The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, August 7, 1898, Page 23

THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL, SUNDAY, AUGUST 7, 1898. 23 This man, an industrious and honest carpenter, came to his end at the hands of one of the midnight thugs whom a lax police ad- ministration still allows to roam at large through the streets of the city. It was late at night on the 17th of November, 1895, when a group of men were gathered to- gether in a little grocery store and saloon at the corner of Greenwich and Pierce streets. The men were taking a final glass preparatory to turning in for the night, when a mysterious looking stranger, wearing a slouch hat, entered. He called ;o_r a glafis of beer, looked about im as sizing up the pla and departed. > e A little later, when the grocer, Eichorst, was about to close his store, the man again returned, accompanied by an equally vil- lainous companion, all the other customers, save Neville, having departed. The robbers held up Eichorst with their revolvers, but he was too quick for them. Diving beneath the counter he slipped out through a back door. No one, except the murderer, saw how Neville met his death, but it is supposed that the rob= ber was about to shoot the es- caping grocer when Neville C00C000000000000000000000000000000 JUST @ FEW OF THE UNDETECTED CRIMES. The criminal records of San Francisco are full of unsolved myst_er- jes. Time and again the police have failed in their duty of bringing murderers to justice. To give a complete outline of these cases would require a volume, but here are some of the most famous undetected murders which nave occurred during the past five years. 1893. DYNAMITE EXPLOSION AT CURTIN’S BOARDING HOUSE, MAIN STREET. Four men killed and several injured. 1894. EUGENE WARE, clerk at drug store, St. Nicholas Hotel. Stab- bed in nineteen places, and found thrown into basement of his own THE.SAILORS' BCARDING-HOUSE | EXPLOSION. i HE labor troubles of 1893 provided ! the police with another startling | tystery, which, as was only to be | expected, they signally failed to un- ravel. During the greater part ar the shipowrers had { riance with the Coast | Union over the matter A large number of nion men, or s , had en on the vessels, and the feeling of the gen- s toward these intru- ry bitter. Quarrels ., and no good st a chance of ab, this feeling, however, lized into dynamite ex- store. 1895. J. B. FOREMAN. Murdered in Chinatown. CORNELIUS STAGG. Shot at Ingleside House by robbers. ELLEN HARRINGTON. Battered to death in her own lodging- ©000 © youse at 1017 Ellis street. ccoo © ;AMES HOWARD. Died at Police Station from blows on head received in the street. Q ROBERT MOREHEAD. Stabbed in East street. - 2 A. NEVILLE. Shot by robbers in grocery store on Greenwich street. g JENNIE MATTHEWS. Poisoned by strychnine at Laurel Hill. © () 00QC00000000000000000 0‘3000000000000000008 bee; natu ) A CHARLES KCELING. Struck on the head with a brick on Folsom street 1896. © LITTLE MAY SMITH, or May McDermott. Strangled in Morton street. © BERTHA PARADIS. Strangled in St. mary street. © JOSEPH M.NNING. Shot in a saloon on Fourth street. 1897. Y/ 7 i/ e nng‘?q\'.‘n © ISAAC HOFFMAN. Shot in ais own office. i}elie”d h‘he weapon and received SR el Ml e © LITTLE PETE. Shot by highbinders in Chinatown. e he Intended fun TR ont aadiy Sesealo butiii o 1898. The difficulty of governing il September 24 that O 7. H. DOW. Shot in his shooting gallery on Kearny street. Mongolians by laws specially Ly Scoumned an O MARTIN PICHNITZ Battered to deatn with a stone. Rt e hagiong Hexzison, Just JEONG YING CHOW. Shot by two Chinese at 310 Washington street. limits of Chinatown our elabos s’ Home, rately organized police force is practically powerless. Thus, because the See Yup So- ciety happened to be at variance with the Sam Yup, one of the MRS. SADIE CARPENTER. Strangled in her room. 2000000000000000000Oooocfif;oeoooooo 000VOo000 o00000000V0CO0C00O0Q00 kept by 8 . This was the fa- of non-union sail- consequence the store in some disorder, the was never disclosed. Indeed, when