Newark evening star and Newark advertiser. [volume] (Newark, N.J.) 1909-1916, 1910-05-09
TH0S. F. BYRNEs,
FAMOUS SLEUTH,
BURIED TOMORROW
Late Police Inspector Was New
York City's Greatest
Thief=catcher.

NEW YORK. May 9.-The funeral of
former Superintendent and Inspector
of Police Thomas F. Byrnes will be
dence, 31S West Seventy-seventh street,
to the Church of the Blessed Sacra-
ment, Seventy-first street and Broad
way, where a solemn high mass of
requiem will be said. Interment will
be in Calvary Cemetery.
Superintendent Byrnes, or ~"1nspecor'
Byrnes. as he preferred to be called,
was New York's greatest th~ief-catch-
er. When he was summoned to police
headquarters in 1880 for the work of
-reorganizing the detective bureau lie
found the metropolis overrun with
well in hand, and upon his retirement,
fifteen years ago, turned the bureau
over to his successor as a powerful
working unit which completely domi-
mated the underworld.
Byrnes it was who established the
dead line for thieves at Fulton street.
Below that thoroughfare no known
thief was permitted TO go. To be seen
in the forbidden territory meant the
Immediate arrest of every one under
the ban of the law. Incidents showing
his remarkable resources as a detec-
tive and his executive ability are re-
lated of the inspector by every one
who knew him. Perhaps one of the
most widely known of his exploits was
the che by the narration of which lie
explained his great w~ealth-he was a
multi millionaire-to the LeXow COM
mittee.
Traps Gould T~brcatener.
Jaw Gould had been receiving threat
ening letters from a blackmailer and
called in Byrnes. 1t was developed IN
the course of the conversation which
followed tina all of the letters had been
mailed to the financier from station u.
Byrnes lamented the fact that the task
was so easy. and promised to have the
letter writer within two days. Plain
clothesmen were stationed in the vi
cinity of every letter-box in station r
with postmen equipped with Keys TO
the boxes as companions.
After each letter was mailed in the
boxes Of that district during the day
the postman opened the boxes and the
pla~inclothesmen examined the envel-
ope. Finally one of the detectives was
rewarded by a letter addressed to Jay
Gould. He arrested the man who had
posted it, a confession followed, and
the threatener, h proved to be of
unsound mind, was sent to an asylum.
Gould was so impressed by this ex-
plot that he is said to have let Byrnes
in on every good thing he had during
the remainder of his life.
Civil War Hero.
Mr.. Byrnes had his first serious at
tack of illness last January. Recently
he began to prepare for the end. He
transferred the fve-story building at
Fcrty-sixth street and Fifth avenue to
his wife. The building is valued at
$3.50. 900.
The Inspectors five children are Mrs.
Charles Al Hickey. of 81 West 1o2d
street, whose husband is a lawyer; Mrs.
r. Frank Conville, of 123 East Sixty
ffth street. who husband is a brewer;
Mrs. George McDouald, of 315 West
Ninetieth street, whose husband is a
contractor, and Miss Annie and Miss
Jessie Byrnes.
1t was during the Civil War hat
Byrnes Joined the force. lie was then
a young man. just from the war, hay
ing served in Ellsworth's Zouaves.
After serving as patrolman, roundsman
and captain he was called to the work
of organizing the detective force in 1880.
For the last fifteen years Byrnes had
lived in comparative retirement, but in
that period he had been called in for
consultation on police affairs by all of
New York's mayors