, 1889-08-22
GOOD BILLS FOR SCRAPS.
NOVEL WORK OF THE GOVERNMENT
REDEMPTION BUREAU.


Dcstroyed-Fire. the Baby and the Pet
Dog Among the Chief Agents of Dc
struction-No Chance to Defraud.
When a small portion of United States
note is returned to the treasury with
sufficient proof that the remainder of II
has gone out of existence, the treasury
will give the full value of the original
note. Naturally the greatest destruction
Of money is wrought by fire, and bits Of
bills with charred edges are constantly
coming in for redemption
But several instances have occurred
where men, in their desperation ct their
loss, have simply boxed up a lot of ashes,
in which there was not the slightest
trace Of the original material, and de
manded hundreds and thousands of dol
lars for them Such requests are, OF
course, refused, and the senders are in
formed that their only recourse is to ASK
congress by special act to indemnify
them.
MICE WITH EXPENSIVE NESTS.
Next to fire the young baby is put
down in the department as the most de
str;!ctive agent. Innumerable atfidavitc
are received in which John Jones, or
whatcye er his name may be, being duly
sworn, deposes and says" that his in
fant son did chew up and swallow the
missing portions of certain s. bills, and
jliat the said missing portions were
thereby wholly destroyed and are now
no longer in existence.
The fashion of keeping small pet dogs
has also been the cause of many solemn
af!davits being sent to the department
Your pug and your poodle seem to take
especial delight in masticating the fruit
and reward of the many days of severe
toll Of the head of tho house.
The fancy of mice for $40 bills as lin
ing for luxurious nests has been impress
ed upon the redemption bureau by a long
series of examples. Only few days
ago several hundred dollars worth of
nest lining was redeemed for southern
man who had for many years given up
all idea of finding his missing treasure.
There was 500 of it in the first place,
notes of almost the first issue made by
tho government early in war times. 1t
had been hidden away in place sup
posed to be secure, and had disappeared
4 quarter of 4 century later, in repair
ing the porch of the old house, the nest
of the wealthy mouse had been discov-
cred, and enough of tho fragments re-
covered to secure more than half OF the
original deposit.
Also from the south came most Of the
moidy, worm eaten bills which have
been hidden in bottles or buried in the
earth for years. There are not so many
savings banks in the south as in thrifty
New England, and hiding places are
used.
But the habit of using the parlor OF
..Itchen stove as q safety deposit vault Is
not confined to any one section Of the
country. Neither is the custom of burn
ing up this treasure by some other mem
Der of the family who is all unaware of
its value. Years ago the clerks in the re-
demption bureau ceased to declaim upon
the stupidity of such people. It has be-
come matter of course with them, and
they expect about SO many letters every
week from people who have warmed two
pair Of hands with 81 900 worth of silver
certificates.
FROM TIE DEAD LETTER OFFICE.
There arc not many attempts to de-
fraud the government through the re-
, demption bureau, and none have been
successful. The sending of the two halves
OF q note of large denomination by diff.
fcrent people. each one swearing that
the other half is destroyed, and asking
for tho full value of the note, frequently
looks like an attempt to defraud, but the
officials think that in most cases the
| senders believe they aretelling the truth.
Counterfeit money comes from every
part of the country, mutilated, probably
by design, with requests for its redemp-
| ton. 1t is always indeibly stamped
counterfeit" and returned to the sender.
The redemption bureau is not q good
place for showing the queer" even in O
fragmeutary condition.
There is in the treasury vault q brown
wooden box eighteen inches long, foot
wide and eight inches deep, which con,
tains paper money of the nominal value
Of several hundred thousand dollars. II
is not worth dollar. The queer thing
| about it is the manner in which it was
! collected. Every bit of it came from the
! dead letter Office of the postoffice depart
ment. Some portion of it is counterfeit
but the most Of it was genuine money
many years ago. The banks which IS
sued it and the officers who signed il
| are gone and forgotten. 1t was all sent
over to the treasury department some
years ago, and Assistant Treasurer
Whelpley undertook to trace up the
| various banks and get rs much as posi-
ble Of it redeemed. Occasionally he
| found descendants OF these old bank of
! ficials, themselves bankers, who were
willing to redeem some Of the notes foi
| the sake of the signatures of their
fathers, and in this way he succeeded in
| getting several hundred dollars worth OF
| itredcemed.
| But of that remaining, not bill can
| be redeemed. A little of it is Con-
/ federate money, but most of it is of
banks, state and private, that went out
| OF existence many years ago. The oldest
notes are dated back as far as 1919 One
| package contained S54, 900 and another
| $4,000, The mystery is how so much
| money could have been lost in the mail.
Neither the men who sent it nor the ones
| to whom it was sent could be found by
| the Postofiice department, nor could Mr.
! Whelpiey find any trace of them or their
descendants. The $4,000 package was
sent from Brandon, Miss, to jackson,
Miss, in 1910, and the letter accompany
! Ing 1t shows that it was sent in conse-
quence Of repeated demands. The most
diligent search fails to discover the
slightest trace of any such banking com
| pany as that at Brandon, Miss, which
| issued the notes, most of which are OF
the 81 ,UG0 denomination. The notes are
handsomely executed, as are large ma
jority of those in the box.-Washingt
Post.