Lawrence Poyneer
Lawrence Poyneer.
The giant switchman who attempted to hurl Furlong fromthe deck of an ocean steamer.
After we had left Astoria and were out several miles on the Pacific, we were taking a walk for exercise on theupper deck, and when we were nearing the stern end of the vessel, and there were no other passengers, or even any sailors, Poyneer suddenly seized me by the neck and body and attempted to throw me over the rail into the sea. I grabbed him tightly around his neck and under one of his arms so tightly that he could not shake me off. I lustily called for help and one of the cabin boys heard me, gave the alarm, and the captain and officer on the lookout in front of the vessel came rushing to my assistance. Whenhe heard them coming, he let go and tried, in vain, to make it appear that he had been joking. I explained the situation to the captain, who promptly placed Poyneer in irons and placed him below in what is called the brig in a ship, where he remained until we arrived in San Francisco. There I had him taken to the city jail, where I kept him for two or three days until I had gotten thoroughly rested. I borrowed a set of irons from Chief of Police Crowley, placed these irons on Poyneer, and took him on board a Southern Pacific Railroad train, and in due time lodged him safely in the Old Parish Prison in New Orleans.
He was tried, convicted and sentenced to four years in prison in Baton Rouge, where he served his term out. After this I lost track of him until about ten years ago, just before the Olive Street Cable was changed to an Electric Street Car Line, in St. Louis. I boarded a grip car on Olive Street one morning, and to my surprise, I recognized Lawrence Poyneer, acting as gripman on the car I had boarded. Poyneer recognized me on sight, but he did not speak and seemed to be very much confused. I left the car near the turning point. Later I was informed that "Jones" had left his grip car at the foot of Olive Street that morning. "Jones" was the name that Poyneer had given when he had secured the position from the company as gripman about three weeks prior to my having recognized him. He left St. Louis and has not been heard from since, to my knowledge.
ARREST OF LOUIS RICE AND TOM LANDS AFTER A LONG CHASE—THE FORGERS ACQUIRED ALMOST A FORTUNE.
During the early '80s the officials of the passenger department of several Western trunk lines made thediscovery that they had been defrauded out of thousands of dollars by the means of forged railroad tickets. These tickets had been distributed or put on the market by ticket scalpers, who then thrived in all the large cities.
These tickets were gotten up on what appeared to be regular paper and in regular form, with the exception of the serial and form numbers, which were necessarily duplicated. The tickets read from Boston, New York, Chicago, Philadelphia and other prominent points on the east to the principal points on the Pacific Coast in the west. The forms were pronounced perfect and the signature of the various railroad officials were imitated admirably on them.
The discovery of the forgeries were first made by one of the assistants of C. G. Warner, general auditor of the Missouri Pacific Railroad at St. Louis. The assistant auditor discovered the forgeries, he having noticed the numbers on the tickets were irregular.
At this time I was Chief Special Agent for the Missouri Pacific, and the case was placed in my hands for investigation, by General Auditor Warner.
After a lot of tedious work, the details of which would not interest the reader, I, with the help of some of my assistants, learned that Rice and Lands were railroad ticket scalpers and had offices in several cities in the middle west, from which they had supplied other scalpers with large quantities of these forged tickets. I also learned that Rice and Lands had established a private printing office in a small town in western Illinois, in which the counterfeit tickets were printed; the forms of which had been arranged by Rice, who had been a chief clerk for a number of years for a General Passenger and Ticket Agent of one of the large railroad systems of the West, and was, therefore,thoroughly conversant with the details of all of the ticket business.
Lands was a crooked lawyer, who had married into an eminently respectable family of the State of Indiana. Rice was a single man, but was engaged to a young lady, whose family was of considerable prominence. He was also of a good family and had always borne an excellent reputation, and was considered a bright, affable young business man.
After learning all of these facts and reporting them to the proper officials of the Missouri Pacific System, I was instructed to locate and arrest Rice and Lands, charging them with having made and issued the counterfeit railroad tickets. I had but little trouble in locating Lands, but, as I considered Rice the principal, knowing that he was the man who had gotten up the forms of the counterfeit tickets, I decided to quietly place Lands under surveillance, by one of my operatives, and then took up the search for Rice, as I desired to arrest him first, being very sure that I could apprehend Lands any time that I wanted to do so.
I traced Rice from Kansas City to Denver, Salt Lake City, San Francisco to Portland, Oregon, but lost trace of him there, and after consuming several days with no results, I decided to return to St. Louis, and to visit the town in Iowa where Rice's betrothed resided with her parents, which I did.
After spending several days near the home of this young lady, I was finally rewarded by learning the alias that Rice had assumed, and his whereabouts at that time, and I immediately, as the traveling men say, "doubled back" to the Pacific Coast, boarding a steamship at San Francisco for Victoria, B. C., and from there went overland to a camp in the Kassiar Mountains, British Columbia, which is about 357 miles from Victoria.
On arriving there I learned that Rice had left but a few days before my arrival, and that he had undoubtedly passed me on my way to Kassiar. He had left word with friends there that he was going back to Portland, Oregon. He had been prospecting in the mountains for gold and had been unsuccessful, and had exhausted his funds, so he had concluded to go back to Portland and seek employment there.
I, therefore, returned to Victoria and boarded a vessel for Seattle and from there I went to Portland, where I succeeded in locating Rice. He was working as a day laborer in a bed-spring factory. He was clad in a suit of greasy overalls, when I found him, needed a haircut and a shave, and did not in any way resemble the dapper and stylishly dressed Louis Rice, whose photograph I had in my possession.
I brought Rice back to St. Louis, and while en route he made a full confession to me as to his and Lands' connection with the counterfeit tickets. He told me about the printing office and gave me the names of various scalpers throughout the country who were engaged with them in handling the bogus tickets.
On arriving in St. Louis I secured a lodging house for Rice in the suburbs of the city, placed him there, by his consent, in charge of one of my operatives. I did this so that the scalpers who were in collusion with the fraudulent scheme would not become aware of his capture until I would have time to arrange for indictments and arrest all the parties connected with the fraud. I also wanted to arrest and bring Lands to St. Louis before he had learned his partner was in custody, and proceeded to Indiana and took him in charge. His relatives, who were well-known and influential, immediately applied for a writ of habeas corpus, which prevented me from removing Lands from the stateuntil permitted to do so by due process of law.
