The Evening statesman. [volume] (Walla Walla, Wash.) 1903-1910, 1907-01-30
More Than 80 YeuPs Old, Convict
Has Unique Record
sWINDLED LAWYER WHILE IN PEN
SUMPTION AND THEN MAKES
FAKE WILL.

ST. LOUIS, Jan. 3O.-Within a few
more widely known as Dutch Charlle,
the confidence man, will have completed
his twelfth term of service as a convict
in the Missouri penitentiary and will be
released. Meier has been coming to the
penitentiary at intervals more or less
regularly for the last fifty years. and
no one in the great institution is more
conVersant with it's history.
Generally he has come to the
prison from some one of the Ger
man counties of upper southeast Mis-
souri,, and in nearly every case he has
pleaded guilty to charges of swindl-
ing in connection with bogus land
deals. His favorite method of opera =
ton is to seek some quiet remote Ger
man community and pass himself off
as wealthy land seeker. Usually this
is good for several weeks free enter
tainment, affording an opportunity to
| lOCdlS WdtIuSS, JSNCiIy anu OthSi
booty, and usually winds up with a
sight draft by the unsuspecting victim.
With the proceeds of the draft
Charlie gets on prOtracted spree at
the nearest town. and when arrested he
pleads guilty. He has been in the
prison so often that when three months
passed without coming back the officers
began to think he must be sick
During the lifetime of Capt. w. H.
Bradbury for many years deputy war
| den at the penitentiary and in charge
of the dcipine of the institution. Char
| lie got back after an absence of fif-
teen months.
Where have you been, Charlie?'
asked Capt. Bradbury. as he shook
hands with the old man in the dressing
ROOM You have not been treating
us right
Apologies for His Long Absence.
Il was afraid you would think that
captain reploed Charlie. You see.
they had me in dinl<y little Jail over
in Illinois for a year. l am mighty
glad to get back home, l can tell you.
Another time Charlie arrived. AS
usual. Capt. Bradbury joked with him
as he was dresser in.''
What did you do this time. Char
lie?"
"Oll, / bought a fine farm down in st
Geneive county, captain. l Speculated
in real estate, but didn't have sense
enough 20 stay sober and get away
from that part of the country before
the sight draft got back
Meier says that he was born in
Germany, and, so far as he knows, has
no relatives alive. He says he cannot
begin to enumerate the Jail sentences
he has served in the penitentiary. He
is blessed with a fertile imagination
and a most plausible tongue and has
fondness for practical jokes.
Some years ago Charlie got the ear
of prominent detective, at that time
at the head of the Secret service de-
way company, and filled him SO full of
story of buried treasure, secreted on
an island in the Mississippi river, near
| Quincy, ILL.,, that the detective spent
several weeks and several hundred dol
lars digging on the island in search of
| it. The whole thing was of course,
hoax.
| At another time, Charlie got hold of
a green prison guard just in from the
rural districts and cOnfided to him that
he knew where a vast amount of gold
and silver was buried in the mountains
of Arkansas. The green guard took the
bait and armed with a leave of absence
for month. map of a remote locality
in the Boston mountains and money
enough to pay expenses, he set out in
search of the spot. All he got out of it
was the trip and experience, for, like
the others. it only existed in the fertile
brain of Dutch Charlie"
While serving a term about twenty
five years ago, Charlie, by dieting on
soap, contrived to fake up quite a case
of consumption" He looked the part,
and sent for an attorney to make his
will for him.
SwindIes Lawyer.
The only property he claimed to have
was $500 in cash, which, he said was
in the hands of a well-known Catholic
priest in St. Louis, and he exhibited
receipt for the money given him by the
priest. The lawyer expressed great
sympathy for Charlie in his stricken
and broken condition.
The crafty old reprobate proposed to
the lawyer that he would bequeath him
the $500 if the lawyer would advance
the money necessary to buy the things
a man in the last stages of consump-
ton desired. Il haven't a relative on
EARTH said Charlie. land you are the
only human being that has shown any
sympathy for me- I'll just have you
draw my will and make you the sole
heir to that $780,
By the time the lawyer had adj
,vanced 5000 Charles sentence had ex-