The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, May 20, 1905, Page 1

| SR The Call Prin o tg-&More News Than Any Forecast made at Francisco and Saturday; brisk west A Distri San Francisco for thirty hours ending midnight, May.20: THE WEATHER. wvicinity—Cloudy i i [ | winds. G. McADIE, et Forecaster. Other Paper Pi N ished in San Francisco THE THEATERS. CALIFORNTA— Saracen.” o— ALCAZAR—"Vivian's Papas." CENTRAL—"A Human Slave." CHUTES—Vaudeville. COLUMBIA— “Terence. GRAND—"The Creole. - ORPHEUM—Vaudeville. " ’ { TIVOLI—Comic Opera. l Matinees at all theaters. SLAPDFFSK WEETS HARD EXPERIENCE Husband of Prima, Donna Accuses | Manager. | Asserts Sam’l o’ Posen Victimized Noted Songstress. Refusal to Sing in Ten-Cent| Theater Takes Strife to Local Courts. I received no she received we wrote regular- ressed to my wife d hers were given to to New York and He told me my wife we took the boat he paying the fare as I funds. When we drew into ew Orieans I observed Mrs. “What does this mean, is my ™ 1 said to Curtis. “‘No,’ he an means that your wife is in that we've got you wher we want you, and unless you sign the contract entered into by your wife with my wife we will have her jailed for debt and we will throw you Into prison. Of course, I was alarmed, and, wanting to get to my wife's side as quickly as possible, I signed the con- tract. Then I asked them to let me go wife, but they told me it was impossible, as it was against the rules of the theeters in America for husbands to travel with their wives. Finally, however, they gave me a ticket and I t to my wife, when I heard of all had happened to her. re told me Curtis and his wife had been maligning me and said that the | absence of letters from me was due to an affair of mine with another woman far away Australia. When I ac- cused them of their perfidy they told me my wife was drunk every might and didn’t know what she was saying. Here was a pretty predicament. I aec- cused of unfaithfulness, my wife ac- cused of inebriety. But we had known ch other too long and their malicious ges did not convey to efther of us even a suspicion of truth. “Then I found how the financial mat- ters were going. Madame Slapoffsk! was receiving a salary of $1700 a week. Curtis took this, cut it in two, put $850 a week in his pocket and then paid ell of the traveling and hotel expenses for himself, his wife and Madame Slap- offsk! out of her half—at least he let ber half go as far as it would. The re- | ity | shortly | right the wrong that had been done sacri- | Sk | PRICE FIVE CENTS. T. LOUIS LAWY INDING. TH ER_WHO SUIT DIED WHILE HIS TRIAL FOR OVER THE LIFE INSURANCE HAS TLEMEN SEERLI BLAIR SUIT DROPPED policies on Blair’s life aggregating $200,500 vhich the Mutual Company alleged werc ler false representations, h n dismissed. This. disposition of the sults is believed to indicate that a settle- ment has been reached out of court, James L. Blair was attorney for the Louisiana Purchase Exposition and was held in high esteem by the legal fratern- throughout the country before his downfall. His wife, as head of the Board of Lady Managers, also held an enviable position. Revelations made last before the opening of the Blair in scveral questionable which indicated that his 2d been obtained by fraud, position and in- rom the Board in an effort to involved His wife Lady M gers and res d ficed her home, horses, | and personal effects, xposure Blair's health gave e the trial was pending he taken to Florida. He rapidly grew worse and died there. It was asserted that Blair took his own life, but never absolutely proved. All that was left to the widow was the insurance policy. — sult was that every weck she ran into Curtis’ debt and now he claims she still owes him $400. “Since she has been in America she has had to ask Mrs. Curtis for money carriages, jewels every time she wanted to buy a piece | of ribbon and every time they charged | this against her. She has had one new dress, which Mrs. Curtis Kindly sold | her for £20, and two rawhide trunks, | which Mrs. Curtis let her have for ach. Mrs. Curtis also sold her some ats for £28, which madame paid for, | but when we reached this city my wife | was presented with a bill for the hats because they had not been paid for.” “Yes,” interrupted Madame Slapoff- ki, “and that is not all. I also received a bill for goods for which I paid Mrs. Curtis once, and God only knows what bilis will be presented to me when I get back to New York.” “When we got here,” continued Slap- ‘Ofl!k(, “Curtis again told me he would put me in jail, but I looked up a lawyer and we may reverse the condition he pictured. I have employed Attorney A. Ruef, and to-morrow morning we will | file suit for an accounting. Then Mr. Curtis can tell of dresses and rawhide | trunks and hats and everything else. We have the proofs and now that I am with my wife her fear has departed and I know that in America we can get Justice.” “Yes, indeed,” concluded Madame Slapoffski, “and I am so glad this | trouble culminated in San Franecisco. | We have friends here that I know will | stand by us to see we TOn't suffer while we are fighting for what is rightly ours.” ———— Criticizes the Press of Britain. ST. PETERSBURG, May 19.—The Novoe Vremya says: “Although seven i ships were blown up during the last fortnight, the British press, so vigilant wherever the seas are concerned, does :lo‘t utter & word of reproach against its y." Indicaron of a Compromise on Insurance —_— —_— ST. LOUIS, May 19.