The judge before whom this writ of habeas corpus was returnable was a lifelong personal friend of the family of Lands' wife, and the judge, therefore, released Lands from custody on the grounds that forged railroad tickets had no intrinsic value.
This was the first and only prisoner that I have ever had released by such a procedure. However, Lands was sick at the time of his arrest, and lingered along for a few months after his release, and died, which was the ending of his part of the crime.
In due time Rice's trial was called in St. Louis, and the judge before whom the case was tried decided the same in this case as had the judge in Indiana on the Lands case; and, therefore, the ticket forgers went unpunished.
The state laws in nearly every state in the Union have since been revised so as to make the forgery of railroad tickets a felony, with the same penalty attached as that of forging any other document or valuable paper.
The farcical termination of the case also caused the passage of laws which have put the ticket scalpers out of business in almost the entire country. Prior to that time, every city of any size was infested with numerous ticket scalping offices. The men engaged in the business were usually of the unscrupulous kind, and their crookedness caused the railroads no little amount of trouble.
In working up this case and apprehending Lands and Rice, I personally traveled, in all, about eighteen thousand four hundred miles, and consumed nearly six months' time, did a lot of hard work and incurred considerable expense.
I will say here that the attorneys of the legal department for the Missouri Pacific Railroad Company werefully advised as to all the facts connected with this case and they advised that the parties be located and apprehended: and the work involved in the location and arrest of Rice and Lands was as good as any work ever done by any one in a similar case. Under the laws then existing the cases of Rice and Lands could not be reached.
After Rice's final release he went to the state of Iowa, where he engaged in the insurance business. He was successful and finally married the young lady he was engaged to, and when last heard of by the writer, was a prosperous general insurance agent, raising a nice family and respected in the community in which he lived.
HOW THE CLUES, WHICH LEAD TO THE ARREST OF THE YOUNGMAN FOR HIS FATHER'S MURDER, WERE OBTAINED—KANSAS' MOST SENSATIONAL MURDER CASE.
No crime committed in the West in recent years was surrounded with more mystery than was the murder of J. S. Collins, which occurred in Topeka, Kansas, in the spring of 1898. Mr. Collins was slain while asleep beside his wife in their home. The weapon used was a shotgun, and one or two of the shot struck the shoulder of the wife, making slight, though painful wounds.
The murdered man had been a prominent insurance and real estate man of the Kansas capitol, where he had lived for many years, and was well and favorably known to the citizens of that city, as well as throughout the entire state; in fact, he was considered one of the state's most prominent citizens. At the time of his murder he was about fifty-five years of age, had a wife, one daughter and a son, John.
The Collins' occupied a comfortable home in Topeka. John, the only son, was a student at the State University at Lawrence, Kansas, where he was being prepared for the ministry. He had been a student at Lawrence for two or three years before his father's murder. He boarded at the school and occasionally visited his home in Topeka, usually on Sundays and holidays. The Collins home, which was one of the best on one of the capitol's most prominent residential thoroughfares, was disturbed early one morning by the discharge of a gun in the sleeping room occupied by Mr. Collins and his wife, which was situated on the ground floor. Mr. Collins had been shot and died instantly, and his wife, as stated above, received one or two grains of coarse shot in her shoulder. Other occupants of the house that morning were Miss Collins, a young lady about eighteen years of age, and John Collins, Jr. Both of them occupied rooms on the second floor of the house. There was also a servant girl in the house. It was in the early part of the summer and the windows were all screened with wire. John, apparently aroused by the shot which killed his father, dressed himself hastily and aroused the nearest neighbors. It was at an early hour in the morning, but after daylight.
The police were sent for, and on their arrival ascertained that the doors of the house were all intact and carefully locked; but a window screen in the rear of the house on the second floor was found to have been cut, leaving a hole large enough for the passage of a human body. This window was immediately above a one-story addition to the main building in the rear. After the police authorities had finished their investigation of the premises they arrived at the conclusion that the murderer must have entered the house by means of a key, and after having shotMr. Collins escaped, going up the main stairs from the lower hall to the second floor and then gone to the hall at the end of which they found the window before described, had cut the wire screen and jumped out of the window onto the roof of the one-story addition, and then to the ground, a distance of about ten or twelve feet, and in that way made his escape.
The murder created a great sensation by reason of Mr. Collins' high standing in the community. A number of the more influential citizens of Topeka who were friends of his, formed a committee for the purpose of locating the murderer and causing him, or them, to be brought to justice. These gentlemen wired me at St. Louis, asking me to come to Topeka to investigate the case. I went to Topeka at once, arriving there, if I remember aright, the third day after the murder had been committed. I reported to the gentleman who was chairman of the committee, and at once began my investigation, by examining the premises at which the murder had been committed. I interviewed the widow, who, by the way, was Mr. Collins' second wife, her step-daughter and step-son, John Collins. Mrs. Collins was a woman between thirty-six and forty years of age, of the brunette type, rather above the medium height and inclined to be slender. She was very attractive and considered a good-looking woman, intelligent and refined.
Miss Collins was also above the medium height, nice-looking, well educated and intelligent.
John Collins had just passed his twenty-first birthday, was about five feet, eight or nine inches tall, light brown hair, fair complexioned, well built, pleasing in manner and a very fine looking young man.
After I had consumed about four days in my investigation, I became satisfied in my own mind that the murder had been committed by some person who belonged in the house, and that the house had not been entered by an outsider. I had discovered that Mr. Collins had been killed with his own shotgun, a high priced firearm, which he always kept in a leather case, and usually placed on the upper shelf of a clothes closet in his bedroom. This closet was unusually large and extended from the floor to the ceiling. The ceiling being very high, an ordinary sized man could not reach the shelf where the gun was kept without the aid of a step-ladder, or possibly it could have been reached by a tall person while standing on a high table.
Mr. Collins had not used his gun for months before the murder, and it had always been his custom after using the weapon to clean it thoroughly, take it apart and pack it in the case. It was, therefore, necessary for the murderer to take this gun case from the shelf, put it together and load it with the ammunition, which was also kept on the high shelf. All of this could not have been accomplished by any outside person without having been discovered by some one of the inmates of the house.
