Washington sentinel., 1853-12-11

The CAREER OF GEN. HINTON, THE GREAT
NAIL RoBBER.-The Star gives the following
account of the career of Gen. Hinton, noted
mail robber in the west:
"The public will doubtless recollect the es-
cape (by nominally forfeiting his bail) of Gen.
Ohio Hinton, the great mail contractor OF the
west, as well as mail robber, whose depreda-
tions were discovered in the autumn OF 1850.
His mail robberies were, by long odds, more
stupendous than those of every one else, SO lar
detected in the perpetration of similar crimes
in this country; covering great many cases,
and always involving the loss of very large
sums of money
GAS far as the depreciation branch OF the
department have been able to ascertain, ne was
in the habit of riding at night on the top OF the
coaches of the Ohio mail stage company OF
which he was the general agent, as well as the
individual Immediately representing that great
establishment in all its contracts with the de-
partment. Being thus doubly the department 5
confidential agent as it were, he was permitted
by the drivers to ride there; when, teigning to
be sleeping, he would open the bag with a
mail key secreted about him. His operations
with the banking houses, and his having this
extended route, enabled him to know when
they had large sums in the mails, upon which
a long time his detection seemed impossible,
until the extravagances of his habits brought
him under suspicion, after the departments de-
tecliye agents became satisfied that the rob-
berries were committed between, rather than in
the offices along the route.
When first arrested, he escaped from the two
agents who held him in custody,in fashiona-
BILE hotel, in which the committing magistrate
permitted him to remain for the night before
sending him to jail) in order that he might the
easier communicate with his friends to get bail.
He got off on that occasion by walking to and
fro in his room, passed the shut but not locked
door, until he had lulled the suspicious Of the
two keepers guarding him with their eyes wide
open. When, suddenly he opened the door, bolt
ed ont of the room, and locked in thetwo bawlng
guards, confederate having slipped key in
the lock outside, for him. He wandered in the
woods for four days, robbing dairies of milk at
night to sustain life. He then gave himself up,
half famished His bail was next fixed at fiji,
teen thousand dollars, which MIR. Justice Nc
Lean finally reduced to ten thousand; and 1t
was given. He then left the country, and was
next heard of in Cuba; subsequently, on the
lsthmus.
From thence he went to California, where he
was servant in hotel, when he was re-
cognized by some one, and was again arrested
through information lodged by agents of the
Post Office Department. On the receipt of in
telligence of his last arrest, the department in
stantly sent ont bench warrant for his trans
mission to Ohio, and the necessary papers to
enable them to hold him safe. But on the ar.
rival out of this authority, &C., it was found
that the bird had again flown. He had been
released by the courts of the new State under
a writ of habeas corpus, the testimony at hand
there not being judged sufficient to warrant
him being held. He Immediately left for the
Sandwich Islands, where we understand ne
fourishes at present. in what capacity we know
nOtn