The daily morning journal and courier., 1898-08-23

the proper officials than these messages and letters were all opened and care ful copy of their contents made for the information of the federal government. Then they were resealed and delivered to their owners, In every case the let ter or message contained directions re- garding the place to which an answer should be sent. Those answers were in turn also secured, opened and their con tents copied, after which they were sent to their destination.
 Frequently Webster was commits stoned to execute peculiar orders for the war department of the Confederacy. Anon the most novel of these was that of procuring quantity of paper suitable for bank notes and bonds, l remember distinctly when he was in the north for this purpose he filled three large packing trunks with paper of this kind and was permitted to take It back with him, In this way the federal gov ernment, to all practical intents and purposes, furnished the Confederate states treasury department with the paper upon which it printed its first bank notes and bonds-and this courte- sy was extended by the hand of a spy,
 "Websters fame for daredevil ex- pioits grew until every secret service man in the north was on the lookout for him, and United States Marshal Mo Phail once succeeded in capturing him. He was at first confined in Fort Henry, from which Secretary Stanton later or dered him brought to the old capitol prison at Washington. The men dele gated to make this transfer were, of course, agents acting under instructions from my father, and who knew all about Webster's identity. A horse, sad dled and bridled, was secreted at a cer- tain point on the way between Fort McHenry and Washington. When the trio reached this place Webster put up very spirited mock fight, fell from the horse on which he was riding, talk ing with him to the ground the agent who had him directly in charge. Then for few moments there was a fusil- Jade of carefully misdirected shots, fol- lowed by general scramble, in which Webster made good his escape on the horse secreted in the bushes.
 'Of course the exploit was heralded in the papers, with the result that the two secret service agents who had al- lowed Webster to slip through their fingers were placed under arrest and confined in Fort McHenry, whence they were transferred to the old capitol pris- on. After brief confinement there the government made a semblance of an investigation of the charge that they had been bribed to allow the prisoner to escape. This accusation was, of course, not sustained in the findings, and the men were released.
 Not many days after the escape of | Webster the Richmond papers celebrat- l ed his safe arrival. His work as se | cret service agent of the Confederacy was assuming large proportions and he asked Secretary Benjamin to allow him l a few assistants. This request was readily granted and he was authorized | to choose two helpers. His selection was, of course, made from among the | trusted agents of the federal secret ser vice bureau He appointed John Scully an Irishman, who is now living at an old age in Chicago, and Price Lewis, who was at last accoVnts a resident of | New York.
 Just about this time a Mrs. Green ! how, a noted agent of the Confederacy, was arrested and imprisoned in Wash | ington, her house there being seized and turned into female prison. Two 1 other women, also secret agents of the rebel government were in custody at | the same time and place. It was finally determined by President Lincoln to do l the chivalrous thing, and consequently l the three women were sent on a steam CT which carried flag of truce to Rich mond.
 1 Unfortunately the big-hearted presi- dent did not know that Mrs. Greenhow
 and her associates were acquainted
 with Scully and Lewis, whom she had
 met in Washington. No sooner had the | liberated women arrived in Richmond l than they went to the Spotswood hotel,
 where they caught sight of Webster's s
 newly appointed associates, who were l ignorant of the fact that the women
 had been released. Shadows were put
 on Scully and Lewis. who were finally | brought in contact with Webster and
 also with Hattie Lewis, clever feder-
 al operative in Richmond. When con-
 vinced that the men were spies the
 Confederate authorities arrested them,
 and. after a brief trial, they were sen- tenced to death.
 "The night before the day set for. their execution Scully, who was Cath
 olic, asked for an opportunity for a
 final interview with priest. Believing
 that he was making the last solemn
 statement under the sacred protection
 of the church, Scully detailed to his confessor the real nature of the rela- tions which he sustained to Webster, who was at that time sick in bed with
 inf1ammatory rheumatism and unable to flee.
 "The priest was of course not a mem
 Der of the clergy, but an agent of the Confederate war department detailed to
 deceive the man who expected to be ex-
 ecuted at sunrise The result of Scul- ly's statements to the disguised priest
 was the immediate arrest of Webster and of Mrs Hattie Lewis.
 "Webster was tried, convicted and
 hanged in Richmond in May, 1882 Mrs
 Hattie Lewis was confined in Castle Tunder for about one year and was then sent north and liberated. The sen- tences of Scully and Lewis were sus-
 pended. and about twenty months later | General Humphrey Marshall, an influ- ential Confederate, succeeded in having the men liberated. At this time the 1 ha