Wichita eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1886-1890, 1889-10-02
Daily eagle
AFTER A WEBSTER HEAD.
HISTORY OF A DANGEROUS COUN-
TERFElT AND ITS MAKERS.
Jim Guyon, Ben Boyd, John Bowdre and
Other Noted Crooks-The Way in Which
Chief Bell, of the Secret Service. Broke
Up the Gang-The Escape of Guyon.


Up the Gang-The Escape of Guyon.
The making of money by the government
has been described thousand times-how
the paper is rolled from pulp at Dalton.
Mass, and a mysterious silk thread woven
into it, which combination is about the only
thing counterfeiter can't initiate; how each
plate is engraved in four pieces, no one man
making the whole plate, in fear that he will
repeat the operation; how the four pieces are
placed together, and an impression taken
from the whole on a soft roller; how an inn
preston is made from this on q piece of soft
steel, which is afterward hardened; how
each sheet Of paper is counted, and how the
plate printers ink and wipe of the plates by
hand, with all the safeguards thrown about
the process to prevent operator in any
way securing BILL or the means of making
one
The great obstacle in the way Of continu-
GUS, brazen and successful counterfeiting Is
the secret service of the treasury department.
1t is composed of a chief, few clerks and a
minimum of about fifty detectives, which is
sometimes considerably increased when work
piles up on them, as it did when, within a
few weeks, no less than fifteen counterfeiters
were caught, all for passing ten dollar
!" cDolci ucOS, IIOll
plate whose history probably has no par
alleL
A DANGEROUS COUNTERFEIT.
1t was in February, 1850, that this note ap-
peared at Chicago, and the arrest on suspi-
cion soon followed Of Terrence Mullen, of Chi
cago, and Jim Keneally, Of st. Louis. Mullen
had been arrested in 1876 with others for a
conspiracy to steal the body of Abraham Lin
coin from its tomb at Springfield, and hold it
for the ransom of Ben Boyd, a noted Chicago
counterfeiter, who had been convicted and
sentenced for a year. These arrests led to
the arrest of John Bowdre alias John Hill,
In May, 1880, on a iatboat la the Mississippi
river, near st. Louis, with $1,000 OF these
tens in his possession, z, 27S sheets of paper
cut the size Of the note and a steel plate for
printing upon the paper good imitation of
fiber
Bowdre was imprisoned, and through him
it was learned that James Guyon, alias Hank,
alias Hamilton, had stoen the plates and
$4,000 Of the dangerous" tens II was as
though Guyon and the plates and money had
dropped cut of existence. For more than
seven years nothing was heard of them, until
last February it was flashed from a dozen
banks in as many western cities, almost stimuli
taneously, that the Nv ebster head" had again
appeared Sure enough it was the counter
felt of 1880, of which Guyon held the mo-
nopoly, again in the field.
At once Chief Bell OF the secret service CON
centrated his men and took the field himself
A dozen arrests soon followed, all of them
persons who had purchased the notes from
Others Through the attorney who defended
some of these men it was learned that Nelson
briggs and his wife, Gertrude, who kept a
road house near Dayton, O., were middle
men" for the sale Of the money. Chief Bell
secured an introduction 10 briggs as Andrew
McWilliams," q crooked attorney ct law Of
Hartford, Conn. His plans to make his iden-
tity good We're ingenious and thorough. He
was received without suspicion as one who
wished to deal in the queer" and then en-
sued weeks OF fencing and diplomacy on both
sides, a description of which would fill book.
The manner in which Chief Bell ingrati4ted
himself into the good graces Of the two would
have been worthy of Nidocq. briggs met his
wife in prison, and when they had served
their time married her, though she was less
than one-third of his age. She was suscepti-
Bile to fattery, like most people, and Bells
nimble tongue soon left no shadow of suspi-
cion in her mind that he was other than he
represented himself. He soon discovered that
Tie III LIle idUSaCtlOn NdS W 10 AO
other than the mysterious Guyon himself, a
lifelong counterfeiter, the man who had the
webster head" plate, and who had got
away with $40, 900 of the bills when Bowdre
was arrested, and who operated constantly.
STRIKING THE BARGAIN.
After weeks of finesse Bell and GIyon met.
The latter talked OF everything but money.
He was Sizing up" the supposititious attor-
bn xviShaJ 10 hr,v- tarfeit
At last everybody was satisfied and the bar
gain was struck INC illiams" was to buy
S25, 900, more or less, of the tens, at 221 cents
on the dollar. Every precaution was taken
to prevent trickery in the transfer On the
day it was decided TO be made two of the tin
cans containing the bills were put in posses
sion of the Driggses The old man was to de-
liver the first, and while he went for the sec
ond Gerty was TO count it and get the good
money for it. Meanwhile Guyon was to pro-
duoe the remainder from some spot not known
even TO the Driggses, fearful were they
that Mac would trick them in some way.
The first can was delivered and paid for in
back room of the hotel, and when briggs
went for the second he was quietly taken in
custody by Bells assistants, who were hidden
outside, and the chief himself suavely in
formed Gerty that she was his prisoner. Sew
eral men had been set to watch Guyon. Three
of them followed him To an adjacent wood on
their hands and knees through Geld of oats.
They were close on his heels as he kneeled
down beside an old stump of tree TO get the
money. He could have been captured many
times, but the purpose was 70 capture HIM
with some Of the money In his possession.
As he was uncovering the tin cans n ter :
rife shrek came from the direction OF the
hotel IL was the scream Of Gerry when put
under arrest Iusrinctively Guyon's trained
ear told him there was trouble. He sprany
to his feet and ran like deer. Doneua, one +
of the detectives called on Lin TO halt and I
throw up his hands. He did, hut it was be-
hind a tree, and he threw up his hand quick
as lightning and shot Donella, tearing piece
from the side of his head. Donela dropped. /
Guyon sprang away through the underbruSh (
end that is the last seen of him though Chief /
Bell vows he viii have him behind the bars .
at no distant day Over SCI 600 OF the 'W eb- /
ster heads" were captured but they were of /
a later issue than the $4,000, and it is not (
known that shy of them had been passed. but !
the plate Is not captured, and 30 the romantic /
history Of that ten years old plate is not vet !
ended W ashingtcn Cor. Fitts6urg Dispatch /
BILLY Was a Good Goat"
Tmet upon hillside highway day Or two .
since funeral procession. l. was a strange
funeral. too, and the corpse was quite as
strange as the funeral tes.n that drew the .