's counsel upon the appeal that "the right of cross-examination was abused in this case to such an extent as to require the reversal of this monstrous judgment, which is plainly the precipitation and product of that abuse." And the Court of Appeals unanimously took this view of the matter.

[...]

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Links to some of the World's coverage.

The Evening World (New York), December 04, 1891, EXTRA, Page 1

Explosion

Boiler Bursts at No. 71 Broad.


The Evening World (New York), December 05, 1891, EXTRA 2 O'CLOCK, Page 1

Who Was He?

A Possible Clue to the Bomb Thrower


The Evening World (New York), December 08, 1891, EXTRA 2 O'CLOCK, Page 1

Byrnes's Man Sane

Physicians Say Prisoner Southworth is no Lunatic


The Evening World (New York), December 09, 1891, SPORTING EXTRA, Page 3

As a Human Shield?

Clerk Laidlaw Claims Sage Used Him for That Purpose

[Word of the World's investigation seems to have leaked before the World could run the story. Did the reporter pose as "one of Byrnes' men?"]

The Evening World (New York), December 11, 1891, SPORTING EXTRA, Page 1

Is He the Man?

Missing Note-Broker Norcross May have Been Sage's Dynamiter

[The story about the World's Boston investigation.]

The Evening World (New York), December 12, 1891, EXTRA 2 O'CLOCK, Page 1

Norcross's Head


The Evening World (New York), March 11, 1892, BROOKLYN SPORTING EXTRA, Page 1

Sage on the Stand

The Millionaire a Witness at the Inquest on Norcross


The Evening World (New York), March 12, 1892, LAST EDITION, Page 1, Column 7

Sage Wants the Evidence

He Asks for a Copy of laidlaw's Norcross Testimony

Did Dr. Mary walker Know of the Dynamiter's Plans?