The Portland daily press., 1880-01-12
Disappearance.
Views Of Police Superintendent Walling
of New York on the Subject.

''The public have little idea of the number
of mysterious disappearance reported to US.
They will average more than one day in Or
dinary times, and occasionally they come in by
patches. The year 1876, for instance, was
especially prolific of them. We were con-
stantly getting telegraphic dispatches from all
parts of the country, My boy has mysteriously
disappeared We had stereotyped formula
of reply in such cases: Look for him in Phila-
delphia' And when they looked there they
nearly always found the lost sheep. TIE boy
had simply run away to the Centennial exposi-
ton, and was generally very glad to be found
and taken home again. Very often boys come
to us, wishing to be sent to their country
homes, having resigned the hopes of sudden
and easy fortune with which they quilted the
parental roof for the great city. In most cases
we have had dispatches to look out for them;
but sometimes sensible parents do not even
trouble themselves that much, but calmly
await the inevitable--the repentant appe al OF
the boy. Then another large class OF entries
on our book of disappearances is composed OF
merchants, business men, and young men OF
good families and social connections, who
yield to the temptations of spree or an esca-
pade in which they are encouraged and as
sisted by some woman. But, of course, that
yery natural explanation of an apparently un-
accountable absence for a day or two never oc-
ours to the anxious wife or friends or parents.
HE was never known to do such thing be-
FORE is conclusive to their minds that he
wouldn't. But the fact is that the best pos
sble reason to some men for doing thing is
that they have never done it before. and it is
by no means easy to guess when the wlSest ana
the best of men may break loose Well, when
tile doUo turn up as he is pretty certain
to in few dayS-he is furious over the pub
licity that has been given to his mysterious dis
appearance, and rushes down here to ask that
it shall be kept out of the papers. or course
we comply with such requests for privacy.
Our records are not accessible to anybody, and
we only give out such information in what
appears to be serious case-where 1t is re-
quested by friends, or where 1t seems to be
necessity to aid in the work of tracing some
one who does really seem to have dropped
mysterionsly and suspiciously out of sight.
In the other cases such as l have mentioned,
we simply enter up: Reported all right and
here's an end OF 1t.
Our records necessarily show but a small
percentage of the missing people as returned
to the knowledge of their friends for the SIM
ple reason that when the lost ones come home
the excitement over their disappearance is at
an end and nobody cares to take the trouble
to send us word that the search is over, When
we hear that a missing man in the city has
turned up again, we generally send to verify
the report and enter up the facts but even
then we find the man disgusted with the fact
of our knowing anything about it, and only
anxious to keep it from the knowledge Of
everybody else. But the. out-of-town cases,
which are greatly in the majority, are rarely,
il ever reported to us beyond the missing
stage Pre- cbably the proportion of the missing
men who are actually lost and never heard of
again is only about one in hundred. The
proportion who turn up promptly and seek to
suppress all public knowledge of their having
been lost is about ons-fourth; yes, perhaps two
thirds And the others, as l said, nearly all
simply neglect to inform us when they come
back. So, as you see, it is not very easy to
arrive at any definite knowledge of the ac-
| ually lost. But we have reeson to believe
| they are very few. People have exaggerated
| ideas on that subject. A great number of
| young girls disappear and are reported here by
| anxious friends within twenty-four hours Of
their vanishing from home; but within twenty
| four hours more they are generally found and
taken home, Probably one-seventh of the en-
tire number of disappearances are of this class.
| AS matter of course, we keep strictly private
| the record of such incidents, which are, as a
| rule, bat youthful indiscretions of character
that all concerned are desirous of forgetting as
soon as possible, and which cannot possibly be
| of interest to the public"