The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1931-09-11
Terror SIEGE
IS PROBED IN
BOAT MYSTERY
Brunei Tells of Outrage
and Murder at Hands of
Bay Pirates.
TOSS MATE OVERHEARD
Bloody Deck Evidence OF
Struggle in Strange
Sea Tragedy.
BY SIDNEY b. WHIPPLE
United Press stan Correspondent

SYOSSETT, L. L, Sept. IA
willing guest" at Mineola police
headquarters. Mrs. Benjamin P.
Ceilings slept Thursday might
under the protection of Long Island
police, seeking to recover her shats
4 tered senses after a night of what
she had described Historically as
piracy, assault and murders
aboard her husbands motor boat.
the Benguin.
Today she was taken to Oyster
! Bay, l.. /, to re-enact the events
preceding and following the dis
appearance of her civil engineer
husband from their motor boat, the
Penguin, Thursday. Mrs. Ceilings,
an attractive brunette of %, was
attended by Inspector Harold King
OF the Nassau county police.
Police announced the discovery
on board the mystery boat Penguin
of a revolver and a broad bladed
! hunting knife. The revolver was
secreted beneath cushions on a seat
on board the strange craft.
1t was admitted that the weapons
might be the customary equipment
of boat, but the Investigators att
tached Importance to them. They
tore up the deck of the little boat
seeking further clues.
Drag Water for Body
Mrs. Ceilings was taken back to
Mineola by motor car after res
enacting her story of how her huss
band was thrown overheard.
Police continued to drag the
waters of Long Island sound for
traces of her husband, retired civil
engineer, believed to have been
killed and thrown overheard by off,
shore pirates or rum-runners, while
they checked over certain dis
crepancies in Mrs. Ceilings amazing
story of terrorism.
The disconnected story of Mrs.
Ceilings, who was found adrift in
another motor boat miles from the
scene of the tragedy, is said to CO.
incide in its main points, however,
with that told by Barbara Ceilings,
5, the only unframed occupant of
the Penguin, who was picked up
Thursday morning by fisherman
while the little cabin motorboat was
drifting aimlessly near oyster Bay.
Nassau county authorities, fur
| thermore, attributed many of the
seeming discrepancies to the effect
of terror on Mrs. Ceilings mind, as
we'll as desire, at first, to cloak
the fact that two men, lone about
so and the other about 1872 had at
tackled her after Ceilings had been
tiled and thrown overheard"
Child, S, Survives
The tragedy was disclosed when
. the yacht Valentine, with a party
headed by N. L. Noteman, nearly
crashed into the derelict Penguin.
Boarding the Penguin, Noteman
found only the child, Barbara,
aboard. Barbara, who had been
sleeping, told of hearing a fight on
deck, but did not comprehend its
significance. She was taken ashore,
Almost at the same hour Mrs.
Ceilings was discovered, crying for
help, in a motorboat moored off
Oyster Bay. In the boat was a
blanket labeled, "St. Charles Hotel.'s
tel"
Mrs. Ceilings attempted to give a
coherent report of the nights events.
She said the Penguin, on which her
family has been spending the sum-
mer in short cruises, was boarded
by two men who demanded Col.
lings take them across the sound I'd
Norwalk. Her husband refused. She
sald-although he was offered $1O0
because he has no night lights on
the boat.
After an argument, according ia
her story, the men drew revolvers.
held Ceilings on deck and locked
her in the cabin. In her fear. she
took off two diamond rings and hid
them in the shoes of Barbara. who
was asleep. The boat was started.
she said, and somee time later she
she said and some. time later she
South Norwalk; this is Stamford =
A moment later she heard the thud
OF body on the deck, and the
words, Tie him up
Assaulted, Set Adrift
Whether she broke her way out
of the locked cabin, or whether the
door was opened by the pirates
she was not Sure-a short time aft~
terWard she found herself thrust
into canoe, and assaulted by the
older OF the pair. Still later-aIo
though she does not remember the
event-she was put into the moored
motor boat in which she was found.
The mystery of an air-infated
mattress found in the Penguin's
dinghy was explained when Mrs.
Ceilings told authorities she threw
1T overheard in hope that her nus.
band, if able to struggle, might seize
it and save himself.
Examination of the Peouir1
showed signs Of struggle, blood
stains on the deck, broken milk bot
ties and a blood-stained boathook.
Ceilings, possessing a modest for
tune sufficient to care for living ex-
penSes, was educated at Exeter and
Yale, where he was an honor stu-
dent.
-Four years ago. at the age of "a.
he retired, having accumulated suf-
ficient wealth to give him an an
nual income of approximately So
600. Boating was his hobby. and
the family had intended to sail to
Florida within short time, on the
Penguin.