The Grenada sentinel. [volume] (Grenada, Miss.) 1868-1955, 1905-08-19
ENGLISH TRAIN WATCHERS.
Shrewdest Detectives Employed in
Tracing Criminals on
Railways.


One Of the most difficult tasks the
police have to perform is that of
tracing a man on the railway, where
there. are endless chances Of escape;
and 400 of the shrewdest detectives
on earth are constantly at work
haunting the great railway termini
and the lines that lead from the me-
tropolis to the coast.
The detective employed at this
work must, before all things, be able
to recognize a man from a written de-
scription. Moreover, he must be more
or less a walking timetable on this
particular railway. Every boat train
from any English seaport is watched
at both ends, and generally carries a
detective on board.
1t often happens that the train
watcher has to shadow a man, though
he has not the power to arrest him,
especially anarchists going to and
from this country, the watching OF
whom is calculated to cost US be-
tween $40, 900 and 100000 a year,
says London Tit-Bits. A register is
kept OF every suspected person arriv-
ing in this country, and his every
movement noted until he leaves these
shores, for which the train watcher is
responsible.
The first thing the watcher has to do
on recognizing his mar is to find out
where he is going if he is not liable
to arrest, and this is not an easy
matter. A train watcher on a south
ern railway adopted a clever subter-
fuge in order to obtain this knowledge
a short time ago. Seeing the man he
was shadowing embark or the train he
.leaped in the guards van just as the
train was on the 10 and quickly eX-
planned matters to the guard. Before
the train drew up at the first stop the
detective had changed clothes with
the guard, and when the train stopped
he got out, and in this disguise sue
ceeded in examining all the tickets of
the passengers without raising sus-
picion, including that of the man he
was shadowing.
4OILC 4 WdL(ACL caught lnC
wrong criminal by accident on the
boat train from Dover, a short while
since. He Swallowed a man into the
train, believing him to be a suspected
person of whom warning had been
given by the French police. But be-
fore they had progressed very far on
the journey he found to his chagrin
that he vas not the man he sought,
and he intended to leave the train at
the first stopping place, when the way
the man placed his hand to his clean
shaven face, as If in search of his
mustache, aroused his suspicious.
Consulting his notebook, he found
his vis-a-vis tailed with the descrip-
ton of a criminal who had slipped
through the hands of the police some
months previously, and before the end
OF the journey he had the man under
arrest. Though he was not the GRIM
inal he sought, he was the identical
individual who had escaped the police
shortly before, and finding France too
hot to hold him had doubled back en-
route for America, and shaved off his
mustache to escape detection.
The arrest of Meunier, the famous
anarchist, who destroyed a Partisan
cafe with dynamite II years ago, by
superintendent Melville, at Victoria
may be cited as an instance
OF the difficult work of the train
watcher. Scotland Yard received a
Geographic description of Meunier,
who was believed to be attempting to
reach England, and with but this
meager information Melville set out
watch the boat trains at Victoria.
Later on he saw a man who an
swered the description the French po-
lice provided, and, putting his hand ON
shoulder, addressed him by his
name. Instantly the anarchist struck
out with his fist, and together they
fell fighting to the platform, Meunier
to get to his revolver. But q
day or two later the great criminal
was on his way back to France in
custody, and had to pay the penalty
Of his crime.