The daily morning journal and courier., 1900-02-22
POUCH FULL OF MAIL STOLEN
FROM PLATFORM OF 4 TRATN 1T
 UNION DEPOT LAST NIGHT.

FROM PLATFORM OF TRAIN AT UNION DEPOT LAST NIGHT. l Man Who Gives tho Name of Edward
 Morgan Caught Tearing Open tho Leta | ters and stufiing Them in a Sewer
 Pipe-MaiI from Along the BerEshiro Division--It is Not Known How Many Letters Were Destroyed Before tho Fellow Was Captured.
 Morgan and who claims to hail from Chicago was arrested at Union depot early last evening on the charge of stealing pouch full of mail from the platform of train standing in front of the depot The pouch had been left on the platform for few minutes before it was to have been taken into the bag gage room to be kept until the 1:10 train for Boston. The mail was that collect- ed late in the afternoon by a train south-bound on the Berkshire division, and the pouch contained letters and other mail matter mailed at Litchfield, Derby and other towns along the Litch- field branch and the Berkshire division. This afternoon mail is always taken up by the train which arrived at Bridge port at 5:08 over the Berkshire division The mail destined to points eastward is placed in pouch at Bridgeport and sent up to this city on the 6:34 train to be placed on the 1 o'clock east-bound mail train, which does not stop at Bridgeport.
 When the railroad employees whose business 1t was to look out for the mail bag found that 1t was missing they no- tified Patrolmen P. Doherty and J. Me- Queeney, who were stationed at the de- pot at the time. They knew that the pouch had not been gone long and that of course the thief could not be far away. The two policemen at once be- gan search of the depot. Entering the mems closet they found the door of one compartment locked and the occu- pant refused to open it at their request. They then burst in the door and saw a man stuffing bundles of paper into the outlet to the sewer. They grabbed him as he was about stuffing in the last bundle, and examining the papers they saw that they were letters In the bun- dle were also little packages of letters done up and marked for certain des-. just as they had been arrang- ed by the mail clerks in Bridgeport. Many of the letters had been torn open. and then wadded up envelopes and their contents together. The thief had wet the letters so that they would wad up closely and go down the sewer pipe @ more easily. He had evidently not had time to open all the envelopes and so had hastily. wadded up the unopened envelopes and the opened ones to stuff them into the water pipe when he heard the policemen at the door,
 The destroyer of letters was taken into custody and with the letters which had been saved from the sewer, he was taken to police headquarters. He is and of sandy complexion. He has a sandy mustache and is rather poorly dressed, wearing no collar and necktie. Superintendent Wrinn believes that Morgan is not his right name. When questioned at police headquarters to as- certain where the mail bag was he re- used to talk and would say nothing more than that his name was Edward Morgan. The superintendent told him hat, since he had been caught with the stolen mail in his possession, he would lot make his case worse by telling what he had done with the pouch from which he had taken the letters He still persisted, however, in his refusal to .alk Later in the evening the pouch vas found on the tracks in front of the 'epot. It is a canvas pouch, No 3, and lad been slit open evidently with a ack-knife.
 When searched at police headquarters Morgan had $7.50 in money on his per- on. It is believed that the $7 which vas in bills is money which he had ex- racted from letters which he had open d before the policemen captured him. n the wad of opened letters which were aved from the sewer by the policemen were several small checks, but Morgan lad not saved these, probably thinking would not be safe to attempt to cash IlGlT Oue OI IuG ClltCkS WttS lOA @0.AU' nd was drawn by the Bridgeport Wood finish company It had not been ascer- aimed yet last night how much mail the ouch contained and consequently no stimate could be made as to how many stters had gone into the sewer before he fellow was captured.
 Among the unopened letters which ,ere rescued was one addressed to Pro- essor Smaller, dean of the Harvard law chool, Cambridge, Mass, and mailed rom Litchfield. In all about one hum red letters were saved, including thosa mich had been opened and the unopen- d envelopes.
 Postmaster Howarth and Pierce N. Iaher, superintendent of mails at the >cal postof1ice, were notified and went ) the police station and examined the ,et mass of mail matter. Since it did ot come from the local office they were nable to say how much was missing. [organ will be turned over to the Unit ] States authorities and will probably g given a hearing before United States Wright to-day.
 Morgan was captured just in time by atrolmen Doherty and McQueeney. .ad they not found him before he had all the letters there would ave been slight evidence against him.