Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1870-07-14

"
ury - The Mysterious Disappear
ance of Twenty Thousand Dollars
from the Issue-ROOm-A Party OF
Five Visitors sSuspected-A Muddle
in Earnest.
From the New York World, July 81
The mystery attending the robbery of
the $4,000 in SO notes from the issue
room in the Treasury Building at Wash
ington, on the llth of June, appears to
thicken as the investigation proceeds.
The supposition that Chas. M. Merriam,
who deposited $500 of the stolen money
in the Stuyvesant Bank of this city, was
directly implicated in robbery has been
exploded, but he is still held as having
been receiver Of the money, knowing
it to be stolen. No accurate account of
how this money was first missed from the
treasury has been heretofore published.
In the many divisions of the treasury
department there is long room called
the apartment OF issues. " The ma
tional currency, as it comes new from
the engraver's and printers department,
is received in this room, where it is re-
corded, counted and sent on to the cash
ier's department. The department of
issues is presided over by Mr.. II. G. Root,
who is a very old and trusted attache Of
the treasury. His chief assistant is Miss
Arabella Tracy, who has been in the
treasury eight years, and who is consid-
cred one of the best female experts in
Mr.. Spinner's whole division There
are about twenty-five clerks to do
the counting. Mr.. Roots desk is
in the center of the room, and
the deposit table where Miss Tracy
sits is on one side of the room at the
same end. The clerks desks stand in a
line through the room near' the center.
The money is first deposited on Miss
Tracys table in bundles of two, ten,
twenty or hundred thousand dollars
each, according to the denomination of
the notes being issued. Miss Tracy takes
memorandum of the number Of the bill
on top of the bundle and the one on the
bottom, divides the money into small
quantities, and distributes it to the
clerks to be counted, taking a receipt
from each clerk for the amount of each
package given him or her to count
When counted, the money is again done
up and sent to the cashiers department.
Visitors have always been allowed to
enter Mr. Roots department, and when
they come they are usually received by
him and shown down the room. On the
llth of June, five visitors-two men, two
women and boy--entered the depart
ment about one O. clock, and, after con-
versing with Nr. Root and passing through
tho room, went out. Miss I'IaGy, IT APP
pears, had just gone out to lunch, leav-
ing the package of $4,000 on her table.
When she returned, which was after the
visitors were gone, the money was miss
ing. 1t appeared to the officer who IN
vestigated the case, almost impossible
for any one of those visitors to go around
him to Miss Tracy's table and take the
money, which made q hundle half as
large as o Websters unabridged diction-
ary, and leave the room without being
seen either by Mr.. Root or one of the
clerks.
Colonel Whitley, who had been work
ing up the case, was called in the eXami-
nation of Merriam yesterday, when he
testified that at the time he first called
on the defendant, who was keep
ing a stable at No. ia Clinton,
he did not deny having de-
posted the $500, and said he took
it from a man named Milton injudgment
for three horses. On being asked if he
knew Miles, the man who deposited the
balance of the money, he said he had
known him for year. He then refused
to give any more information. Colonel
Whitley said the prisoners manner was
nervous, and that his statements were
contradictory The examination was
again postponed.