—The suit of the Mutual Life Insurance Company of New | York against Mrs. Appollir i widow of the late James L. ! heirs of Blair to c: ! PREPARING 'Document Will Not Be Ready for Some+T_i_me. WASHINGTON, May 19.—Commissioner | Garfield's report on the investigation of | the Oil Trust will not be ready for sev- eral months, but he contemplates having it in shape to present to President Roose- 3\'&]!. who will forward it to Congress | just before that body convenes, | Commissioner Garfield, who has per- | sonally conducted the investigation, is | now in Washington. He is pleased with the progress that has been made. He positively declines to discuss the question \as to whether he has yet secured any | evidence on which to base a prosecution | of the trust for entering into a combina- tion in restraint of trade. v THE DETROIT COES ACROUND WASHINGTON, May 19.—The Navy De. \partment to-day recelved a cablegram { from Rear Admiral Bradford, command- ing the Caribbean squadron, stating that the Detroit had gone aground at Puerto Plata yesterday and that her port pro- peller was totally disabled. Admiral Bradford has left Santo Domingo City for Puerto Plata to Investigate. ———— '“W EMBASSY SECRETARY | PRESENTED TO EDWARD Louis Einstein Introduced at the Court of St. James by Embassador Choate. LONDON, May 19.—King Edward held a levee in the throneroom of St. James Palace to-day. Embassador Choate presented Louls Einstein, the new third secretary of the Ameriean embassy. The only other American presented was Francis H. Leggett of New York. 4 . 7 HOCH FOLND CULTY I JCK TINE Chicago Bluebeard Is Convicted of Uxoricide. — el Whistles Lively Tune and Wants to Die Immediately. He Maintains, However, That He Is Innocent Vietim of Hasty Judgment. CHICAGO, May 19.—Johann Hoch, who by his own confession Is several HIS. REPORT mes a bigamist and who is charged | Dy the policé with having married at | least forty women in the past fifteen years, to-day was found guilty of mur- | der and the death penalty was recom- | mended by a jury in Judge Kersten's | court, The crime for which Hoch will be led to the gallows ds the murder of his last wife, Mrs. Marle Walcker-Hoch. lioch had been married to this woman but a few days when she be- | came suddenly ill and died. He formed | an alliance with the sister of the dead woman and, securing the latter's | money, fled from Chicago. This woman, in quest of revenge, notified the police that Hoch had poisoned her sister, and a search for Hoch was begun. He was found two aveeks later in New York and brought back to Chicago and con- fronted by several of hls wives. Dur- ing thé . expert testimony was offered 6 State that Hoch had poisoned oman by administering arsenie. To-dey's verdict was one of the quickest on record in Cook County, the jury reaching a .decision-in less than | half an hour. Three ballots were taken. The first ballot was unanimous as to Hoch's guilt and then a ballot followed as to the punishment to be inflicted. This ballot showed ten in favor of the death penalty and two for life im- prisonment. A third ballot resulted in the twelve jurymen voting for the death penalty. “ALL OFF WITH JOHANN.” “Well, I guess it's all off with Jo- hann,” groaned Hoch as the verdict was read in court, and it was plain he was greatly affected. He sat in a stooping position and when the dread word “death” was reached he turned pale, stdred hopelessly at the jurors and then sank wmp in his chair. Hoch’s attorneys will ask for a new trial, al- though the condemned man, after reaching his cell, declared he was ready to die and would be better satisfied if they did not make the effort. “I wish they would hang me to-night, now that I have been found guilty,” declared Hoch. “I am not afraid to die, | and the sooner it is all over with, the | better.” Hoch expressed great surprise at the the jurors did not take time to con- sider the evidence. | “The evidence was all circumstantial,” | he said, “‘and my life was | by the jury, which did not give sufficient | consideration to the testimony offered. | better chance. | finding fault now. It is all over with me, 1$2000 a month, on which she eventually finding of the jury and declared that |11y realizing that Mrs. Bell's allowance ‘guessed’ away | COntested ever since. | Had they done so I might have stood a | 2llowance cut off, But there is no use in | Means of consuming the money left by OLD MAY S00N FLOW INTO DEPLETED COFFERS OF MRS. TERESA BELL. Papers filed in the County Clerk’s office by Thomas Frederick Bell, transferring to his young wife his rights and interests in the late capitalist’s estate, reveal the fact that lands in Santa Barbara County, long ignored, may soon bring a fortune to Mrs. Teresa Bell and other heirs of the deceased, also relief to a score of anxious creditors. £ kS Land of the Estate! in the . South Holds Oil. Discovery Cheering‘; News to the | . Creditors. Syndicate Offers the! Widow Fortune for Ground. Impoverished to an extreme by years of bitter litigation and mismanagement, the once rich estate left by the late millionaire Thomas Bell has suddenly been promised recuperation that may | end in its empty coffers belng restored | their gold and its heirs permitted to | enjoy the fruits of wealth that the fam- ous Californian had planned should be