The morning call., 1894-03-31
PUZZLES THE LOCAL POLICE. |
There Is No Reason for Doubling
the Truth of the Confession.

There Is No Reason for Doubling
the Truth of the Confession.
The mystery which has surrounded the
murder of Henry Hillebrand, the grocer
who was shot down in his store at Eddy
| street and Fern avenue on the 90 b of
| Octo ber, 1892. has at last been dispelled.
AT least the police think so, and as The in
| formation comes from a pal of the men
accused, who are a VIGOROUSLY bad lot. it
| is deemed authoritative.
About a week ago the mother of Walter
| Edwards, a lad who is serving term at
Folsom for burglary. informed Warden
| Aull that her son knew the perpetrators
of the crime and desired to make state
ment Captain Aull came to San Fran
cisco and communicated the fact TO Chief
| Crowley, who has instructed Detective
Ben B0hen to go to Folsom and receive the
statement of Edwards. Bohen has been
| engaged on other matters and has not
| yet visited the prison. He will 60 to Fol-
| som on Monday next. 1t is understood
| that Edwards charges that w. II. Black
and kid" Mccoy, whose right name is
Schercliffe. were the men who drove up to
Hildebrand's store in buggy aud COM
mitted the murder.
The main facts of the HildeDrand MUIR
der, which is now about to be again
brought to public notice after all hope of
catching the perpetrators of IL had been
abandoned, are as follows: Henry Hille-
brand was German. 40 years of age, who,
so far as known, had not an enemy 10 the
world. He was behind the counter Of his
Eddy-street store when two young men
who had justdriven up in buggy entered.
and one OF them asked for five cents worth
| of picnic crackers.
| Hillebrand turned TO get the crackers,
and one of the men, the shorter of the two,
pointed revolver at him. When the gro
Ger again faced his customers, the man
with the revolver said, Hold up your
hands,
Instead of obeying Hillebrand grasped
cheese-kDife which lay on tie counter,
and received a bail in the body. The
bullet passed through the liver and lungs,
and Hillebrand died three days later. He
made an ante-mortem statement, in which
he gave description of the murderers
! Immediately after the shooting the men
ran to their buggy and escaped. ALI at
| tempts on the part of the police to discover
their identity failed, and the case has been
one of the mysteries of the police annals of
| the city.
Notwithstanding the fact that Edwards
statement. so far as it has been made
known. is accepted by the police. there is
theory that it is based on revenge and
may not be true. The description which
the dead grocer gave of the men who
entered his store on the fatal night does
not fit Black and Schercliffe, and
Chief Crowley is himself puzzled over that
| fact.
| Descriptions of all the men are in the
hands of the police, and when Detective
Bohen gets a minute statement from Ed
wards he will be better able to tell whether
his story is true or not.
| Captain Lees adds some details to the
way in which Edwards was induced to
make known the facts of which he pre-
tends 10 be possessed. The crime for
which the young man is serving term of
| five years in the Folsom Prison was COM
mitted in this city shortly after the Wach-
horst affair at Sacramento.
A jewery store on Third street was en-
tered by two men. who threw handful of
pepper into the eyes of the proprietor
and made off with some of his goods.
Edwards and Black were soon aftsrward
arrested, but the jeweler failed to identify
Black as one of the thieves and he was
released for lack of evidence to convict.
While Edwards was awaiting trial Cap
| tain Lees was informed that Ned Foster
had purchased large quantity of dia-
monds for $3.50. Foster admitted that he
had bought the jewels from man who
had told him that be had won them from a
woman in bet on borserace. Inquiry
showed that the man who had sold the
1fo- - I'D
The diamonds proved to be the ones
stolen from Wachhorst, and it was then
apparent that Black had been a partici-
pant in that robbery. From other infor-
nation at hand 1t was quite certain that
Edwards was also involved. Captain Lees
thereupon visited Edwards in the County
Jail and told him that Black had
lifted the plant and sold the
diamonds. he urged Edwards to re-
late all the circumstances of the Wach-
horst crime, but had great difficult
ty in convincing him that Black had
taken the jewels and sold them. When
Ned Foster confirmed the statement Ed
wards was forced to believe and ne became
very bitter against his former pal. He
promised that he would reveal the secrets
of the Sacramento robbery. and added that
he knew enough about Frank Schercliffe to
hang him. He kept putting off his reyela-
| tions, however, and Captain Lees repeat
edy had his case continued pending his
efforts to secure this important evidence.
The case was finally tried and Edwards
was sent to Folsom
Black had in the meantime been arrested
and sent to Sacramento and Edwards was
taken from Folsom to the capital, where
he made statement to District Attorney