Mower County transcript., 1890-07-09
CAUGHT BY A HABIT.
Some Queer Cases in the Work
of q Detective.

PROCESSION uHu SOLu0 queer cases.
had the reputation of being 'lucky,"
and am ready to admit that luck has a
great deal to do with successful detec-
tive work. have known officers who
were honest, conscientious, and pains
taking, but who always just missed it.
If thcy had been on a case for six
months, and had finally run man
down until he was within arms length,
some one else was sure to step in and
bag the gamo at the last moment. 1t is
an old saying that "luck brings luck. !"
1t was certainly true in my case. My
first capture was that of the famous
Dick Morton, the Tennessee outlaw of
thirty years ago. was in Nashville
when he shot and robbed two men on
highway forty miles distant was
then on tho Cincinnati force, and was
interested in getting close description
Of the man. Any description you may
give of particular man will apply to
dozens in general way. Dick was
about six feet high, brown hair, blue
eyes, sandy whiskers, etc The only
real point was in his manner of speech.
1t was said that he always rolled his
eyes upward when beginning a SEN
tence. He did this on the advice Of an
old woman to break himself of the
habit of suffering, and it was success.
Just week after I left Nashville I
was in Evansville, Ind. AS sat in the
Office of hotel man came in and reg
istered, and when he answered the in
quiry of tho landlord up went his eyes.
When had seen him do this three or
four times l began to compare him
point for point with my description of
Dick Morton, and in five minutes ! was
satisfied that had my man. He had
been shaved, had his hair cut, and wore
suit of black, but there were some
things he could not hide. The little
finger on his left hand was off to the
first joint; he held his head cooked to
one side when listening to you. and his
made no move until after dinner. Then.
as he came out of the dining-room I
held him up with the muzzle of a revol-
yer right against his breast and
the landlord put the handouts on him.
Then / called The local officers and
turned him over. He had two pistols
and knife on him. and his wallet
panned out over $4,000. At this time
more than one hundred mon were
looking for him in Tennessee
and Kentucky, there being re-
ward of $1,000 offered for him dead
or alive. 1t was luck, so far as our
meeting in Evansville, but had l not
caught him as did, and in the way l
did, the affair would have had q differ
ent ending. He was going to settle his
bill and take boat down the river, and
once outside the hotel he would havo
killed any man who dared approach
him.
In the second year of the war a young
man named Cassius Phillips, cashier in
State bank in Chicago, ski pped out
one night with about $35,000 1t so
happened that l was off service then,
doing bit of work for Uncle Sam, and
was asked to take up tho embezzler's
trail had seen him in court about
month before, where he was witness
in a case. His popularity was his voice.
While he was big, bewhiskered fell
low, his voice was as light and thin as
woman's- He had thirty hours the
start of me and had left no trace of his
trail Having learned that be was al
ways talking about life in Paris,
set out for New York in hopes to hear
something of him at the steamer Office.
He had not been seen, nor had he been
among the passengers sailing for any
foreign country the day before /
argued that he had fingered on the
way somewhere, and would yet turn up
in New York. l had been there three
days, and was going up Broadway one
afternoon in stage when there was .
jam. A stage coming down locked
wheels with us, a horse was thrown
down, and amid the excitement heard
q thin, piping voice crying out: 49,.
.'Why don't you do something? We
shall all be killed before We get out of
this tangled"
The voice belonged to a good-sized
man on tho outside Of the other stage,
and I spotted him in an instant for
Phillips. l followed him to his hotel,
and from thence to the Office of the
French line OF steamers, and after he
bad purchased a ticket stated the case