The Portland daily press., 1880-03-12
The Fraudulent Count.
EXPERT TESTIMONY SHOWING
CHANGES IN THE RETURNS.
Traces of P. A. sawyer's CHR ography

Monday William C. Holt, cashier of the
| Veazie National Bank of Bangor, was before
| the committee on election returns and testified
| that on examination of the words twenty
| seven" as the whole number of votes in the
| Perkins Plantation return, and comparison
| of them with large amount of handwriting
over the signature of P. A. Sawyer in what is
| called the council letter" for 1879, he pro-
nounced them all the same.
| AS experts are apt to sometimes jump at
| conclusions which are hard to believe, it may
| be well right here to state that Mr.. Holt has
attained quite a reputation for his ability in
| detecting crime by means of the handwriting
| of persons. His testimony was accepted in the
Lowell murder case at Auburn, Gordon MUIR
der case at Thorndke (tried at Belfast) Mank
murder case at Rockland, the Herrin-Carey
cases at Houlton, and in several civil cases IN
Bangor, so it will be readily seen that ms
word is recognized as having considerable
weight.
The committee pressed him for his reasons
in concluding that the writing in the Perkins
return was Sawyers, and he stated them brle1-
ly. He had examined letter after letter writ
ten at different times and found such a SINH
larity that he could not believe that other than
the same hand wrote the words "twenty-seven
(20," and the writing in the letter.
Looking at the Brownfield return he pro pro
nounced the words "Brownfield' and "Ox-
ford' as written by a different ink and by a
different hand than the body of the return and
the filing. Satisfactory reasons were given for
this conclusion, and which also revealed the
closeness with which he had examined the
writing. For instance in the word "Oxford"
in the body of the return, the 80" and "F'' are
made by one stroke of the pen. Then cross
is made to form the *" and evidently a
comparison was here made with the fling the
pen again touched to the paper to make the
'x' more nearly correspond with the filing
These works are all distinct, and can be readi-
ly seen when the attention has been called to
them.
In the name of Oliver "P." Bragdon in the
Gouldsboro return, he stated that with the
aid of glass and also by holding the return
up to the sunlight, he had become firmly con-
WINGED that the quirk half forming "B'' was
both made by different hand and with a diff
ferent ink, and that the addition had original
ly been larger than now, but had been partly
erased to avoid the too palpable appearance Of
having been added to the original "P.''
On the Berwick return he found that the
name of George "A.' Wakefield had been
changed from the original George Ell. Wake
field. The ink is darker and coarser; the fin
ishing stroke on the left side is about the same
width as the size of the 'H' on the right side
is heavier and runs down upon the original SO
that the union of the different inks is readily
distinguished by means of glass. The join
lures also looked patched and ragged.
In the Buckfeld return for county officers
the word "Buckfeld" at the end, opposite the
name of the selectmen is entirely dissimilar TO
the handwriting of any of the signers or the
body of the return Mr.. Holt stated that the
formation of the ''l1' and ''f'' quite convinced
him the word was surreptitiously inserted
The 'sF' is peculiar and may inHtime lead to
the discovery of the person making it, for con-
trary to the usual custom, the upward stroke
of the lower half of the letter turns up on the
left side of the down stroke, instead of on the
right In all his experience only one such pc
culiarity has ever come under his observation,
and that was a woman's handwriting The
smoothness and regularity of the "f" indicated
construct this letter.