Fayetteville observer. [volume] (Fayetteville, Tenn.) 1850-1966, 1877-10-18

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Our New York Letter,

"Birds of Feather''!The Era of
FOrgery-Piety and Rascality-
The profession" i'm New York
VIM. H. Lyman, StenOgrapher
"A Friend in Jail is a Friend
Indeed-A Timely Flood.
TO the Editor of the Observer !:
New YoRK, October 5, 1877.
Everyone who has paid atten-
tion to the statistics of wrong
doing cf any kind must have
noticed the curious way in
which crimes of any certain
class, like evil birds of a feather,
incline to flock together. Sea-
sons of burglary recur in irreg-
ular cycles, train robberies usu-
ally tread on each others heels
to the number Of half dozen
or so, murders shock the COM
munity in rapid succession. The
same odd laws appear also TO
govern, at least to some ex-
tent, what are commonly called
accidents. Thus railroad men
haze told me that when, after a
season of freedom from such
disasters news reach them of a
serious accident Of travel, they
fl ell morally certain that two
more cf a similar character will
follow it at sufficiently short IN
teryais to connect the three in
one group. The same piinci-
pie seems to prevail in connec-
lion with large fires, and so on.
Our epidemic now seems to
be forgery and misappropria-
ton Of funds. Take tie last
two weeks. Without taking
into account ten cases which
involved sums ranging below
$25,OO0 each, there has been the
fraudulent issue Of lmost a mil
lion dollars Of railway bonds
traced to President Morton of
the Permanent Exhibition Of
Philadelphia, the detection and
fight of William G. Gilman,
one of the most high-toned,
gilt-cdged brokers of Wall
street, after a series Of prac-
teal forgeries amounting
to nearly $30O,00O; and later
the discovery that two impor-
tant and long established insu-
rance concerns, are defaulters'!
in the amounts of $4,000 and
$125, ,000respectiyely. The ques-
tionin everybody's mouthnow is
"Who among Us can be relied
on!" and no one appears in
clined to venture a reply.
Were | called upon to answer
the conundrum / should say
that until laws were passed, and
enforced too, under which great
and awe-inspiring criminals
could be railroaded from their
luxurious offices into the peni-I
Tertiary with the fewest posi-
bic stops along the route, the
community has no reason to-
expect anything different and is
served just right for its failure
TO protect itself.
But to show that the ancient
and honorable profession of
forging has not yet passed en-
tirely into the hands of the pi-,
Gus church members like those
above indicated, the detectives
have just brought to light an
other series of operations of
this sort performed by an ex-
pert professional gang during
the last eighteen months and a.
mounting to about $4,000.
These have mostly been accom-
plished by buying a small draft
on New York or some neighbor-
ing country bank and obliterat-
ing parts Of the writing with
chemicals and filling up the
draft again with sums TO suit.
Thus a draft for $50 was made
to collect $1,000 and so on
through the list. The detec-
tives have been after this gang |
for a long time, but only suc-l
ceeded in running them to earth |
this week. The head and front
of the forgers was found TO be a
quiet gentlemanly looking man
who for some time past has oc-
cupied an Office in Park Row
near the Post Office, the door
of which bore the sign "Wm. /
II. Lyman, Stenographer." I'M
this office Mr.. Lyman was cap-l
tured, together with various col
ored inks, chemicals, brushes
and other appliances of his
crooked art, which were sufff-
cient to establish his guilt be-
yond a doubt. Itturns olt that
Lyman is we'll known. lie has
served two terms In Auburn for