The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1909-03-31
cruel CRIMES
Against American Parents Dur
ing The Last Half Centuary
MOST FAMOUS CASES

1hS ShS "oo
Short Sketches Of Each That Viii
Be Read With Interest by the
General Reader.
kidnapping is the most nefarious,
most fiendish, most diabolical crime
in the calendar"
So Judge Gregory, of Albany, char
acterized it when he was sentencing
three men to Is years each in the
penitentiary for the kidnapping of
little Johnny Conway in 1897.
Certainly in the abject paralyz-
ing fear it strikes in the heart of
the parents, there is no crime more
terrible. The sickening suspense and
the hopes rising only to fall again,
make it the more agonizing.
Only one kidnapper yer aroused
any public admiration. and then only
after he had given up his victim.
This was Pat Crow. who for pluck,
termerity and cool-headed pictures
que deviltry, stands at the head of
the profession" in America. He
thought, like Robin Hood, that 1t
was all right to prey on the rich.
After kidnapping the son of Cuda-
hay, in 1900, the millionaire beef
operator, getting $4,000 ransom and
making a clean get away to South
Africa. Crow returned voluntarily
to stand trial in Omaha, and was &C
quilted amid the cheers Of the court
room.
Crow left notes on the Cudahay
lawn, giving directions about leaving
the $4,000 in a certain lonely place
in Omaha. The father followed in
structions and got his boy back in
the morning.
The missing Charley Ross Is the
most famous of all kidnapped boys.
He was playing with his brother in
front of their house in Germanton,
Pa, in 1874, when a boy four and
a half, when two men in a buggy
offered him a ride. Charley never
came back from that ride.
Christian K. Ross, the boys faith
err, spent all his fortune, and never
gave up the hope entirely until he
died. a broken and penniless old man
in 1897. The kidnappers we're killed
while burglarizing a house in New
York, and the secret of the boys
whereabouts died with them.
A number of cases of kidnapping
by Indians were reported in colonial
history, but the first big kidnapping
in times comparatively recent was
that Of 4-year-old Mary Gaffney, in
New York, in 1864.
Mary's father was a union soldier
and the little girl was her mothers
great comfort. One day she wander
ed out on the street with her little
pink sun bonnet and bingham dress
and never came back.
The case aroused the sympathy of
the nation, but the child was never
heard of again. The father died in
battle, leaving her $4,000, which is
still held in trust for her.
In the half century of kidnappings
since then Is a trail of broken hearts,
insanity and bitter %desolation. Per-
haps one of the most strange was
that of 5~-year-old Rosie Adams, of
Chicago, who was carried away by
gypsies.
The parents turned all their be-
longings into money and started or
a hunt that carried them as far as
Hungary and Egypt. Everywhere
the girl had been sent on to another
tribe and they lost the trail.
Finally in Massachusetts, the
couple found their daughter in the
camp of Chief John Stanley. Here
came the strangest part of the story.
The parents were penniless and brok-
en- in spirit. The gypsy who had taken
their daughter offered to take then
into the tribe. And the parents &C.
copied the offer.
Daring in its successful rescue at
tempt was the story of Johnny Con-
way, of Albany, in 1897. A ransom
of $4,000 was demanded. Instead
the father, P. F. Conway, a train
dispatcher, collected a posse and went
to a place in the woods where he
thought the kidnapping party was
in hiding. His surmise was right,
and a revolver battle was fought be-
tween the two parties.
The boy was rescued, unhurt, and
three of the kidnapeprs arrested.
One, A. S. Warner, was an Albany
lawyer. Each was sentenced to Is
years in the penitentiary.
There is a CHASTITY touch in the
| abduction in 1898 of Gerlad Lapimer,
a two-year-old New York baby, who
was heir to 100000.
Baby Gerald simply disappeared.
There was no demand for ransom, no
word from the kidnappers. Police
and detectives were unable to gain
any clew. 1t was a nine-days' sensa-
ton, this disappearance of the baby
heir.
It was several months before the
mystery was solved, and then by
chance. Gerald was discovered liv-
ing on a farm near gainesville, O.,
with an old couple Of imbeciles NAM
ed John Collins and Anna Ingersoll.
The baby was returned to his rela-