I also learned that John Collins had left his lodgings at Lawrence on the evening preceding the murder, going to Topeka and directly to his home, where, he claimed, he retired for the night at an early hour. He also claimed that he remained there until aroused by the shot that killed his father. I also learned that the young man had formed the acquaintance of a very estimable and wealthy young lady at Lawrence, with whom he had become infatuated. He had paid much attention to her for months, and finally she had informed him that her mother haddecided to purchase or lease a cottage at Long Branch, in which to spend the summer months. I surmised that when he learned that she intended to accompany her mother to Long Branch for the summer, young Collins decided that his sweetheart was liable to meet some of the many fortune hunters who frequent the resort during the summer months, thus endangering his chances of winning her, so he had made up his mind that he would arrange, if possible, to spend the season at Long Branch too, so that hemight guard the affections of his good-looking, or I might truthfully say, beautiful young lady friend.
J. S. Manning
J. S. Manning.
Superintendent of the St. Louis Office of the Furlong Secret ServiceCompany who did some clever work on the Collins case.
The elder Mr. Collins had been considered to be more wealthy than he really was at the time of his death. He had met with financial reverses, and really had but little more than his home in Topeka when he was murdered, but he was carrying thirty thousand dollars insurance on his life, ten thousand to his wife and ten thousand to each of his children.
Having secured the above information I sent one of my operatives, J. S. Manning, to Lawrence, Kansas, with instructions to quietly ascertain all that he could as to the habits of the young man Collins and his associates. Mr. Manning's investigation there developed that young Collins had been spending considerable money in buying flowers, carriage hire and entertainments. He had no means of defraying these expenses other than twenty-five dollars a month allowed him by his father for that purpose. Mr. Manning also learned that there were a couple of colored hack drivers in Lawrence, who had been patronized by the younger Collins. Upon receipt of this information from Mr. Manning, I sent D. F. Harbaugh, who was then in my employ, to Lawrence. Mr. Harbaugh had lived in Lawrence, Kansas, for a number of years before he entered my service. He had been in the livery business there, and had been a hack driver. He was personally acquainted with the colored drivers before mentioned, but these men did not know that he was in the secret service work. For this reason Mr. Harbaugh found it easy to find out everything that the hack drivers knew about John Collins. After renewing their acquaintance Harbaugh learned from them that Collins had approached them and entered into a verbal contract to kill his father for acertain sum of money, part of which he had paid at the time the agreement was made, he agreeing to pay the balance after the murder had been committed.
They told Harbaugh that they had no intention of attempting to murder Mr. Collins, but had promised John they would do so to work him for what money they could get out of him, knowing, as they did, that he dare not expose them when they failed to carry out their agreement. The murder was to have been committed on or before a certain date. The date passed and Mr. Collins still lived, whereupon, John became anxious and expostulated with the colored drivers. They told him that they were entitled to more money than what he had agreed to pay them, and he gave them an additional one hundred dollars, as well as a gold watch his father had presented to him on his twenty-first birthday. This money young Collins had secured by borrowing from his friends and through drafts he had drawn on his father, as we afterwards learned. There was then another date set for the murder to be committed by the hack drivers. When that day arrived and passed young Collins again remonstrated with the drivers for not having carried out their agreement, and they coolly informed him that they had concluded that if his father had to be killed that he had better do the killing himself, that they positively would not commit the crime, and that they had never intended to do so. Learning this, young Collins became desperate and left Lawrence and went to Topeka, as before stated, and without doubt killed his father with his own gun.
When this evidence was obtained I reported it to the gentlemen who had employed me, and they then decided to hand my report over to the prosecuting attorney at Lawrence. At the request of the prosecuting attorney thecounty commissioners at Topeka employed me to complete the evidence, so that Collins might be arrested and prosecuted for the murder of his father.
John Collins was immediately arrested, placed in jail without bond, and in due time the case came to trial. The trial caused a great deal of interest in the community, by reason of the fact that the elder Mr. Collins was so well known, and the killing had been done in such a mysterious manner. The trial attracted great attention throughout the entire country. All of the leading western papers had special reporters present, and all the sensational features were "played up" (as newspaper men call it) as they developed. The court room was crowded, and many noted lawyers were also in attendance to watch the legal battle, which at times waxed very warm, as all the counsel on both sides were very able men. Prosecuting Attorney Jetmore was at his best, making one of the greatest fights I ever saw to get his evidence before the jury. Among the spectators during almost the entire trial was the late Justice Brewer, of the United States Supreme Court at Washington, who was visiting his daughter, who was the wife of the prosecuting attorney, Mr. Jetmore, in Topeka at the time the trial was on. At the close of the case Mr. Justice Brewer complimented me very highly for my work in solving the mystery.
During the trial a great many people got the idea that I had been employed by the insurance companies, believing that the companies were trying to avoid payment of the thirty thousand dollars insurance, by proving that the son had killed his father. This opinion was erroneous. The people who employed me in this case were citizens of Topeka and lodge friends of the murdered man, and were in no way connected with the insurance companies interestedin the case, and were merely acting as good and law abiding citizens, and just as soon as I had satisfied them that John Collins was the murderer, they immediately turned the evidence, as far as had been obtained, over to the proper state authorities.
The trial lasted more than a week. Collins was defended by two of the most prominent attorneys at that bar. They labored earnestly and to the best of their ability to clear him, but he was found guilty of murder and sent to the state prison to await the governor's action in fixing the date of his execution; but, in as much as it has always been the custom in Kansas for the governor to never fix the date for execution of a person found guilty of murder, the prisoners are usually kept in the prison, and a sentence of death in Kansas usually means a life term in the penitentiary.
There has been an effort made by friends of young Collins and the family to obtain a pardon for him, but up to this writing I understand it has been unavailing.
I will say here that the colored hack drivers, before mentioned, from Lawrence, took the witness stand for the state against John Collins, and produced the watch that he had given them, which had been presented to him by the elder Mr. Collins upon the anniversary of John's 21st birthday. This watch, with the testimony of the colored hack drivers, in which they detailed the contract they had made with the younger Collins, all of which was corroborated by circumstances that were not, or could not be, contradicted, led to the conviction of the son for the murder of his father.
