Evening star., 1933-08-10
D. e.. Fire Force Has O,vn Slelttt
To Investigate Mystery Blases
Roberts, Painstaking
Work Is Winning At-
tention in Department.
SOlred Hub Warehouse
Fire in First Case as
"Detectiue.o

" VERYBODY knows the District
l. Fire Department has its Watson.
This story is to introduce its
- Sherlock Holmes.
The Watson, OF course, Is
Chief Engineer George S. Watson. The
other is Pvt. Raymond Roberts, the
departments ace detective.
Roberts remarkable sleuthing has
recently brought him to the fore, par
ticularly the difficult job of the Sigma
Chi fraternity house fire. Yet he has
been sleuthlng but three years. He Is
90 years old
Right at the start it Is best to get
over the discouraging news that Roberts
attributes his long list of successes to
hard. ordinary work and little sleep.
He also insists, Alphonse like, that the
credit for the crime solutions he has
worked cut goes to Fire Marshal Calvin
G. LAUDER. The fire marshal, respond
ing in the best CASTOR tradition, says
the credit is all Roberts.
At any rate, Roberts consented to
give a detailed account Of the manner
in which he solved three of the most
battling incendiary fires the department
has had to deal with. They cover three
widely varying types of detective work.
In the 20 months preceding Septem-
ber "a, 1880, there had been six fires
at the Hub Furniture Warehouse. On
the latter date there was disastrous
fire. entirely cutting the warehouse and
contents and doing some S400,000 worth
of damage. This was Roberts frst
assignment.
Drew Plan of Building.
All of the fires were more or less
suspicious in origin, although none had
ever been pinned on anybody. They
had the appearance of inside jobs.
Roberts had the hunch, among others,
that the same person had set all OF
the fires. So he reconstructed lists OF
the entire personnel of the warehouse
at the date Of each fire. Then, in long
days of questioning, he secured the ap-
proximate location of each man IN the
building at the time each fire broke
out.
He drew a plan Of the building, ex-
actly to scale, and indicated these posi-
tions on the plan. He narrowed down
his field of suspects by eliminating each
person who had not been present at
all of the fires. Then he started a
further process of elimination by con-
centrating on those nearest to each fire
at the time 1t started.
These indications pointed to one man.
|
| vestigation unearthed which added
strong corroborative evidence. The last
fire was set at the precise time when
an enploye had taken all of the fire
extinguishers from their usual places
| for refilling with chemicals. This en-
ploye. in taking the extinguishers to
be filled, used a path carefully
marked on the chart) which took him
directly by the suspected man.
Roberts questioned his suspect. The
suspect confessed. He readily admitted
setting all of the fires and was sent to
the criminally insane ward at st. Eliza
| heth's Hospital.
The Carberry School fire. which oc-
CURED April 4, 1881. called for an en-
| tirely different method of approach.
: There the floor was covered with some
gummy, resinous, inflammable sub
stance, which on investigation turned
out to be shellac. In one place there
was a perfect print of small rubber
heel The children's bank at the school
had been broken open and all its pen
MES and postage stamps taken. The
fire was on the Saturday in the Easter
| recess. All Of this pointed to the work