The Morehouse clarion. [volume] (Bastrop, La.) 1874-1904, 1886-08-27
EXPERTS IN HANDWRITING

handwriting have become very frequent
Few If our readers, outside of commercial
circles, are aware of the astonishing amount
of forgeries which are constantly being per
petrated. In the aggregate they amount
annually to hundreds of thousands, and
even millions of dollars. While instances
like the noted bond forgeries, and frauds
amounting to half million of dollars
lately attempted and partially accomplished
upon the Bank of England, and the NOR
recent forgeries Of probably nearly eque
amount, of railroad and telegraph bonds
our own country, may be of comparative
rare occurrence, successful and unsuccesfn
efforts to procure money from banks and
individuals, by means Of forged check.
drafts, letters of credit, ETC., are of almoss
daily occurrence in this city alone.
The subject is, therefore, one not only o
the greatest Importance, but of the deepen
interest, and in order to give our reader.
an account Of the most recent progress i
this direction, we have conversed with two
of the most experienced and skllful experts
in this city, and probably in the country
Messrs. George Simpson, Jr., who has made
the study and pracBice of writing life prr-
suit, aud is now the penman of the Equit-
able Life Assurance Co., 100 Broadway, and
2o5 BROADWAY. who has devots-a~-~~- 49,. -
years to the careful study and practice of
the subject as author and teachez.af-rrsrit-
among penmen From tese faas 3
have received great many Interesting hints
and facts, which cannot fail to be OF interest
to our readers
In the eye of an expert. an irldivi,2'les is
as much personiied in his handwI1 io. s,d
as surely recognized by it. as he is py his
physiognoiay. person may Il ,caise or
distort the, general appearance of his writ.
ing, as he may the expression of his face or
the sound of his voice. yet the peculiar
characteristics by which he is recognized
will in each case be plainly visible, in spite
of all efforts at disguise. Habit imparts
peculiarties in form of letters, to their pro-
portions, slope, space, connections, turns,
shade, etc, which person can no more
successfully conceal than he could his per-
sonal identity By drawing up his nose,
squirting his eyes, or walking with limp
1t is to the careful examination OF these
peculiar and habitual characteristics that
the expert directs his attention, rather than
to the general appearance of writing In a
forgery general semblance Of writing is
easily obtained, and as easily changed in q
disguised hand while it is well nigh inn
possible to impart these habitual points of
distinction to a forgery or to conceal them
in disguised handwriting In forgery
there is also usually manifest hesitancy
in the lines, and want of the grace and free
dom of the genuine. Especially is this the
case where the genuine is written in rapid
off-hand movement. from the fact that the
imitator must slowly draw the lines at the
same time that he is studying the original,
as schoolboy would his copy.
The writing of persons who write slowly,
with d drawn movement, is therefore the
most easy to counterfeit, as the movement
conforms more to the necessarily slow draw
ing movement of the imitator
One of the most frequent modes of dis
guising writing is to change the customary
slope, which with some variation in type Of
letters, etc, at once imparts an entire
change to it's general appearance, 80 that
page, line or signature placed in juxtaposi-
tion with the ordinary hand, would, by
novice, be pronounced entirely dissimilar.
Yet the force of habit is so powerful in con-
trolling movements Of the hand as to in
stinctively inpart many or all of the pecu-
llarly individual characteristics of the
writing-as, for instance, the manner Of
beginning and ending words, dotting the
certain 1atgeFs ana Jaqzsp at
as th, ex, II, ETC.; SO that while quite dis
similar in general appearance, in detail they
are very much the same.
Letters are often the same in general ap-
pearance, and entirely different in their
analysis, striking instance of which oc-
Cured in the case Of a person charged with
forgery, where the charge rested upon the
alleged close resemblance of certain letters
to those which he habitually made; for in
stance the small E was made, in the forgery,
invariably divided two-thirds above the
centre loop, which pointed downward
while in the other it was habitually made
one third above the centre loop, which
pointed upward the same general resem-
blance occurred in many other letters,
equally dissimilar in their analysis, suf-
hcient to give very close general appear
ance. but very different in detail