A TRUSTED EMPLOYEE OF A JEWELRY FIRM ROBS HIS BENEFAC-TOR—QUICK CAPTURE OF THE THIEF ANDRECOVERY OF THE LOOT.
The arrest of Fred Erfert, who had been a trusted clerk in the jewelry house of John Bolland & Company, of St. Louis, occurred in the latter part of 1892.
Erfert had been employed by the company since his boyhood. At the time of his arrest he was about twenty-two or three years of age, and had become a trusted employe, and carried the keys of the establishment. He was the first man to open the store in the morning, and the last man out at night, closing and locking the store himself.
The firm was rated among the first establishments of the kind in the city, and was doing a large business. A large quantity of valuable goods were mysteriously disappearing and could not be accounted for, and finally the manager, Mr. Clarence White, called at my office one afternoon, and stated the facts in the case as he knew them. He stated, further, that Mr. Bolland had requested him to come and see me and tell me of the state of affairs, and ask me to take the matter under advisement, and that Mr. Bolland would call on me the following day for a conference, which he did.
Mr. Bolland stated to me that they had been missing goods from time to time for the past two years or more and that these losses had grown to alarming proportions. In an effort to clear up the mystery he had secured the services of another local private detective agency, at a considerable expense, but who apparently had not been able to fasten the numerous thefts on any person. He further stated that the losses seemed to be increasing, and that hewould like to have me make an investigation and apprehend the guilty party, or parties, if possible. He said that in view of the amount of money he had already spent in attempting to locate the thief he did not feel as though he was justified in spending much more money, but he wanted me to make an investigation and see what I could do. He stated that he had also consulted the Police Department of the city, but they had failed to apprehend the thief. Mr. Bolland instructed me to proceed at once, saying that he did not believe that they had any one in their employ who was dishonest or disloyal, to which I answered, "It is evident to me, Mr. Bolland, that you believe all of your employes to be honest and faithful, or you, of course, would not have them in your employ." Mr. Bolland replied, "You need not spend any time in looking after Clarence White, Fred Erfert or (laughingly) myself, but you may use your own judgment as to the other employes, although I want you to understand that I have the utmost confidence in all of them."
A short time before this interview took place, the Bolland company had purchased a large stock of jewelry at Sixth and Locust Streets, at a bankrupt sale. On purchasing this stock the Bolland Company sorted out the most desirable parts, which they removed to their own store, and then culled out from the stock in the main store, stuff that was growing stale, and placed it with the bankrupt stock. They then started to auction off the surplus stock. They placed Erfert in charge of this auction store, with a number of clerks and a professional auctioneer. This auction was running full blast at the time of my interview with Mr. Bolland.
Mr. Bolland stated to me that goods were also being missed from the auction store, as well as from theirregular store. So the following day I instructed one of my operatives to carefully observe all that he could about the auction store, from the time the store opened in the morning until it was closed at night, which the operative did. After he had spent the first day at the auction store the operative reported to me that he had noticed a number of what appeared to him to be irregularities, especially on the part of Erfert, the manager of the place. He reported that on the evening of his first day on the job he had seen Erfert and the other clerks leave the store. Erfert, being the last man out, locked the door, put the key in his pocket, and the whole party walked to the corner of 6th and Olive Streets, where they separated, taking different cars presumably for their homes. He said that Erfert, however, did not take a car, but walked west a block on Olive Street to 7th Street, then north on 7th Street to Locust Street, and east on Locust Street to the side entrance of the auction store, where he unlocked the door, entered the store and immediately returned to the sidewalk carrying a couple of large and heavy packages, which were fastened with shawl-straps. He then went back by the same route to 6th and Locust, where he boarded a car and carried these two heavy packages, one in each hand, to his home in South St. Louis, where he resided with his widowed mother and his sister. He entered the dwelling with these packages.
On learning this, I told the operative to carry out my instructions on the previous day, telling him that in case Erfert doubled back on that evening after closing the store, and repeated the actions of the previous evening, that after he had emerged from the store the second time, as he had the night before, the operative should then approach him and say to him that I was in my office in theChemical Building and wanted to see him at once, and to bring him up without delay. I remained in the office that evening, so as to be on hand in case Erfert repeated his actions of the previous evening, and that is what he did.
It was in the winter time and dark about 5:30 p. m., when Erfert closed and locked the store and left the other employes, apparently starting for home. He accompanied the others, as he had the night before, to 6th and Olive, then left them, they going home and he making a circuitous route, the same as the night before, and went back to the store, letting himself in, and emerging almost immediately again, carrying two heavy packages, heavier than those he had taken the night previous, and fastened with the shawl-straps. After he had locked the door and had picked up the packages, which seemed very heavy, my operative approached him unobserved, and touched him on the shoulder, saying, "Mr. Furlong is at his office in the Chemical Building and wants you to come over and see him at once."
Erfert replied, "What does he want to see me for?"
The operative said, "I do not know. He will explain that when he sees you."
Erfert replied, "I am in a hurry and haven't time. I'm late anyway, and will call and see him tomorrow."
The operative said, "You can either go with me right now and see Mr. Furlong, or I will call the policeman (pointing to a policeman who happened to be standing diagonally across the street from where they were) and have him take you to police headquarters, and probably Mr. Furlong will go there and see you. Now it is up to you. If I take you to police headquarters your name and picture will appear in the papers in the morning and you will probably get a lot of undesirable notoriety."
"I don't want any notoriety," replied Erfert, "but I can't understand what Mr. Furlong wants to see me for tonight. However, I will go with you, but I will put these packages in the store."
The operative said, "No, take these packages with you. What is in them?"
Erfert replied, "I have two fine clocks that were sent over to my store by mistake and are too expensive to sell at auction, and I intend to take them back to the main store, where they belong."
"Well," said the operative, "you take them up to Mr. Furlong's office, and after you have seen him he will probably allow you to take them to the main store."
The operative brought Erfert to my office, packages and all. I had known Erfert since his boyhood, and on his entering the office I took him into my private office.
Here I will say that on the second day I had put another operative to work on this case, unknown to the first operative, who had been shadowing the first operative and had witnessed everything that had occurred, and had reached the office a few minutes ahead of the first operative and Erfert, so that I was fully aware of all that had occurred.