little May Smith or Ma- s T despined drawer of the cash register was mie McDermott was fm;nd most famous characters of artariiml open, and drawetiiol Serod e strangled on the early morning CRARE S c after midnight Dot S ‘\ T L A Chinatown, Little Pete, was shot Ceonee o lney v il No was there, but O'Day SR many whose first words were, OF, sWitntseyeral suspecting a tragedy, continued \‘ “The Denver strangler has come his search. There was a flisht £ T o In February and March, 1896, however, Morton street got a thorough scare. Little May tone stairs leading to the nd at the foot of huddled up in a of % 7 , stood was the lifeless body 1 i s P ite Smith was a beautiful girl, only ghing in His ghastly white 7 20 d- is side bealingly 20 years of age. Her rooms a ¢ . b b o o Wwere two _entrances, black va- orway of the one through the saloonand one d at the t prophetic in- t xclaimed, *“I believe in it,” and murdere from the the edge of the street. It was no- then the infer- iched th of y i ), blowing lar door. . There were ticulay t nots who entored . , evidently - z'lde\ w llhA )El or left her apartments. The sharp two ged dagger, all over murderer, whoever he was, re his body, nineteen wounds, any of them dying a one of which might have been r, making the mortal, were counted. had every opportunity to work in secret. It was only when the rent collector called for the pitiful dole which vice pays to capital that the unfor- se impossible *h of the wounds had e explosion was nt of the house wn in, and ev 2 Sailors’ was destroye y accident the ould have been . The miscreant 3 intended to place d valise in the hallway, s day night he police, as 1 it a l » kept the boa rst. Could this have some light might have n thrown on the tragedy as showing where the flend attack- ed his victim. Naturally this terrible butch- ery did not look like the work of a reasoning man; it seemed as a maniac, or one thirst- ing for an awful revenge, could have done such a deed. Yet the police, unable to reason beyond the routine track of investiga- assumed at first that rob- bery was the motive. As if a mere thief would commit such tunate girl was discovered dead, the marks of human fingers on her throat showing how the foul deed had been perpetrated. The police put a close patrol on the street, and all sorts of foolish tales floated around. Among other stories was one of a jealous woman who had horsewhipped a man on Morton street that night, and who had vowed vengeance against the inmate of one of the dens of vice. The police examined and cross-examined everybody they could think of, but they an enormity. Besides which was never got any near- said she had seen a lot of union er the mys- men hanging about, pointed it three whom he vaguely thought might have had some- thing to do with the crime. tery. The ex- True to traditional methods, S "h"'"’h('r‘ e [:f{lonk pE except i (%5 citement caused by of She Do cigar money, this crime had hardly these men to the or might not have be subsided when a month lateran- Ware before he clo: other and more awful murder occurred. In this case the vic- tim was Bertha Paradis, who lived at 27 St. Marys street. At The victim's. gold chain were also untouched. Two sweating den in z ity = = spots of blood were fc > e % = __ the City Prison. They h’f 'd = t;‘e Q"”‘r‘g"anilu’r\r‘f\;!“y‘h: 2 o’clock on the morning of early in 1897. Little Pete was were not charged with any £ Aaiaed o = March 10 her parasite, a Wealthy and influential; for offense, but merely detained it was deduce at the sta Frenchman named Caesar Che- years he had been at the head bing was done upstairs, and the body afterward bundled down bart, found her dead in her Of every scheme and corruption rocms. A large handkerchief “:fig]ch originated in Chinatown, had been literally rammed down while his dealings with white illegally, in the hope that one or the other of the trio might Le induced to confess some- thing. The Coroner’s inquest next idea of the police = id of political bosses were i o5 S 4 e was the e or jealousy her throat with the aid of a car- Th 3 S . notorious. BEd