The San Francisco call., 1910-08-01
$50 Williams in
BOOK. ...COUNT EN-
Police Captain Duke Turns
Author and Hangs Star in
Literary Firmament

There is soon to be a new literary
star stuck up in the armament. This
time it will be policeman's star On
ordinary occasions the star in ques-
ton reposes on the broad breast of Po-
lice Captain Thomas S. Duke of the San
Francisco department. but within four
weeks it will scintillate on the cover
the literary captain of police entitled
Celebrated Criminal Cases of America -
Morallst and historian, Captain Duke
is about to publish the criminal history
of America since 1880, so that all the
world may admire He will relate the
romantic stories of ladies who have
committed murder. 1t is not to en-
courage, but rather to discourage the
nations youth from emulating the
deeds Of the villains that the police
captain will publish his work. All told,
there will be 100 williamson 10 times
13-in the book
The object of my book" said Cap
tain Duke last evening, 'is not to make
heroes of criminals, but to show that
while some of them might make fabu-
be seen that in the end there is no
profit for the criminal and that he
dies in poverty and comes to an igno-
minious end. My book will prove def
nitely that crime does not pay Sa
KNOWS WHEREOF HE WRITES
Captain Duke, with his 13O poverty
stricken villains, will be prepared to
point the moral that has aroused the
enterprise of literary men before his
time. But none of the other literary
men have had the intimate experience
with criminals that has come to Cap
tain Duke.
In his review of the criminal history
of the United States since 1880, the
year in which modern crime started for
the purposes Of the book, Captain Duke
has dealt with every sort of law
breaker. OF course. the bandits have
come in for lot of space--they are all
in the Duke book-Quantrill, Jesse
James and his reformed brother Frank,
the Younger bops, and others who in
early days aroused the pride and the
| fear of Missouri, our own picturesque
cut-throats Joaquin Murieta, who linn
tied his operations to the state of Cali
fornia and seldom went north of Mount
Shasta or south of the Mexican line;
Tiburcio Vasquez, who was hanged
Juan Sofa, who was killed by Harry
[
Dalton and Sontag gangs. Black
Bart the gentlemanly bandit who
robbed stages with an empty shotgun
and then wrote poetry to the express
company in wicked glee, and other des-
perate characters of California are ex-
plotted in the Duke book.
HIS HALL OF FAME
The history of the San Francisco
police department is told since that day
in 1S4S when six constables were APP
pointed in the city of Yerba Buena be-
cause two whalers were coming into
port and the sailors would swell the
existing population Of 472' to a turbu- :
lent size. The deeds and achievements
of every chief of police of San Fran
cisco, and of the famous chiefs and de-
tectives of the United States are re
lated. The six greatest detectives in
| the United States Duke will name to be
| Herman +. Schuettler, assistant super
| intendent of police in Chicago; Inspec-
tor Thomas Byrnes of New York; Allan
Pinkerton and William Pinkerton of
the Pinkerton agency; the late Chief OF
Police j. w. Lees of San Francisco and
James Mcfarland, who worked up the
Mollie Mcguire and Harry Orchard
cases.
Captain Duke has included the Nor
mon. massacre at Mount Meadow. Utah
in which $50 gentiles were slain, the
story of the Dennis Kearnv riots the
life and death of Little Pete" inven
tor in San Francisco of the high binder
and more than a hundred other cases
to make up his full measure of 13O
villains and 130 villainies. The casual
ties are uncountable.
Captain Duke himself has taken an
active part in police affairs. With
Chief Dinan he captured Siemsen, the
''gas pipe thug" and he participated
in many other police adventures
The book will be issued in four
weeks from the press of the Thomas
Barry company. 1t will contain 300 .oOO
words, all of which, but those in the
preface, will tell of crime. The preface
will be moral.