When we were seated in my private room, I said to Erfert, "Fred, what have you in those two packages?"
He answered, "They are two clocks, which were sent over to the auction store by mistake. They are expensive clocks and I will not sell them at auction, and intended to take them home tonight and return them to the main store in the morning, before I opened the auction store."
"What other stock have you on your person which was sent over to the auction store by mistake?" I asked.
He replied, "I have only a few stick pins, and a few other small articles of jewelry."
I said, "Put them on my desk."
He did so, and the articles that he had concealed in his pockets, according to the prices marked on them, amounted in all to nearly four hundred dollars. There were gold rings, stick pins, and other small pieces of good jewelry. Thinking that possibly he had not emptied his pocket, I inspected them myself. I found a memorandum book, in which he had kept an accurate account of all articles that had been taken from the jewelry company, the cost price of each article to the company, and the price he had received for a large lot of articles that had already been disposed of. This book was written in cipher. I also found a key to a safe deposit vault that he had in some safe deposit company.
I then informed him that thousands of dollars' worth of stuff had been stolen from his employers, that he had been practically raised by them, having been in their service nearly all his life, and that the company had always treated him well and justly; all of which he admitted, and that now, as he had been caught red-handed, I thought that it was his duty, and to his interest, to tell the whole truth as to what he had taken, and do all in his power to return as much of the property as possible.
At this time my office was on the fourteenth floor of the Chemical Building. My private office fronted on Olive Street, and Erfert made a sudden lunge for the window and attempted to jump out. I prevented him from doing this, and after talking to him for a few moments, he admitted that he had been stealing from the company for the past two years. Recently he had been assisted by another of the employes. His grandfather was conducting a jewelry and novelty store in South St. Louis, and nearly all the stock in this store had been stolen by himself and his confederate from the Bolland establishment. He also stated thathe had a quantity of the stolen property concealed in the attic of his mother's house, where he lived, and agreed that he would go with one of my men at once and deliver all the stolen goods that he could to me, and he faithfully kept his word. At the conclusion of his statement, I sent a messenger to Mr. Bolland, telling him that I wished him to come to my office at once, as I had succeeded in capturing the culprit. (It should be remembered that the above all took place on the second day that I was working on the case).
Mr. Bolland arrived at my office about ten o'clock, accompanied by his wife and Clarence White. I met them in the front office.
Mr. Bolland said, "The messenger told me that you had captured the party who has been robbing us."
I said, "Yes, that is why I sent for you."
"Whom have you caught?" he asked.
I replied, "Fred Erfert is the principal party."
Mrs. Bolland and White simultaneously exclaimed, "Why you have surely made a mistake."
Mr. Bolland said, "I told you not to bother with Erfert; that I believed he was all right."
At this juncture White (using a slang phrase) "butted in," and said, "Why, Furlong, you have got your foot in it sure. Erfert surely had nothing to do with these thefts, and you have made a great mistake by even accusing him. He has been practically raised by Mr. Bolland and in his service for many years, and we've always had implicit confidence in his honesty."
I replied, "Yes, I understand all of that; but Mr. Bolland employed me to apprehend the party, or parties, who were robbing him, which I have done. Erfert knows that he is guilty and he has fully admitted his guilt, and I am satisfiedfrom the evidence that I have found on his person that he told the truth when he said he was guilty. I, of course, realize Mr. Bolland's disappointment in finding that Erfert was the guilty person, but I cannot help his feelings. I have simply done my duty in the matter, and now it remains with Mr. Bolland as to what shall be done with Erfert."
"Where is Erfert?" Mr. Bolland asked.
I pointed to my private office and said, "He is there and waiting to see you. He has promised me that he will tell you what he has already told my assistant and myself, and that he would at once return a considerable quantity of the stolen property to you, which I have advised him to do."
I then conducted them to the private room where Erfert reiterated the statement that he had made to me. He admitted everything. Then I, with some of my assistants, immediately procured a hack and went with Erfert to his mother's house, where we found about two hack loads of stolen goods, consisting of clocks, silver plate, fine umbrellas, and various articles of bric-a-brac, all valuable stuff.
I had these goods hauled direct to the Bolland store. We then visited the store of the grandfather, in South St. Louis and recovered about four hack loads of goods from there. By the time we had hauled the last load away from there it was nearly daylight.
While this loot was being removed from Erfert's house, by Erfert himself and two of my assistants, I was standing outside guarding the hack into which the goods were being placed. A police officer came along. He knew me and was somewhat surprised to see me at that time of night in that locality, and asked me, in a friendly manner, what I was doing there. I told him that there had been some stuff stolen from a jewelry store, and that it hadbeen taken to this house, and I thought it advisable to remove the goods after night so as not to attract the attention of the neighborhood, as I felt sure that the women of the family were not aware of the fact that the property which had been placed in their house had been stolen.
The policeman later reported having met me and what I had told him, to his captain at the Soulard Street Station, and, of course, this report reached the Chief of Police Harrigan, the following morning. Whereupon, the chief became exasperated and ordered the policeman suspended immediately, assigning the reason for so doing the fact that the officer had not arrested the hack-driver and myself. He also suspended one or two of the officers connected with the station who were on duty that night.
The next morning, about ten o'clock, a city detective called on me at my office and said to me, "I have been sent down by the chief to see you. The chief understands that you arrested a young fellow by the name of Erfert last night, and that you recovered a lot of stolen property. Is this report true?"
"Part of the report seems to be true, while the larger part is not true," I replied. "You know, and the chief should know, that I have no legal right to make arrests, and therefore, I have made no arrest, nor have I caused any to be made within the city of St. Louis, but I did recover a large quantity of stolen goods last night and early this morning. I have delivered them to the owner."
"Where is Erfert now?" he asked.
I replied, "I do not know where Erfert is at the present time. Why do you want to know this?"
"Because the chief instructed me to come down here and get him, and bring him to headquarters at once," he said.
"Have you any charges against him at headquarters?" I asked.
"I don't know," he replied. "All I know is that the chief sent me down here to get him and bring him to headquarters."
I said, "I do not know whether there will be any charges preferred against Erfert or not. His employer seems inclined to sympathize with him and more especially with his family. I do not believe that he cares to have him prosecuted for these thefts. I expect Erfert to call at my office some time during the forenoon, and I am looking for Mr. Bolland here at any moment. When Erfert comes I will tell him that the chief wants to see him."
