Martinsburg herald. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1881-1920, 1906-09-22
list OF Thugs OF INDIA
MN Who Reduced Murder to
an Art-Victims Sacrificed.
HOW GRAFT FLOURlSHED.
Relicious Devotees That Divided
Spois Of Their Crime With Tenn
pIe--How Members Of the Band
Were nitiated-Their Palmy
DAYS In Paris.

pIe--How Members Of the Band
Were lnitlated-Their Palmy
Days In Paris.
The Thugs were under vows to Kali
Deyi, the black browed consort OF
silva the Destroyer. She is that terri
BILE parsonage who appears in the
Hindu Pantheon as fierce but beau
tiful woman, riding on tiger, or as a
bideous, blood stained idol, garland
ed with skulls. Banded together as
caste brothers, the Thugs hunted men
to offer them to the deity Of destruc-
ton, and because she required blood
less sacrifice they killed their victims
by suffocation.
The Thugs, not being cannibals,
could not live by mere murder. so
they robbed their victims and divided
The spells between themselves and the
temples of Kali. AS religious body
they were protected by the Brahmins
and by pious but impecunious Rajas,
who licensed and taxed them. 1t was
an easy way for ruler to increase
his revenue and the victims were tray-
cling merchants who would not be
! missed.
During the many centuries Of war
and anarchy in India Thuggee -four
iDhed nightly. Under Aurungzebe. TO
when as AIoslem Kali was an an
holred idol, it suffered check.
The Emperor ordered the Thugs to be
strung up by the let hands in the
Jungle and left there 10 die. The Ban
ians, prototypes Of the sentimental
lists who present notorious modern
criminals with bouquets, banqueted
the strangers before the execution.
These terrors of The Indian high
way are now extinct, like the sabre
| toothed tiger. About sixty years ago
many hundreds were executed and the
remainder transported OF put to work
at tent making and other peaceful
| trades, In strict confinement.
1t was the writer's privilege a few
years ago to visit one Of the last OF
the world famous strangers. He had
been captured young, and sentenced
TO Imprisonment for life in a central
Indian Jail.
Nadhoo, so he was called, had been
so long a prisoner that he was rather
cared for as curiosity, a museum
specimen, than treated as a criminal.
He had become an expert in weaving
and when the looms were idle was by
no means unwilling to talk of his ex-
Ieriences as Thug. He had been
horn in the caste, and devoted early
to the service of Kali. His father led
him to a secret place in the jungle
end initiated him, by the wierd rite
OF the corpse and the dagger, into the
freemasonfy of the brotherhood. He
learned their signs, how to interpret
| the omen Of the owl, the patter OF
the "ramawsi' secret language
of the craft. Being precocious youth,
as he said, he was selected to play
the part of "talker," or confidence
man. The old man illustrated with
ing the rumai, or handkerchief, round
the neck OF the victim. He told how
the travellers were buried while warm
| In the graves that mad been prepared
| fer theIA. For himself it was his des-
| tiny to be Thug. 1T is our Gus
TOM" he said. The potters son takee
| TO the potter's wheei; the copper
smiths to the linking of the ham,
mer."
The garrotters who infested London
| In the COS choked but did not kill the
late returning citizeAs. When chloro-
| form came into use in surgery, the
| underworld of crime, or at any rate
its master minds at one appreciated its
value 1t was painless, it was safe
| for them; the victim would awake u
a state of mental contusion-he could
give the police no clew. The drug pc
came popular with the scientific GRIM
inals who operated on English rail-
road lines, where the closed compart-
ments secure privacy. Sometimes a
| subject died under chloroform by mis-
| adventure. but that might have hap.
| pened at the hands of a young med
zeal practitioner.
In Paris, however, the tricks of In
dian Thuggee have been closely fol-
| lowed. Look over the files Of the
Partisan papers of recent years, you
will find accounts of men found DEAD
in lonely places with leather cords
around their necks and empty pock-
| cts.
A robber dressed like a workman
| or petit bourgeois would approach a
| belated clubman and offer him tor
| sale ring, ostensibly picked up from
| the pavement. If Monsieur did not
take alarm the robbers partner. VINO
had crept behind his victim, shared
his mouth and throat In a moose. Then
with a quick jiu-jitsu turn the thug
heaved him off the ground on to his
own back. like sack of coal, and his
| partner stepped up and rifled Mon
| sieur's pockets. The latter was then
| dropped on the pavement with force
enough to stun him and the thugs