Wit (i oAbt pelice have many female friends, some }’egneé“k:}:‘e‘;‘;"g the amand, sire to get rid of their focrogs later on proceeded against a of whom had been seen in the There was not the faintest able enemy, the head of the Sam Yups. Rather than be annihilated the See Yups put a high pr LI‘;tle iPete's head. She still more recent case, details of which are still fr;gfi in the public mind, was the murder of Isaac Hoffman, a wealthy merchant, the senior partner in the firm of Hoffman, Rothchild & Co. His murder in his own office, at the close of a busy day’s work, seems like a torefonjthe; nisht sbeiore sihe trace of the criminal. Her sou- teneur was obviously the last man to have committed such an offense, and no one knew who man named Tyrell and succe ed in getting him held for t , though the scanty evidence ‘which they could gather to- gether was not sufficient to se- cure a conviction. Y THE EUGENE WARE MYSTERY. “Much like a subtile spider which doth sit In middle of her web, which spreadeth wide,” While fly offenders through the meshes flit And dare the subtile spider to deride. of the many unsolved criminal P ROBABLY one of the most famous mysteries of recent years was the ; fnurder of Eugene Ware, a clerk the sweating process. But the less creature, had had his face 7 the Jap in custody. But noth- page taken from a detective ro- in the drug store at the St. man knew mnothing and was burned some time before with ing whatever turned up to con- 7 2 e 3 eventually released. Anemicas and the Chlafthought nect the Japanese with the trag- / cmz""jfl’g fi“efir;‘md“flt in this so revolting in its character, the \ 3 < this a conclusive proof and held edy. . r ng contrast to motive of the murder was so D <\\ NELLIE HARRINGTON'S MURDER Then it leaked out that Miss Risy tzeatmenthof the.recent completely shrouded in doubt, o A f WO ey Hnn;llxlgtlnn had a great friend, / ,e,;‘t’ie‘f‘es‘“‘e;:gfi)l:g- pflnfl;ma:s == orded scope fc the 5 an elderly gentleman, w 4 ivate de- oA :l‘vln-it’«r‘d:lgtei(l‘i.\rjg okt T SR REMARKABLE feature about the frequently to (-::lrln;fid‘t:l(:eutslee(!l‘ 2L tectives and strove to bring the is needless to say that the police 7 S~ N murder of Miss Nellie Harrington out for a ride in his buggy. crime home to Figel. But Figel, 8 nee ; & & 5 &) was its committal in broad day- Strangely enough no one could unlike Lochner, was a man of influence and position, and Lees absolutely declined to do any- thing so outrageous as to arrest a man on bare suspicion. When Attorney Ach demanded Figel's arrest Lees explained to a re- porter: “If Mr. Ach or anybody else wants anybody arrested there is a simple way to accom- ever be found to assert posi- tively that a buggy was or was not standing outside the door at the time of the murder. No one had seen the conveyance, but at the same time nc one would swear that it was not there. Then it was discovered that Miss Harrington's friend was in an open lodging house. Yet no one saw the murderer enter ~ or leave, and by a curious fatal- ity, Aeath sealed the mouth of 1 Y ex-Senator Buck, the only man = 1 who could have thrown light i1// upon the crime. Miss Harrington was a woman tterly failed to gain the slight- \ & . committ : fu‘ hint of the murderer’s iden- N 7T\ lightoat 1 oclock in the afternoon, 4 ind the man who stabbed Nq ‘ - ¢ Fug . Ware with a dagger in n different places, almost -;L g his body to pieces, is Il at large, unless, indeed, his sin “has already found him out, ol and he has expiated hjfi crime on the gallows. There is a popu- 2 PR plish it. Let th y e JEalloy L5 it of good character, who kept a ex-Senator Buck. N em swear to a o theoty) that Durrant was the lodging house at 1017 Eilis street. Here is where the strange sec- 2‘;‘,’,‘3’.“'“‘ and secure a war- s - On the morning of June 1, 1 ond fatality of this tragedy s e . 