The New Orleans bulletin. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1874-1876, 1875-12-03
THE HALPN CASE.
Reports of the Experts.
The Question of Signatures.

Ia the Halpin case, now pending before
the Second District Court, the question of the
legality of the marriage certificate Of the
alleged wife of Halpin came up. The Court
appointed DR.. Crawcour and w. r. Whita-
ker, Esq, as experts to examine the certlf-
cate, and they have made the following re-
port
REPORT OF DIR. CRAwCoUR.
| have examined microscopically docu-
ment purporting to be certificate of mar
riage between Patrick Halpin and Anna Ben
nett Dalton, and find that the ink is traversed
in several places by minute transverse spaces,
and that many of the lines of the writing are
covered by fbres of the paper, which had
apparently been mechanically disturbed The
flores of the paper are also torn and stand
upright in various directions, Overshadowing
the lines of writing, and bore fuzzy appear
ance. like wool or hair.
The inference from this is, that after the
certificate had been written or dried, it was
rubbed against or was rubbed with some
hard, rough and dirty substance, which has
abraded the surface of the paper and thus
allowed the flores to become separately and
distinctly visible IS described. Ordinary
handling, or the natural discoloration result
ing from age would not produce this appear
ance. Another circumstance which also
leads me to believe in the mechanical soiline
of the paper is the fact that the edges, which
would naturally be the most soiled and worn
are clean and smooth.
A competitive trial experiment was made
with document written the same year, the
ink was found to be free from the separate
| interspaces, the paper presented a natura
striated appearance, no fuzziness being visi
BILE and no running over the lines of writing
| A further trial was made by writing two let
tiers on piece of paper (the paper is signed
| by me), rubbing one against dirty, rough
surface, and leaving the other in it's ordinary
| condition. The former presented the same
appearance as the certificate of marriage, thu
latter was perfectly smooth.
The instrument used for the examination
was Smith l. Becks binocular mscroscope
| with No. eye pieces and two-thirds ob
jective, giving an application OF about sew
enty diameters; examined with lower power
three inch objective, similar appearances
! were observed, although, of course, less highly
| magnifed. L L CRAwcoUR NJ. ID.
VIM R. wHITAKER's REPORT.
participated in the microscopic examina
| ton of the papers referred to in the forego
| ing aud concur with the entire statement
of DR.. Crawcour. l also compared the hand
| writing on the following papers in the record
Document A, oath of office (of the iustic'
| signing the certificate of marriage); documen
B, marriage certificate; the letter annexed tc
| the commission; signature to testimony
photograph endorsed, and copy of marriag
certificate, and have come to the conclusion
after careful investigation, that all these speci
mems of handwriting were written by tn
same person, except the writing in the OATH
of office and the signature thereto, whicl
were written by two different parties, neithe
one of them the writer of the other pieces o
penmanship. VIM. r. WHITAKER