Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1893-11-09

In spite of the fact that the employees
OF the mint of the United States handle
sums of money or very valll-
able bullion every day, the list of rob
berries of United States mints is very .
short. The memory of the present Off .
GERS of the mint bureau does not run !
beyond the NeguS case, to which Coch- i
ran, the Philadelphia mint thief, re-
ferred when he claimed that his theft I
of gold bullion was justified because
he had saved large amounts to the
government. Cochran was the assist
ant to the weighing clerk in 1851. when
$4,000 of gold dust was stolen from
the Philadelphia mint, and it was on
his information that the thief was ap-
pretended The claim which he made
when arrested in Philadelphia was
that he was entitled to all of the sal
airy of NeguS, his predecessor, rs well
as to his own. The officials of the
mint bureau, says the Washington Star,
think that this is one of many cum
ming tricks by which Cochran will seek
to evade punishment for his crime.
'They will try the insanity dodge
! in COchran'S case" said the director OF
the mint, Mr.. Preston, discussing the
case a few days ago But l do not
believe that they will succeed in get
ting him eff He had no consideration
for others. He did not stop to think
of the position in which he was placing
them. The position iii which [ was
placed was most awkward. / had
weighed the gold in the vault in 1887,
and while / could not have been held
legally responsible for any shortage,
[ would have been held to a moral ac-
cOuntability. And the most unpleasant
feature of the case for me was this:
When the investigation of the theft
was made it was found that some Of
the missing bars had been in the last
row and that one of them should have
been at the bottom Of the last pile
Of gold. OF course, if Cochran had not
confessed, they would have said that
even if he had hooked the gold, which
was near the door, it would have been
impossible for him to have got at these
bars, which were placed under such
an enormous weight of metal. 1t was
| a fortunate thing for me that Cochran
did not keep his mouth shut though
) it would have been a good thing fOl
him if he had. When he made his
confession he told how he had gone
into the vault after much of the gold
l had been removed and had taken ten
bars from the last stack and shot them
: into the ventilatOr. That completely
eXOnerated me. Cochran made the
/ case very easy for the secret service
people, If he had said nothing there
/ would always have been Il doubt
/ whether that gold really went into the
t vault in 1887. / knew that it went in
: because I saw every bar put in place
: A record is kept at the assay office
: of each melt of bullion, and the bars
: from each melt are marked so as tt
| be thoroughly identified. / had an ole
t invoice of the New York assay office
: and with this in my hand, i checked
5 each bar of gold as it went into the
2 vault Melt No. so and so would be
entered as containing so many ounces
of gold cast in 80 many bars. These
bars and their weights had to checl
r the truck Then [ followed the work
f man with his truck into the vault an(
: saw each of the bars Jmloaded ant
2 put in place. In the meantime, Mr.
2 Fox sat there and watched the depOsi
5 of the bars and watched the bars unit
1 they We're all in place and the vaul
5 was ready for sealing. The lattice(
r door, behind which these bars were
5 stored was really not put up so much
? for protection as to separate this colo
from the other bullion stored in the
, mint.
Cochran may be crazy" said Mr.
Preston, 'ibut he is the kind of crazy
: man that I want to see behind the
| bars. He was cute enough to draw
, $40 on account of his salary only /;
| few days before the discovery of the
theft was made; though he had more
: than $1,000 at his house and did moi
: need the advance on his salary at all
The preparations which he had made tC
t conceal his crime We're remarkable
: He had a safe set in the wall of his
house so cleverly that you could hunt
: all day and not find it. He had secret
: springs in the panels of his door, and
, behind them he had concealed a full
METERS Outfit-crllcible. tongs, gloves
and everything. He had a circular
stove in the top Of his house made
expressly for melting. He melted the
bullion and added silver to it so that
it was neither standard, sterling or
fine. In this way he avoided the posi-
bility of suspicion when the express
company delivered the bullion at the
mint for him. Oh, he was a cute one
But he went all to pieces when they
proposed to take the bullion out of
the vault and coin it. He begged the
acting superintendent to have bullion
sent over from the New York assay
office De of the arguments that he
used was that the bullion was piled
up so prettily that he liked to show it
to visitors and that it would be a
hame to disturb it. When he heard
that they had asked me to send q
man over to supervise the weighing
out, he got leave of absence over to
Washington and I found him at my
house at 10 O'Clock at night. He
begged me then not to have the vault
opened. When I told him that a man
had already been sent over from my
| IL -, +I,.,+