The detective said, "No, you need not do that. I will wait here and when he comes I will take him up with me."
I turned to him and said slowly, "If Erfert calls at this office while you are here, and if you have a warrant for his arrest, charging him with any crime, you may take him to headquarters; but, unless you have a warrant, I will not permit you to take him out of this office. I think, perhaps, you had better go and communicate this to the chief."
This city detective and myself had been friends for a number of years prior to this occurrence, and I must say that I did not like the idea of him coming to my office and attempting to have me admit to him that I had violated the law by having unlawfully detained a citizen, thereby laying myself liable to prosecution. However, not having violated the law, I felt perfectly safe. I knew that the chief was over-anxious to make me trouble as he had made others in my line of business in the past.
The detective left my office and went to report to his chief. In the meantime Mr. Bolland came to my office andI told him of the visit of the city detective and what had been said. Mr. Bolland said that he did not care to prosecute Erfert; in fact, preferred not to do so, but, as the police had the right to prosecute the case, he was really undecided as to what was the best course to pursue.
I advised Mr. Bolland to quietly take Erfert up to police headquarters and tell the chief what he had said to me, as it occurred to me in all probability the chief would insist on having Erfert prosecuted.
Mr. Bolland accompanied Erfert to police headquarters, where the chief and the detective who had called at my office took charge of him and put him through a series of questions, which were principally concerning what Furlong had done. They tried to make him say that Furlong had arrested him and forced him to make a confession of the thefts, and Erfert afterwards told me that they never did ask him whether or not he was guilty of having robbed his employer. They bent their efforts to try and make a criminal case against me, and had gone so far as to prepare a statement, which they urged Erfert to sign, declaiming that I had violated the law, instead of Erfert, by having arrested him and then forcing him to make the statement admitting his guilt, all of which would have been a violation of the law on my part. Erfert refused to sign this statement on the ground that it was untrue. I will state right here that the foregoing is a sample of how criminal cases were handled at police headquarters about that time. However, all these efforts were in vain, as Erfert truthfully replied to every one of their questions. He told them that I had explained to him in the beginning of our interview that I had no legal right to arrest him, and that I had advised him that it was optional with him whether or not he returned the stolen goods, but that ifhe did not stay with me and help me that it would be my duty to turn him over to the police, and he then would be written up in the newspapers and would get a lot of undesirable notoriety that he wished to avoid.
The chief became very much exasperated with Erfert's statement, by which he could make no case against me. However, he later made a complaint himself against me, charging me with running a private detective agency without a license from the Police Board. He had a warrant issued for my arrest. I waived a hearing, and in due time my trial was called before Judge Murphy. I was placed on the witness stand and asked if I was engaged in the detective business in St. Louis. I replied that I was. I was then asked if I had a license from the Board of Police Commissioners. I answered that I had not and had never applied for one. I was then asked by what authority I was conducting my business. I stated that I was conducting my business by the authority of a charter from the State of Missouri. I was asked to produce the Articles of Incorporation. I did, and after the Judge had carefully read them and had examined my charter, he dismissed the case and assessed the cost of court on the complainant.
The Chief of Police insisted on a prosecution in the Erfert case. Erfert was out on bond, and in due time appeared in court, pleaded guilty and received a minimum sentence, which, if I remember correctly was two years in the penitentiary. I understand that he was a model prisoner and was released under the two-third rule.
The stolen property that had been recovered amounted to several thousand dollars. I have learned that since Erfert was released from prison he has been leading an exemplary life and is respected in the neighborhood where he resides. His confederate was a mere boy and was notprosecuted, it being understood that he had simply been a tool for Erfert, and he had not been concerned in many of the numerous thefts.
HOLD-UP OF A MISSOURI PACIFIC TRAIN FRUSTRATED—JAMESWEST, ENGINEER, AND ELI STUBBLEFIELD, EX-CONDUCTOR, CAUGHT WITH THE GOODSON THEM.
With the assistance of Joseph S. Manning, of my St. Louis office, and three special agents regularly in the employ of the Missouri Pacific Railroad, I prevented the holding up of a passenger train on the Lexington Branch near Sedalia, on the night of November 29, 1898. This was only done after quite a revolver battle between my posse and the robbers, resulting in the wounding of one of the latter.
A few days before the attempted train robbery occurred, Horace G. Clark, then General Superintendent of the Missouri Pacific, with headquarters at St. Louis, summoned me to his office. On arriving there Mr. Clark told me that a former employee of the company, who resided at Sedalia, had just informed him that a plot had been formed by six railroad men, including himself, James West and Eli Stubblefield, to hold up and rob one of the company's trains at some point near Sedalia, Missouri. The exact date and point had not been definitely fixed, but the informant was to furnish a team and conveyance with which to take the would-be train robbers to the point at which the holdup was to be made, and after they had succeeded in robbing the train he was to take them back to the city of Sedalia. He further informed Mr. Clark that when the date and point of attack had beensettled on he would at once advise him, as he, the informant, had only agreed to furnish the conveyance and assist in the robbery so that he might have the guilty parties caught and handed over to the officers of the law.
I listened to the foregoing statement and called Mr. Clark's attention to the fact that I never placed much credence in the information given by any man who would deliberately enter into a scheme of this kind with his former comrades.
Mr. Clark replied that he had known his informant, who was an ex-engineer named Adams, as a faithful employee of the road for a number of years, and he was in good standing with the company. Adams had met with a serious accident, having lost one of his arms while in the company's service, and since the accident he had engaged in a legitimate business in which he had succeeded and had accumulated considerable property within a few years. I had known Mr. Clark for a number of years, and had done considerable business with him while I was chief special agent for the Missouri Pacific road, with which company he also held an official position. It was on account of our close friendship that Mr. Clark had sent for me, for at this time I had severed my connection with the Missouri Pacific road and was conducting a secret service company in St. Louis.
Mr. Clark said to me, "Furlong, just as soon as the time and place for this holdup has been fixed I will notify you and I want you to take measures to prevent that train from being robbed, and catch the guilty parties."
