Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-12-07
ESPECIAL rrLroRAn 70 THE DrspArcH.,

ESPECIAL TELEGRAM TO THE DIsPATcH.I
NEW YORK, December 6.-On the morn
ing of March 20, 1887, comely, fresh-com-
plexioned girl, with light blue eyes and
wavy brown hair, was found dead, with her
throat cut, on the outskirts of Railway.
That was the beginning of the great Railway
murder mystery. She was never identified.
Scores of cleWs turned up, but all proved
fruitless.
During all the investigation and clew-
hunting that followed, the suspicious at
taching to the Froat family, of Railway,
were regarded as most significant. The
Froats, or Fouratts, were a family Of poor
people, who lived in a small house within
800 yards of where the body of the dead
! girl was found. None of them ever went to
of their neighbors did. Neither did any of
the Froats visit the body at the Railway
morgue.
NOT THE SAME GIRL.
1t was found out that few days before
the murder the Froats had had a strange
| girl staying with them. This girl was
proved to be Irish. She had recently ar
rived in this country, and her name was
| Nancy. The detectives found her still
| alive.
Nevertheless, public sentiment in Rah-
way set very strangely against the Froat
family, and few months after the murder
the family moved away from Railway to
Elizabeth, and finally they disappeared from
Elizabeth
Throughout the northern part of New
Jersey there are several families like the
Froats, all intermarried. Around Railway,
| Elizabeth, New Brunswick and the Amboys
are scores of separate families of the Froats,
or Fouratts, Sodens and Keeches. ALI of
these form set in New Jersey. The police
give some of them poor character as re-
CARDS morality, and say they are lazy, shift
less, and generally reputed to be criminal.
oVERTAKEN BY THE LAW.
On Thursday, John Fouratt and his wife,
and William Fouratt, their son, who live
in a shanty in the woods between New
Brunswick and Railway, were held in
s., 800 bail by Justice Ford, of New Bruins
wick, for abducting and OBTAINING for five
weeks Mamie Hughes, the proprietor of
a laundry and carpet-cleaning works
in New Brunswick. The circumstances de-
veloped in the case of Mamie Hughes are
significant as bearing on the Railway mur-
der. 1t cannot be said that anything yet is
proved, but, all things taken together, and
the whole history of the Railway case re-
viewed, the facts Just discovered are deserv-
ing of further investigation. These are the
facts discovered:
lit seems to be common thing for
different families of Froats or Fouratts to
detain or to persuade to remain among them
young women whom they. chance to find,
and for these young women to be taken
from one family to another.
A SUSPICIOUS SIMILARITY.
2-william Fouratt. one Of those con-
cerned in the alleged abduction of Mamie
Hughes, told the girl (according to her
story) that in the spring, two years ago, he
met German girl, wearing black
fur cape and carrying black satchel,
on a road near his fathers house,
took her to the house, and kept her there
two weeks. One night Fouratt and the
girl started out to go to a party. The two
quarreled, the girl ran away and Fouratt
said that that was the last he saw of her.
Third-This girl, as described by Fouratt,
bears a general resemblance to the girl
found murdered at Railway. On the night
or the night before the murder there was a
party held by the Sodens. Keeches and
Fouratts or Froats, at Clinton Froat's
house, near Railway. Clinton Froat's
house is eight miles away from that of his
new Brunswick relatives.
MAMIE HUGHES STORY.
Mamie Hughes disappeared from her
home in New Brunswick on October % last.
Her father lives out on the road to Piscata-
way, eastward from New Brunswick, and
at o'clock in the evening of the day
named Mamie left her home to come
to her aunt's house in this city. She
was to take the train at Stelton, the first
station on the Pennsylvania Railroad east
of New Brunswick, and she started to walk
there, distance from her home of a couple
of miles. She missed the train st the sta
ton, and then started for the house of Asher
Fleming, who lived not great way of,
and with whose daughter she was ac-
quainted.
She lost her way, the rain fell heavily,
and she applied for shelter at the first mouse
she came to. It was the house of the
Fouratts. She says that the Fouratts took
her in and detained her there for two
weeks During this time young William
Fouratt Che is 26 years old, his father 72,
and his mother 64) paid her many atten-
tions, and asked her to marry him. He
told her not to be afraid, as his father and
himself had often detained girls there. He
then told her the story of the German girl,
as related above.
FORCED TO BE WED.
Mamie says she refused to marry Will
lam, and that the old man Fouratt then took
her in boat down the Raritan river, to
the house of his other son, james, at Key
serVille, Staten Island, and that there she
was forced to marry William, a minister
named Wardlow performing the ceremony.
The Hughes family were much alarmed
over the disappearance of Mamie. De-
tectives were employed, and finally De-
tective Gregory, of New Brunswick, got
trace of the girl at KeyserVille.
He went there and brought her to her home.
On the day Detective Gregory brought
Mamie Hughes home, and while the de-
tective was at the girls home, old Mrs.
Fouratt, her son William and young girl
we're seen coming down the road near the
house in a wagon. Detective Gregory ar
rested the whole party, and took them into
Mr.. Hughes, house.
ANOTHER PITIFU1 TALE.
Then another pitiful history was un-
yelled. The girl in the wagon was found to
be Katie Ellis, 16 years old, the daughter of
a widow living at KeyserYille, Staten |
Island, She cried with Joy when |
the detectives arrested the Fouratts. She |
said she had been hired in Keyserville to |
come and work for the Fouratts. near New |
Brunswick, not knowing who these people |
were While at the Fouratts' William |
Fouratt tried to get the girl to marry him,
and also assaulted her.
In the New Brunswick Jail on Thursday |
night the detectives asked William FouraJt |
if he knew anything about the girl found
murdered at Railway. Fouratt turned as
white as a sheet and trembled. He said
that he did not know anything about
the girl He at first denied that he had |
met German girl on the road shortly be-