Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1883-06-19
AN OHIO GIRL
Playing the Part of the Merry
Maiden and the Tar.
She Swears Like a Tar, Looks Like
One, and Says She
is One.

CHICAGO, June lS-A young woman
with a history was locked up at the Chica'
90 Avenue Station last night. She was
dressed in mems clothing and her dis
guise was the most deceiving the police
ever met with. She was arrested on the
docks, where she mingled as sailor with
out her sex being discovered by even her
nearest associate. For three years she has
acted as cooks mate aboard various lake
vessels, always passing for a boy and
mingling with the sailors as one of them.
She would give no other name than
Frank Chambers, insisting that her real
name was too sacred to
DiVuIge In Police Station.
She said she was born in Newark, Ohio,
seventeen wears ago. and donned male attire
the better to get along. There was not one
chance in twenty of getting employment
as a woman, where she could succeed as a
man, and as the latter had the better OF ii
all through life, she concluded to disguise
her identity and engage in labor performed
BY the other sex. She liked the change.
manor born. Though mixing constantly
with the very toughest of the seafaring
element, few ever
Discovered Her Secret.
She drank with the rough sailors, but was
wise enough not to take too much, and she
never became intoxicated. She accompan-
led them in their roistering tours when in
port, but always had a leady excuse to Of
fer when any frolic was proposed which
might disclose her sex. She believed in
womans rights, and smoked and chewed
with the ease of an old tar All her move
mentS were masculine, and her converse
ton was plentifully interlarded with ex-
pressions characteristic of the sterRer sex.
When proffered cigar, she
Lis the Match ON Her Trousers.
and when il went out her disgust was ex-
pressed in terms more emphatic than ele-
CANT. She seemed TO be lad of eighteen,
and though her features were regular and
pleasing, there was nothing etfeminate IN
her look. Her hair was cut close to the
scalp, as if by a machine, and she wore a
frock coat and black trousers, a cheviot
shirt and nobby derby.
Some one gave me away was the reply
she made when asked how she came to be
arrested. al have only been in town few
days, and behaved myself the best could.
No one would suspect who am, and was
never found out until | got in a row with
fellow once
IGot q Black Eye,
but then there is always blsck eye aboard
a ship; if the captain hasn't got it some Of
the crew have"
The prisoner, who is charged with being
disorderly. said she had early been left to
shift for herself. Her mother died when
quite young, and her father, who is drink
ing man, never gave her any care. Some
two months ago girl was arrested in
Detroit under circumstances the same as
the present, but was let go the next day on
the promise she would resume her proper
attire. She gave the name of Annie Nc
Donald, and told the identical yarn the
girl told at the station last night. But
Mr.. Gordon as the fair youth chooses to
be known by, denied being the same per-
son. averring she had never been arrested
before. 81 don't care how often they arrest
me-" she said, "l'll never wear women's
clothes. hate hustle, and if am not q
man l an always going to dress as one"