Early on the morning of Nov. 23rd, I received a message from Mr. Clark, stating that he had just learned from Adams that the passenger train on the Lexington Branch was to be held up and robbed that night, at a point nine miles north of Sedalia, and instructing me to take immediate steps to protect the train and prevent the robbery. Mr. Clark placed W.W. Kay, his special agent, at my disposal, and, on consulting the official time card of the Missouri Pacific road, I found that in order to protect the Lexington Branch train against the contemplated robbery, I must leave St. Louis at 8:45 that morning, so that I might board the endangered train at Independence Junction, Missouri, that evening, as that train was due to leave Kansas City on its east bound trip before the one I was obliged to take from St. Louis arrived at Kansas City. I found that if both trains were on time I would have three minutes at Independence to make connections, and I succeeded by hustling—to use a western expression. I only had time to catch the train from St. Louis, and barely time to get word to my assistant superintendent, J. S. Manning, who accompanied Kay and myself to Independence, where we boarded the threatened train.
I told the conductor in charge of the train of the instructions I had received from General Superintendent Clark, and instructed him that when the train was flagged and stopped not to pay any attention to the parties who attempted to stop the train, but to devote his whole time to keeping his passengers quiet and to keep them in their seats in the cars, and to see that none of them raised a window and put their heads out. I then went over to the engineer and told him what was liable to happen, and told him that when we arrived at a certain curve, at which the information indicated we were to be flagged, and he saw the signal, which would be a red light shown across the track, he should stop the train immediately, and by all means he must not run beyond the danger signal. I told him that after he had stopped the train he and his fireman could squat down on what is known as the hearth of the engine, in front of the boiler, where they would both be entirely safe, and could not be reached by bullets fired from the ground, as the sides of the cab, up as far as thewindow sills, were steel, and by stooping down below the level of the window sills both of them would be perfectly safe from any shots that might be fired. The engineer and fireman understood my instructions perfectly, but I noticed that the engineer, who was a big, husky, middle-aged man, acted as though he was an arrant coward.
When we arrived at the first station north of the curve, which was about two miles, I placed Mr. Manning on the front platform of the express and baggage car immediately behind the engine. He was armed with a .44 Colts. Detective Frank Barnett, of the Missouri Pacific, with headquarters at Ossowattomie, Kansas, and whose home was at Sedalia, and who had joined my party at Independence, was placed on the rear end of the express car, armed with a repeating Winchester shot gun. I boarded the engine and took a seat on the engine box. I placed Mr. Kay on the fireman's box on the opposite side of the engine. The fireman gave Kay his cap to wear and I had the engineer's cap on, so that any person on the ground, it being after dark, would naturally suppose that I was the engineer and Kay the fireman. The real engineer and fireman stood on the hearth in front of the boilerhead. They could attend to their duties standing where they were as well as though they were seated on their respective boxes. We proceeded south from the last station in this order.
When we reached the curve, I being on the inside of the curve, saw the signal first. It proved afterwards to be a white lantern with a red handkerchief tied over it, which gave it the appearance of a real danger signal. It was swung back and forth across the track, vigorously. I called the engineer's attention to it, while we were at least two hundred yards away.
We were running then at a speed of about thirty miles anhour. I told the engineer to slow up, get his train under control and by all means to be sure and come to a full stop before passing the signal. There was a slight grade to the curve, and although he shut off his steam, he did not apply the air-brakes, so that the train slackened its speed but very little. I saw that we were bound to pass the signal, and again commanded him to stop the train, but he seemed to be bent on passing that signal. It appeared that he was too frightened to think of the air-brakes at all. Whereupon, I threw on the reverse lever myself, or "plugged the engine" as the engineer would say, which caused the wheels to slip, although they did not hold to the rails or stop the speed of the train but slowly.
Meanwhile the party who was swinging the signal light stood in the middle of the track until the train was almost on top of him; in fact, I thought he was going to be run down, but he did manage to leap from the track just in time to save himself. He jumped to the left hand side, which was the opposite side of the engine to where I was stationed. When we passed him we were running at least fifteen miles an hour, and he immediately opened fire on the engine with what we afterwards learned to be a .45 Colts revolver. He riddled the upper part of the cab with bullets. The moment the firing began I sprang from my side of the engine to the gang way on the opposite side. It did not take me an instant to get to that position. The gang way was just passing the fellow who was doing the shooting and I had time then to take but one shot at him. I knew that I hit him, for I saw him fall into the ditch. About the time the shooting began, another would-be robber was discovered on the right-of-way. He also began firing at the officers, sending a couple of shots at Manning, who was on the front end of the expresscar, and both of which only missed Manning's head by a margin of a few inches.
On account of the grade the train did not come to a full stop until we had passed the place where the signal had been shown, probably a distance of fifteen hundred feet or three train lengths. I had instructed Messrs. Kay and Manning and Barnett that if any shooting occurred to open fire on any person they might see on the ground, knowing as I did that they would obey orders. I had also told the conductor to be sure and see that none of the passengers or his crew got on the ground, and for this reason we dare not leave the train until it came to a full stop. After we came to a stop Kay, Manning and myself got off of the train and started to the place where we expected to find the dead or wounded man whom I had shot and had seen fall into the ditch. After we had left the train the engineer began backing up, and nearly ran over us as the train was backing faster than we could either walk or run.
At Lexington, Missouri, the train had picked up an extra coach, containing about twenty passengers, members of a local theatrical troupe bound for Sedalia to give a performance there. They were what theatrical people would call "barn stormers." Every one of them had a popgun of some sort with them, and they began shooting out of the car windows. When we reached the spot where I had seen the robber fall we found that he had disappeared. There had been a light fall of snow, probably two inches, on the day preceding the holdup, and the tracks of this man were plainly visible, and there was also a streak of blood about two inches in width, which led across the track from the east to the west to a road running north and south. The wounded man had taken this road, which led to Sedalia. While we were trying to find the trail we saw another man attempting to getthrough a barbed wire fence, which was on the right-of-way of the railroad on the east. His clothing became fastened in the wire. He struggled, however, to extricate himself, and finally succeeded, just at the time that Manning and I reached the place where the other man had fallen. We saw him as he was getting through the fence, and he started to run in an easterly direction through a large newly plowed field. To make matters worse the ground was covered with snow.
