The daily morning journal and courier., 1903-08-20
CROOKS AND THEIR MAIL.
Queer Ways in Which They Carry On
 Correspondence.

pear almost incredible are the metnods by which professional criminals com municate with their accomplices. No body knows better than the rogues themselves that by sending their mes sages through the ordinary channels they place both their liberty and their plans in jeopardy. But it is so impor- tant that they communicate with one anather swiftly and secretly, to elabo- rate some scheme of rascality or to give warming of danger from the authorities that the clever criminals set up pecu- liar postofices that are distinctly their own.
 The United States secret service agents and the United States postal in spectors run across a large number oi varied systems of this kind. From the stories they tell of postoffices" they have discovered 1t appears that nothing is too audacious for men playing a game the loss of which means for them a term in stripes behind the bars.
 Out in Iowa a few months ago" said secret service man who was trans ferred recently to the New York office, myself and four of my associates were detailed on a baff1ing case of counter feiting. The state had been flooded with spurious coins and some less eleverly made bank-notes, and later it appeared that the same stuff was going into all parts of the country. We could not locate the plant and it was evident that the work of manufacture and dis tribution was being directed by a mas ter mind that was wise enough never to go near the plant.
 There was a suspicious newcomer in a small town on the Mississippi river who attracted our attention. He was a man of some education and very re- served. He lived in fine style In one of the best houses in the place. We watched him for nearly month. There was nothing to give any force to our suspicious, but we kept him under eye. He never got letter at the town postoff1oe that he was not willing that any one should see. In fact, he very frequently read them on his way home and then threw them carelessly into the street. They were innocent-appearing notes, all of them, containing not a clue.
 Every morning at about seven o'clock a young milkrnan went to the mans house and left quart tin of milk. The milkman was a newcomer, too. He had arrived about a week before the other fellow and had bought out a small dairy with money which he said he had left him by his father upon his death. A stout cook at the fine strangers kitchen always took the can of milk and handed the young milkman the can that had beenleft the day previous.
 sThese cans, as we learned afterward, had false bottoms, in which letters were placed-letters to and from the fine ap- bearing newcomer. The letters were from the men who were operating the plant, which we subsequently, uncov- cred in town eighty miles away, and from agents in various cities who were showing the queer The answers were the master minds instructions. The rniikn1an and the cook were faithful &C., complices. The milkman had been set up in business there for the sole pur- pose of delivering the correspondence that directed the whole, works.
 The operator of a notorious get-rich- quick concern eluded the police when a raid was made recently upon his estah- lishment upon complaints of score of persons in several states that they had lost many thousand dollars. He secre- ted himself under plain disguises in a tenement house in Elizabeth street. not more than a dozen blocks from police headquarters. Several postofflce in spectors and central office detectives were searching for him. The fugitive had a number of friends who wanted to prevent his capture, one of their req sons being that his trial would bring out their names and show their com plicity in the unlawful scheme they had worked.
 Tsese men, however, were known to the police and 1t was impossible for them to communicate with the man in hiding-who may be called Logan. Much more was it out of kuestion for them to visit him. But they agreed to keep watch on developments in official circles and to serve Logan in whatever way they could. Within a week danger was lurking near for the fugitive, and one of the watching gang learned of it. He sent a servant to a telegraph office with this message to friend in Chica- go:
 Your Aunt Helen died to-day"
 Mastering his grief with an effort, the nephew went to a telegraph office and wrote this message, addressed to a clothier in the vicinity of Houston street and the Bowery; ..l
 . Deliver at once to Henry Prescott (Logan's alias), at - Elizabeth street, six pairs plain black sox.''
 With this the Chicago man sent a telegraphic money order for an amount sufficient to cover the cost of the arti- cles ordered.
 The socks were delivered to Logan that day. When night came he disap- peared from Elizabeth street. The Chicago man had told the fugitive when and in what direction to go-the firm chosen, the article, their number and color all being a part of a clever code which the hunted man understood. E1