2 she was, it is presumed, dres: Cornes In . IThe Senator on: ihe er, despite the fact that have Tescmbled D D ing to g0 out, but she never left same day, was thrown from his the Loroner’s jury declined to But no taugible £ s v the door of her house alive. Soon buggy in Oakland, and received specify by whom the murder Dort o A it ia only after 1 o'clock, the inmates of injuries which resulted in his was committed, Figel was been brought forWiREd Cp the building noticed a smell of deith Tt oAl (T eventually arrested, but the evi- B gl e fire, and the battered corpse of S e e b ot ot denee produced at his trial was ;‘:«‘xlh probably has no £ s l};/ussl I—_{ar;lnglam “‘i’ll?h found ter his accident, and conse- a(l)'l‘:”h’e \Hl;su?géeul::te;n convict urning in her room. e mur- 2 v 3 N g quently was unable to throw Another case in which the po- derer, not content with beating the woman’s skull in with some blunt weapon, had soaked her It 1bout 1:15 on the morn- tng of December 14, 1894, that Police Officer O'Day, patrolling lice raised the futile suicide theory occurred on the first day of the present year. J. any light o‘n fih.e m.urder, MORTON -STREET STRANGLER. in_the vicini of the St. Nich- body with coal oil and set fire to olas, noticed that there was no it, hoping, doubtless, that the e H. Dow, who kept a shooting gallery on Kearny street, on the Barbary Coast, was found dead in his es- tablishment Three blaze would cover up all traces of his awful deed. But the fire was extinguished before it had time to spread, and the police ight in the drug store. This twas an unusual circumstance, though the store gener- d at midnight, the always left burn- DURING the early months of 1896 there was a regular reign of ter- /// 7 ror among the denizens of Morton street and its vicinity. The scarlet ing inside. Like an intelligent of- ficer, O'Day pro- ceeded to investi- gate. He found the door unlocked, and the | murder. One, in particular, a durk-eyed Jewess, had been no- ticed to leave the store for a few minutes and speak to a man in a light coat outside. The woman was eventually found, but it was soon seen that she had nothing to do with the case. An unfor- tunate window cleaner, named Frank Brown, had been seen near the store, 8o the police, fol- lowing the same tactics as in the recent Lochner case, had him arrested and submitted him to . ; o were left with a difficult plece o of work before them. The task was one which might well have puzzled skilled detec- tives, let alone Lees and his sub- ordinates. The motive was evi- dently not robbery, for nothing of value, except a watch, had been taken from the room. The murdered woman had apparent- ly expected some such fate, for she had left two wills, disposing of her property in the event of anything happening to her. The weapon with which the murder was committed was never found. As usual the police started on a wrong scent. Lees got hold of an unfortunate Jap, who had taken a room in Miss Harring- ton's house. This man, a harm- woman for the time being was scared from the pursuit of her ancient and dishonorable pro- fession. The police proved ut- terly powerless to protect her, nor was any trace of the mur- derers ever discovered. Owing to the secrecy with which her trade is conducted the ‘“unfor- tunate” offers herself as an easy prey to the midnight mur- derer. History relates many such instances. Jack the Rip- per terrorized Whitechapel with his butcher knife, but no trace of the man was ever found. The Denver strangler Kkilled three French and one Japanese woman in 1894, but his identity had visited her during the even- ing. All this occurred right un- der the shadow of St. Mary’s Cathedral, where in those days vice used to hold its own un- checked. The police were pow- erless, the Coroner’s jury re- turned the customary verdict of murderer unknown and the curtain fell on the last act of the dual tragedy. S oo JUST @ FEW MORE CASES. HE impunity with which burglary, or even murder, can be committed in the outlying parts of San Fran- cisco was never more clearly lustrated than in Neville's case. small bullets, fir- / ed trom a 2. caliber single barrelled pistol, such as are com- monly used for practice in these had struck his head. The Coroner, after an autopsy, said it was clearly murder, but Lees stuck to his suicide theory. J. F. ROSE-SOLEY.