Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1872-10-28
ANOTHER HIGHWAY ROBBERY.
of Wesson-Where are the PoIice7
-nlAM Your Xhinlla.

A More Daring Robbery Than that
of Wesson-W here are the Police
BLOW Your whistle.
II has been well known outside Of
police circles that Che Exposition and
County Fair have attracted robbers and
desperadoes to Memphis from Northern
cities Last evening at half past seven
o'clock, while our religious citizens were
vending their way up Madison street to
church, four men were seen engaged in
scuffie in front OF the marble yard,
near the corner Of Madison and Third
streets. The three men who robbed
Mr.. Wesson on Second street were
again at work. They attacked Mr..
James Speed, general railroad ticket
agent at No. 1874 Main street. Mr..
Speed states that as he was going home
ward on Madison street. last evening, he
passed three men, One Of them silently
followed him and threw his arm around
his neck, while the two others robbed
him of his gold watch and chain. He
attempted to cry out for assistance, when
he received violent blow in the stom-
ach and was hurled into the street Mr..
Speed was almost insensible, and was
conveyed to his home on Madison street,
where bis injuries were attended to. His
neck and face showed the effects Of the
rough choking he received. Mr.. Speed
could give no clear or definite description
of the garroters, who ran up the alley
between Third and Fourth streets into
Court, and escaped. The watch taken
from Mr.. Speed bore the inscription
Presented to James Speed by his
friends-Memphis, June, 1861"
The Avalanche of this morning just
discovered that Mr.. Wesson had been
robbed on Second street last Wednes-
day night, and the Appeal, after ridicul-
ing the Wesson robbery, comes out this
morning and says, the hallucination
last Wednesday night, on the corner Of
Second and Court streets, was not all a
dream" When the LEDGER published
the account Of the Wesson robbery, the
police officers and attaches sneered at it,
did not believe it; they entered into
labored arguments to prove that Mr.
Wesson could not have been robbed on
Second street. Now, they cannot sheer
at the Speed robbery, by three men"
a curious coincidence, because they were
the same men who robbed Mr.. Wesson,
and they are evidently a part OF
the gang who successfully commit.ed
the diamond robbery at the Exposition,
We know where the trouble is in police
circles. Detectives are always suspect
ing honest men to be rogues, and when
Mr.. Wesson failed TO report his case at
the police office, instead Of the LEDGER
Office, he fell under the ban at once.
We felt indignant at the apathy and
incredulity displayed by the police au'
thorities in the Wesson matter. They
smiled, turned up their noses aHd looked
wise. But the Speed robbery has turned
the scale. They now have awakened
from the dream. We now suggest
remedy for these robberies. A little
more efficiency and activity in police
circles, through all its ramifcations; an
active patrolling of the streets at night,
so that the cries of victims in the hands
of robbers can be heard and attended
TO. The little whistle" does not deter
the garroters, let it be blown ever so
adroitly by men on horseback. Come
down to the work, gentlemen, and all
will be well. No journal in the city has
more cheerfully accorded praise to the
police when they deserved it than the
LEDGER. We never INDUCED in fulsome
eulogy or sycophantic praise, and no
journal will condemn the police more
openly and squarely when such thing
is unfortunately necessary. The patrol
force is no doubt too small for the city.
1t is impossible for two men to watch a
territory of large extent. We believe the
patrolmen, in the main, do their duty as
we'll as could be expected, but let greater
activity prevail, and keep good and re-
sponsible men on duty as patrolmen, de
teetves and officers frr,s