Waterbury evening Democrat., 1906-05-29
MONEY MYSTERY CLEARED
Secret SerYice Men Have Been Working
 on Ii For Some Time.
(Special to Democrat.)

Washington, D. C., May 29.-Se- |cret service detectives have just clear ed up money mystery that has been worrying the sub-treasury officials at Chicago and the authorities of the department at Washington for sey- eral weeks Some time ago the sub treasurer at Chicago discovered that all the bills of large denomination coming from the collector of customs at Detroit bore the names ot business firms in ink Whether 1t was some new advertising scheme or the de- liberate work of some person with an ulterior object in view could not be ascertained. The statutes distinctly prohibit the printing, writing or im- pressing of any characters upon , Uncle Sam's money, and as the in coming of the marked bills continued | the secretary of the treasury handed the case over to Chief Wilkie of the secret service to run down. Agents of MT Wilkie's bureau visited Detroit, where the bills came from, but for some time no clue could not be ob- tained that indicated either the per- petrator or the object of the work. No bills of less than $50 were mark
 ed with the names of the business firms. and all the concerns "men- | tioned' on the faces of the bank
 notes were engaged in the foreign | trade. Names of houses transacting 1 local business exclusively and hay- ] ing no dealings with the collector of customs never appeared on the green
 backs It was observed, also, that the
 names were all written in the same
 hand. When the secret service men l interviewed the managers of the firms
 whose names were found on the
 money. all of them professed absolute
 ignorance of the proceeding. Most of l them were conversant with the law
 forbidding such treatment of good
 money. they said, and the most searching investigation made in the
 counting rooms of these concerns re-
 suited in no light The collector Of
 customs at Detroit said that he knew
 nothing of the strange handwriting; l all he could vouch for was the fact that when the money was received from the business houses. 1t bore their
 names. At last. however. the mys- I tery was cleared away The clerk of
 one of the importing concerns hap-
 pened to remember that when he
 made payment at the collectors of
 fee. using aahundred dollar bill. the
 cashier who received the money
 wrote something on the corner of
 the note The secret service men at once interviewed the cashier at the
 collectors office and he shouldered all the blame. He was new in the
 ioh. he said and was not familiar
 with big bills Therefore. in order to
 protect himself If any of them should
 ever prove to be counterfeit. he made
 it rule to mark every bill of $50 or
 over. with the name of the man from
 whom It was received. The collector
 of customs and the secret service men
 had short heart-to-heart talk with
 that young cashier. and suggested
 that a better way to identify big
 bill was to take down It's check num- | Der on sepa~ate sIin Of paper. rhe \ name of the last holder Of the bill
 could very easily he placed opposlte
 the Identification number. thev told him. and. in the event of trouble. he
 would he inst as we'll nrotected as though he had written the name Of
 the concern all over the faces and
 hacks of the hill The cashier prom
 ised to follow these instructions to
 the letter and the mysterious mark
 ing of large bills has ceased.