The Appeal. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. ;) 1889-19??, 1901-05-25

Wnen tHdt t1Io OIL Strol.g- arm men;
stuck up one OF their pals the other
night for parcel of swag he possessed
some of. the newspaper accounts, I no.
t1ce, somewhat mournfully suggested
that the incident presaged the passing of,
the proverbtal honor among thieves" re-
marked a retired detective sergeant Of
the Byrnes regime. Now, that's mis-
leading stuff. There never was any honor
among thieves. l never knew crook
yet that wouldn't do his pal as quick as,
he'd eat plate of ham and eggs.
"A little more than twenty years ago
three Class A cracksmen of this town
Trained UP a promising bank job over in
Paterson. The thing went through in;
bully shape. They put the watchmani
under the gun when he stepped to the
banks front door to get a breath Of air
and they had him cordaged up and
gagged in the basement before he knew
where he was at. .--..... LIZ
Ihe vault was an ordinary combina-
ton affair without any double or time
lock contrivances, and it was dead easy
for men who knew how to handle the
blow-pipe and the nitro. They got her
open after an hours work, and it just
looked like the world was their'n, so to
speak, for there was 100000 in new cur
rency in plain sight. They let the heavy
gilt. stuff alone, and made leisurely
job Of dividing the loot into three equal
parts of $4,000 for each man. - a.. -
1.-The lookout or outside man abandoned
his post in front of the door to be in at
the division when he knew the safe was
hanging from it's hinges. The three were
sitting inside the vault. stufhng the cur
rency into their clothes and planning tor
their different hiding places when two
cops suddenly appeared at the entrance
to the vault and covered the three OF
them. 1t was all so sudden that the fms
of the three went right straight up.
while one OF the cops kept the three
covered by The simple gYnzfanning proc,
ess, the other went behind EN- and
deftly removed their shooting TOOLS Then
he quite as deftly distracted the bundles
OF currency from the pockets of each.
This done, March,! said the two cops to
the three cracksmen The cops marched
the three down to the basement, where
the Waterman was still tied up. Then
they executed a walking ba edward move.
still covering the three. got out the iron
door at the back leading into the alley,
slammed the door, which closed with a
spring lock. ard the three cracksmen
were neatly hobbled. ~. .4
'"They hadn't any tools, and so they
aouldn't get out of that basement. They
united the Waterman and ordered him to
turn them loose, but they had collared
the watchman's keys upstairs before
dragging him to the cellar, and the keys
were still upstairs So the three cracks
men and the Waterman were found to-
gether in the basement on the following
day.
1.-The cracksmen's story that they them
selves had been stick up by couple of
cops was secuted, and when the watch
man chimed in and stated that the story
was true, he was Immediately under
suspicion OF having been in cahoots with
the nitro men. The Waterman had hard
time in squaring himself, and came near
doing his bit over the road. He stuck to
the cop story so persistently, however,
that the cop on the bank beat and the
man on the adjoining beat had to make
all kinds of explanations as to their
whereabouts on the night of the robbery.
TO square themselves both had to own
that they had been taking maps and pro-
duce witnesses to that effect and both
lost their badges. The three cracksmen
got ten-year stretches in Trenton.
Now, these two cadets in the rig-out
OF cops were Chicago bank burglars.
They'd come East to wait for the graft
to pick up bit in their home town, and
in some mysterious way they'd learned
about the details of this Paterson job. 1t
looked like ready money and no work,
and so they went to one of the cellar
costumers in this town and had their
measures taken for policemen's suits.
Then they went to Paterson on the ap-
pointed night and just stood by until
their time came. Then they made their
play, and 1t sure was neat and proflta-
BILE one. ~ '.s-& w.. ~
.-.They got away with the goods and the
story didn't get around for three or four
years afterward. Then one of the Chi
cago putty blowers got glibly drunk one
night and spun the yarn. Now, If there
was ever anything in this honor among
thieves pipedream you'd naturally sup
pose that these two 'ud have been os-
tracked by their pals who heard of their
profitable masquerade as cops in Pater-
son. Nothing of the sort happened The
gang patted EN- on the back and ha-ha' q
over the picture Of the three Eastern
nitro men locked UP in the basement
with the watchmen. 2ae&
Those two are still in business in Chi.
cago, but they're strong arm men now
One of them was kicked almost over the
edge of the big divide by two of the
Eastern cracksmen after the latter go1
out of Trenton, but he probably didn'1
mind little thing like that, remember.
ing all the fun he'd had with his end OF
that 100000 that had been picked up will
so little trouble. -. ia 5A
ark-grafters-that is to say, diamond
snatchers or biters-are very rarely on
the level with each other when they'r
working as a team. I particularly recall
one case of this kind A couple of top
notch spark grafters got onto the fact
that the proprietor of a certain restau-
rant started for his home ON a Broadway
car every night about IL o'clock. They
had rubbered on this man because he al
ways wore in his four-in-hand tie a huge
Hashy four-stone diamond pin. The stones
were the white boys and each of them
looked to weigh about four carats.
"fhe old restaurant man generally hai
pretty good bun on when he took the
car TO go home, and he looked good to
rhe pair of spark-grafters. So they fxee
q night TO get that pin They boarded
the car In which the restaurant man sa
DOING IN the enjoyment of his regular
going-home jag, and waited for the CA
to I'LL up with folks from the Broadway
theaters. s
line old chap. very gallant, got up t.
give a lady his seat Then one OF the
spark- grafters gave him the elbow In thu
small OF the back, and when he turned
to put up a yelp the other one pinchee
the four-stone pin. 1t looked a good two
thousand worth, anyhow, to the crool
who had done the elbowing. They go
off the car and made for +t.s II. - 81,