Litchfield enquirer., 1869-02-25
sf Illss ea4 From the New York Sun. sA TALK WITH A PICKPOCKET.

I'the community an erroneous notion pre- vails that the taking of money or vaIuables from mans pocket approaches art: in short that pickets is a Ekilled department in thievery. Newspaper and magazine
 writers favor the same idea. Now this no i. tion is not exactly correct, and it to sei the matter right that I indite this article. have had peculiar facilities for an honest man land I hope am such-any how. l
 never have been detected in any crime}. . s Not long ago. was brought into certain ] relations with one of the most noted and
 expert pick pockets of the day, and fol
 more than year had daily opportunities
 of communicating with him. During thia time, he explained to me the whole busi- ness of stealing from the person, and gave me practal illustration of the modms ope-
 randt in . number of cases. To set the gist of the matter of the numerous inter. views had between myself and the, pick i pocket in clear light; suppose that the
 following conversation occurs: 0o
 The Writer-Now, George, what is your simplest mode of taking mans money? George hard to tell, Captain
 there are so many ways of doing it, one as
 easy as the other, that there is no choice;
 besides, it depends upon circumstances.
 But the commonest way is this-there aint
 much skill to it, only boldness. Three of us go together, r.a ss .rf5+a F..e x,s:: To question-No: we hardly ever work
 alone unless circumstances are very favor.
 able or we are hard up. Of course any body can take 3 mans 'wipe," but that
 game isn't played in the country. In fact there he digressed with a sorrowful air), picking pockets don't pay. like burglary
 man has to make so many more opera tions, and consequently runs so many more risks of being caught But never mind,
 three of us go together, each one having his particular duty. We go into crowd fa any large crowd, but prefer still crowd,
 such as you find listening to political
 speech, elections are rich times with us
 and to suppose 8 case in such closely
 crowded throng, we single out man who is promising, and whose money we want;
 one of us works his way in front of him so
 as to crowd against his left arm, another gets himself behind and the operator stands at his right, partly back. In. this particu-
 lar case 1t is supposed that our game is a stranger having considerable money about him. He is careful of his money, and keeps his hand on his pocket book, which is in his right hand pocket. When the pAOPc1 tsuC COmS1, tu0 uau U6uluU GDS up or smashes down the hat of the coun- tryman, whose first impulse is to restore it, and as he can't raise his left arm. he takes
 his hand from his right pocket when, the operator dives and seizes the money. This action the poor devil does not feel nine times out of ten; he is generally mad at having his hat knocked over his eyes, and turns to see who did it. The one who did the act seizes the first i" "fiatu near him, and shoves him ahead, then dives and rushes through the crowd; this we all do, and meet at some appointed place to di- vlde profits. Generally, the man whose money we have got, has a "iaw" with the one he finds behind him, and by the time
 he has missed his money, we are dividing 1t. Of course, we conform to circumstan- ces in the way of operating, but this is fair illustration. Sometimes, however, when 1t IS safe, we adopt the way of lifting the lining of the pocket and so extracting the money. If we are caught in this, the same manner of getting away is adopted" ."
 "Well, George. as to operations on street cars and railroads?
 ]" In respect to the former, they are gen. erally nothing but forcible robberies; we get together in the platform, and by crea- ting Q row, take 8 man 8 money by force before he knows it. And there is not much difference in our way of doing things on railroads. We pick out our man, and at some stopping place, where he gets out for lunch or any other purpose, one or two of us manage to get ahead of him, the other behind him, and by jostling and causing confusion, we have no difficulty. Why! I alone made $8. 900 in following the Prince of Wales when he was here, and could have
 made more than that in following Lincoln from Springfield to Washington, if some of us hadn't been fools. You see, suspi- cion was strong on us, and we stayed over in Buffalo to gamble, and were caught and convicted. They could not find anything against me, but one of the party had some money which was identified, and the Buff falo judges never let man go If there is 8 shadow of a chance of holding him, and when he is found guilty, they pile it on awful A New York Judge wouldn't have gwen me half as much as l got from that Buffalo man, andI believe should have got clear away" .esaeE To question.-"O yes, there are wo- men ick-pockets, and men who pick wo- mems pockets. They usually go alone, and frequent horss-cars, stages, and churches
 7sometimes theatres, concerts and lec- lures. It is risky business, for when . woman fastens on you, she sticks. But the way of doing it is easy. For instance: sit alongside of woman and manage to get my hand or finger into her pocket (she cant feel it as man could) and take our her pocket-book; then open it, under stand, though this never was my line--Im only telling you how 'tis done) and extract the money, and then replace the pocket book. That is 'sweeding." If she discov- ers her loss, she is almost sure to think she has lost her money or left it where she was last shopping;, and so we get of easily enougn The stories about throwing a bullet, which is shot into the pocket-b book, and is fastened to slender cord, is 6 hum- bug. and any person of sense ought to ryg" slI'a @s.s -. 'l0s 1.f1 l5 -..as ...575' v
 las We don't do it-that is, the best of us don't-unless we are hard up. Some poor sticks make a business of stealing watches,
 but they are inferior. If we want mans watch, we manage pretty much the same
 way as if we were after his money. No:l we don't cut chain. We get the watch ont of his pocket easy enough, and twist the ring out of it. Some of the old fashioned ones have the rings rivited anl make q loud snap; but the thing is easy. Then we get new rings put in and have the numbers a1koxo6-s a1 ohriokOniuo xra ,o11 q c~1 o.n