Daily camera., 1897-08-14
RAILWAY ROBBERY.
Not So Many Trains Held Up as
There Used to Be.
Extra Precautions Are Taken by Ex.
press Companies and Laws Are
Being Made Which Have
Their Eject.

road trains held up in this country by
imitators of the James and Younger
gangs. The next year the number was
"a. 1t was 40 in 1895, and last year
dropped to 23 In the last seven years
there have been 1S3 trains held up or
wrecked for the purpose of robbery.
The number of persons killed in the
perpetration of this train-wrecking or
holding-up crime was 10, the number
wounded 5o. The smallness of the rec
ord for 1896 may be partially accounted
for by the fact that passengers and
crews have recently fallen into the way
of fighting train wreckers and train
robbers. There were several instances
in 1896 of deliberate plans having been
made by railroad officials 10 trap train
robbers and kill them, and the plans
were successfully carried out, fact
which proved decidedly discouraging
to the train-robbing profession. The
mortality in 1896 was four among pas
sengers and 80 among trainmen.
Sofrequ .~fend so desperate have been
many of these efforts at train-robbing
that the idea has become more or less
popular in Europe that railway travel
in the United States is about as danger
Gus as is travelled by private conveyance
in the brigand districts of Italy and
Sicily, and it cannot be denied that
there is considerable justification for
the prevalence of this idea. 1t is not
he ciraa bro n,.f fo1,r nd
less boys were sent to the penitentiary
from Rome, N. Y, for the crime of
train wrecking. But terms in the pen
itentiary are not regarded as an ade-
quate punishment for this monstrous
crime, and so the penal code of the En-
pire state has recently been revised,
placing train wrecling among the cap
ital crimes. Hereafter any man in New
York state found guilty of train wreck
ing will suffer the same punishment as
does any man found guilty of murder
in the first degree.
An idea of the magnitude of the dan
ger to railroad travel in the United
States is prevalent on this side of the
Atlantic, and it finds voice in the elhb-
crate arrangements for defense made
by the several express companies of the
country in their cars devoted to the
transportation of valuables.
The interiors of some of the express
cars have the appearance of verita Bile
arsenals. In fact, some of the cars are
called arsenal cars. They have bull
let-proof room located in their center.
They are built of steel 1H inch in
thickness. The doors leading into
either end of these compartments are
punctured with peepholes, through
which gun can be ranged and fired.
On either side is steel projection a
foot wide extending from the level of
the window sill to the roof. At each
end at the side of this arrangement a
port-hole is provided so that rife may
be used to sweep the side of the train,
front or rear. or to shoot from side
hole in any direction from this bomb
proof. These are only some of the
many features of the ideal arsenal car
that has come into use on account of
the frequency of train-wrecking and
train-robbing. These precautions have
been thought necessary by the astute
managers of the express companies.
Meantime the United States govern
.ment- that is engaged in transporting
valuables in mail cars has taken no
such precautions to protect the prop
erty intrusted to its care. To be sure,
the recently constructed mail cars have
no door at each end accessible to the
train-robber, but they have doors on
the sides, to which an expert robber
can find access and where the railway
mail clerk could answer and does an
swer frequently a summons to open.
Millions and millions of dollars are
every week sent through the United
States mail in these unprotected mail
cars. If the train is held up, if the rob-
Der succeeds in finding his entrance to
the railway car and the valuables from
the United States mail bags are rifled,
the owners have no recourse. The gov
ernment refuses to be responsible. 1t
is probable that to this lack of respon-
sibility the governments laxity in
taking necessary precautions against
train-robbing may be attributed. The
express companies recognize their re-
sponsibility and prepare themselves ac-
cordingly. The government seems sat
isfied to trust to luck and. unfortunate
ly, in many instances the patrons also
of the United States mail service trust
to luck The fact that the warm and
fatal reception given robbers last year
reduced the number of train-robberies
and train-wrecking, it would seem,
ought to be accepted as a reason why
the government should take as radical
precautions as have the express com
panies A knowledge that mail cars,
like express cars, were little else than
moving arsenals, together with such
drastic measures as have been just
adopted in New York state, would GO
long way toward making train-rob,
bing in America an almost unheard-of
crime.-Cincinnati Times-Star.
Mahogany railroad Cars.