The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1905-07-30
CONFIDENCE MEN.
Ingenuity of Their Schemes Exceed
ingiy Great.


is undoubtedly American in origin. 1t
is only in the expansive air of Ameri-
can institutions that confidence in its
double sense can blossom its brightest.
Whether Confidence be taken TO mean
impudence" or ''trustfulness' it is
equally indigenous to American soil,
and all other versions are but imita-
tons In Paris this genesis is so
thoroughly realized that this species of
sW1ndl1ng Is called lie vol la Ameri-
cain, and the operator always speaks
pad French and poses as rich and &c
centric Yankee.
That character is not unfamiliar, too,
10 the operators who hang around the
{ big hotels at Charing Cross, but of late
there has been a distinct tendency to
adopt the colonial pose. Perhaps it is a
tribute 10 the imperialism that is in
the air that these specious, shallow
Swindlers find il their most effective
cloak. A few months ago a case came
before London police court in which
the swindlers were posing as Australian
sheep farmers who had made a pile OF
: money and were seeing life. Still more
recently d corporal in the South African
conStabulary was actually swindled out
Of his money at Waterloo station as he
was waiting for his train for South
ampton. In this case the operators
We're men from the Rand who were
anxious to give a South African good
Send-off-
In these instances the confidence trick
assumed the form most familiar to US.
One of the sWindlerS has a large sum
in bank notes, the proceeds of a legacy,
which he proposes to hand over TO the
dupe to administer for charitable pur-
poses. He proposes that the dupe
should hand over his purse and money
as security while he is going on some
fictitious eTrand. When both the
swindIers have disappeared, the "come
[oe 10 L. 1ad In, Arr0l frcl iv1n Ia
that he is the holder of a parcel of
Bank of Elegance notes, and that his
confidence has been misplaced What
ever the excuse, this is always the re-
suit.
Closely related to the confidence trick
is the Spanish prisoner" swindler. The
Spanish swindler circulariZes innocent
househoIders, offering them large
fortune-which he cannot get at be-
cause he is in a debtors prisOn-on con-
dition that they will provide for his
daughter. Sometimes il is the treas
uTeS of the eX-EmpreSS Eugene which
he offers; sometimes il is the war chest
Of Don Carlos. Many English people
have sent sums as high as 81OO or &1oO
and on arriving in Barcelona discovered
they had been duped. The persons con-
Quoting the Swindle have been re-
peatedly arrested at the instance of the
British consul in Barcelona. but as the
victims are all trying to grasp at
fortune TO which they are not honestly
entitled they Invariably decline 10
prosecute, and after q few days deJen-
ton the Swindlers are released.
But America. is the real home OF the
confidence man. it is his native air,
and he fiourishes like a green bay tree.
IT is not a swindle there; 1t is a Syno1-
cate. Tom O'Brien, the confidence man
who shot his old pal kid" Wadden,
another American crook" at the Care
du Nord Station in Paris, just ten years
ago, had in his prime two or three
dozen men in his employ, who used
the funds he provided and turned over
to him the profits, just like commercial
travellers They would wait outside
hotels and railway stations for we'll
te-dO visitors from the rural districts
'haySeedS," is the slang term 1t was
easy enough for these plausible, wen
dressed fellows to strike up an
acquaintance, and then the "hayseed"
became a "come-On.
The confidence trick in their hands
had endless subdivisions. There was
the man whose dearest friend had in
vented an electric plow that only want
ed s., 900 worth of Improvements 10
sell like hot cakes. The farmer who
put up some Of his good money Tor
this enterprise learned afterward that
the stock certificates were bogus.
Then there was the gold brick
game" in which Tom O'Brien person
ally excelled. He would, when at his
best, sell two gold bricks a day for
a n q
miner from California, Australia or
Klondike, who had got all his clean
up melted down into one solid gold
brick. He was tired of carrying IL
around and showing it. It was marked
with a United States assay mark and
he would sell IT for $1,000 to get rid
of il. The purchaser learned too late
that the United States assay office
mark only guaranteed the character
of a neat three-inch plug of gold
cd TT nff1
wise leaden brick, and the whole suit
Another branch of the confidence
trick in America is the ''sawdust
game" or the doodle game" as 1t
is varlously called. Here the "bunco
steerer'' persuades the smart Alec"
from the country that he knows a man
who can make counterfeit sreenba
so good that they cannot be detected
He is 'Steered'' to the ''joint," where
the other operator is waiting. In the
early stages of this trick the dupe was
induced to pay for a box of sawdust
carefully clamped with iron bands, and
was then hustled off with much Sc
crecy in order that the police should
not find him. Later, as the fish became
more shy, il became the fashion to
substitute a roll of dollar bills, of which
the upper ones were genuine currency
and all the other counterfeits- The
operators We're safe from exposure,
since the victims had become parties
TO a plan to pass counterfeit money
Their only danger was that occasion
ally the 'fcome-on" would return and
give them a good hiding, but they were
generally able to take good care of
themselves Such large sums were
made by O'Brien and his like that they
wore diamond waistcoat buttons and
invested largely in real estate. For
shooting Waddell in Paris O'Brien was
/ sent to Cayenne. but is reported to
have since ESCAPED.
Another famous American confidence
man who has just been sentenced TO
a long term is Ross Raymond, who
was a school fellow of President Nc
Kinley. Ross Raymond is not his real
name, but he bore it in Europe and
Asia He managed TO attach himself
to the encourage Of the eX-Khedive
Ismail in Paris a few years ago, and
ordered large quantities of jewels in
IsmaiPs name, which the Paris jew
elers could never get pay for, Ismail
repudiated liability. but the American
confidence man did not repudiate the
gems. About the time they disappeared
from the Khedive's hotel Ross Ray
mond vanished too
Mike Ryan, another famous New
York confidence man, used TO provide
the roll (as the genuine greenbacks
are called for several other minor