Discovering that our wounded man was gone, and spying the other one running across the field, we gave pursuit. Manning succeeded in jumping over the fence, but I thought I could get through where the robber had, believing that he had sprung the wires and it would be easy, but I also got caught on the barbs and it was only with difficulty that I finally released myself. By this time Manning had got quite a lead, but soon, however, after getting away from that fence, I overtook him, and so it was a neck and neck race between us for at least 150 yards. After leading us a merry chase for that distance, the robber fell, and we, having gained on him, were close to him when he fell, and we sprung upon and disarmed him. His hands and face were covered with blood. He lay on the ground moaning, and we believed that he was badly wounded. There was every possibility of his being seriously hurt, because several shots had been fired at him by Manning and myself during our chase across the field. The "barn stormers" had taken the matter as a general jubilee, and had begun firing at friend and foe alike. They all had shooting irons of some sort and threw open their windows and began firing as soon as we began to pursue the robber. Even the express messenger, who knew that Manning and myself were running across that field, opened fire with a Winchester rifle from his car. Just before the robber fell, a bullet, which had evidently been fired by the expressmessenger, struck the handle of the revolver that Mr. Manning was carrying in his right hand, splintering the handle and nearly paralyzing his hand and arm with the concussion. If the bullet had hit Manning's hand it would have ruined it forever.
Just as Manning and myself had grabbed and disarmed the fallen man, Detective Barnett reached us, and jerking the handkerchief, which had been used as a mask, from the would-be robber's face, exclaimed, "Why, hello, Jim." We all knew then that we had captured West, whom we had known to be in the conspiracy. "Is that you, Frank?" exclaimed West, after which he feigned unconsciousness. West was at that time in the employ of the Missouri Pacific, with a run out of Sedalia, where he had resided for a number of years. He had been at one time superintendent of a Sunday school, and stood well in the estimation of the business men of that town. He also had a reputation among persons who knew him better than the church people, as being a fairly good poker player, and exceedingly fond of the game.
Manning, Barnett and myself were finally joined by the conductor and members of the train crew, and we succeeded in carrying West back to the train. He appeared to be unable to walk, so we had to carry him. We laid him down in the express car, examined him for wounds and found that he had not been shot, but he had severed some small blood vessels on his wrist while struggling to get through the fence and had smeared his face and clothing with blood from these wounds. He shammed being drunk, but he was not at all under the influence of liquor.
Thinking that the wounded man could be found later, and not wishing to delay the train any longer, we boarded the train and were soon in Sedalia. I was personally acquainted with Eli Stubblefield, and being pretty sure he was the man I hadwounded, when we arrived in Sedalia I sent Manning and Detective John Jackson, of the Sedalia police department, out to watch his brother's house, where he made his home, in the hopes that they could intercept and arrest him. Frank Barnett and myself secured an engine at Sedalia and returned to the scene of the attempted hold-up. Picking up the trail of the wounded man, from his tracks and the blood in the snow, we followed it out to the main road and on towards Sedalia. We came to a house occupied by a negro family, which stood near the road. There the negroes told us that just after they had heard the shooting a tall slender man, about middle aged, had stopped in front of their house, coming from the north, and was going south, and yelled to the occupants, stating that he had been hurt and would give them ten dollars if they would hitch up and drive him to Sedalia. They told him that they could not get a horse at that time of night. He departed for Sedalia holding his right arm, and leaving a trail of blood along his tracks. Satisfying ourselves that Stubblefield was sure to show up at Sedalia, Barnett and myself abandoned the hunt, returned to our engine and were again soon in Sedalia. We were right in believing Stubblefield would soon show up in Sedalia, for about two or three hours later the wounded man, who sure enough proved to be Eli Stubblefield, turned up in Sedalia and near his home, where he was captured by Manning and the Sedalia police officer, who were waiting for him, according to my instructions. He was taken to the county jail, where West had been incarcerated, and physicians called to dress his wound. It was then learned that I had shot him in the right arm, the ball entering and breaking the bones at the elbow. The wound soon healed, but Stubblefield never had the use of the arm again, it always hanging limp at his side.
Early the next morning West was released on a bond signed by a couple of prominent and wealthy Sedalia business men, but later in the day, on learning all the facts in the case, the bondsmen surrendered him to the sheriff and he was again locked up, where he remained until his trial.
Adams, the informant, stated to me the following morning, that at the last moment the other four who had promised to join in the robbery, had weakened, using his expression, and therefore Stubblefield and West were the only two he had to take out, and that after the firing had commenced he did not wait for them, but hastily drove his rig back to Sedalia.
In due time both Stubblefield and West were tried and convicted of the attempted holdup, and sent to the penitentiary, if my recollection serves me right, for ten years each. They have served their time out, and, I believe, are at large at the present time.
We found two six-shooters in the possession of West, and also two revolvers in the possession of Stubblefield. Stubblefield was well known as a freight train conductor, and was in the service of the Missouri, Kansas & Texas Railroad Company, popularly known as the "Katy." West had always been an engineer and had been in charge of a freight engine on the Missouri Pacific for a number of years. The others who had promised to participate in the train robbery were all ex-employees of some railroad with the exception of one, who was a butcher. I withhold the names of the other four, as they did not appear on the ground nor participate in the robbery, and were not arrested or tried in connection with the crime.
I will state here for the benefit of the reader that Adams, the informant, had been in the employ of the Missouri Pacific Railroad Company for a number of years as a locomotive engineer, had a good record with the company and stood wellin the community where he resided, as a sober, reliable and intelligent man, and a good citizen. While oiling around his engine one day at a station the throttle began leaking, thereby admitting steam to the cylinders, which caused the engine to move suddenly while his arm was extended through the spokes of the drive-wheels. The sudden movement of the engine tore his arm from the shoulder and thus terminated his career as a locomotive engineer. The railroad company settled with Adams for the loss of his arm without a suit, paying him quite a sum of money. It was with this money that he began business in Sedalia as a money lender. West and Stubblefield were among his clients, each owing him quite a sum. It was while talking with them about their indebtedness to him that West and Stubblefield first approached the subject of robbing the train to Adams. "We will have plenty of money to pay you all that we owe you in a few days," said one of them to Adams, and then they asked him to join them in pulling off the job, which he agreed to do for the reason before stated.