the inheritance of his children. { The first indication that fortune had | again smiled on the estate came when Thomas Frederick Bell-named' in the | will of the deceased as a son, repudiated | as such by the woman he had known from childhood as his mother—filed in the | office of the County Clerk an assignment of all his interest in the estate to his wife, Elizabeth M. Bell. *“I did this,” he sald, “because the estate is rich again | and I want her to be cared for should | the unexpected occur to me.” Just as Mrs. Teresa Bell is reconcil- ing herself to the possibility.of soen Seeing the remnant of her once vast fortune pass beyond her reach, lands in Southern California belonging to the estate of ler husband have been found td be rich in oil and a price far in ex- cess of the originally appraised value of the entire éstate has been set upon them by an Eastern syndicate. ‘When Thomas Bell died years ago his estate, including 14,000 acres of grazing land in the northern part of Santa Bar- bara County, was appraised at $840,000. To-day the Santa Barbara property is roughly estimated to be worth nearly $400,000 more than that figure, which, if realized upon the property through negotiations now in progress for a sale, will relleve the estate of its cumber- some indebtedness and leave for the widow and children asfortune of sev- eral hundred thousand dollars. Bell was not a good manager, a fact that plainly suggested itself when the executors of his estate set about their work of straightening it out. They found the Bell properties burdened with mort- gages and other obligations to the ex- tent of about $400,000. Hardly had the millionaire been placed in his grave before the widow had appealed to the local courts for a family allowance of drew from the funds of the estate some- thing like $200,000. WRECKED BY LITIGATION. The creditors of the estate, read- and the lawyers’ fees would soon eat up the entire Bell wealth, inaugurated the litigation that has been so bitterly Although the creditors finally suc- ceeded in having Mrs. Bell's handsome she found other her husband and to the present day, de- and I hope that no time will be lost in | SPite the fact that the creditors, with taking me to the gallows. I do not want | their approved claims, have been fight- my attorney to attempt anything more | Ing every move made by the widow, for me, as I know it will be of no use. | they have failed to discover a sufficient The ¢nd ‘cannot come too soon to suit me. | amount of funds upon which they could I committed no crime. If my wife had | levy to satisfy even a portion of the in- been shot by me instead of poisoned, as | debtedness standing against the estate. was alleged, it would have taken the jury | Sults and counter-suits, followed by ap- at least a day to have returned a verdict; | peals to the Supreme Court, have even- but this was a case of polsoning, in which | tually wrecked the estate. And aside at least twice as much time should have | from ‘these troubles the creditors have | taken for its consideration.” been confronted with claims to large SAYS HE HAS NO HOPE. {:r!lon: «l:t lthe lelule originating in Hoch denied positively that he had e seemingly close friendship that | murdered a mumber of wives, as has been | ®Xisted between Thomas Bell and the alleged, and displayed some bitterness in | 1ate Mammy Pleasant and later in the speaking of the matter. wonderful influence that the strange \“Such talk is foolish,” he sald. “The |c0lored woman apparently exerted over reports have been spread .iat I am a |Mrs. Bell modern Bluebeard. This is untrue. All| It was only a few weeks ago that that can be sald against me is that I | Thomas F. Bell formally transferred committed bigamy. As to the talk that I[to his young wife, Elizabeth M. had nearly a dozen wives, it is nonsense, | Bell, all his interests in his as are the stories that I made away with | father’s estate., It was sald at the them. There was no evidence that I-had | time of this transfer that young Bell another sweetheart and wanted to get rid | had been made to appreciate the bank- of the woman I am accused of poisoning. | Tupt condition of his father's estate I spent money to get her, but this part | and had taken this means of insuring of the evidence was Ignored by the : Ssome protection to his wife's Interests Jurors.” in the event of future years revealing Hoch said he preferred the death pen- | anything of a tangible nature in the alty to life imprisonment. A prison guard, | estate. who had heard Hoch's talk, said in an MILLION IS IN SIGHT. attempt to cheer him up: ‘“‘Where's life there's hope, you know.” - Hoch smiled |5 and said: “Not for me, and Johann. is | s going to die.” Hoch then comenced to whistle a lively tune as he was returning to his cell. He is said to be penniless. But the latest report is that Bell had higher motive ::(m: transaction. It now said, d he verifies it, erty and is still in a position where he can, through the agency of his wi e e realize handsomely in the event of a TWO AGED MEN ARE ACCUSED deal for the oil lands being consum- OF ASSAULTING LITTLE GIRL | mated. The property that was former- ly regarded as only available as graz- Child Cauwes Arrest of | Ing land has lately enhanced in value of th Mg e & ‘| in view of the fact that ofl in abund- Her Own Father on Seri- that he learned of the sudden rise,in|immediate use. This decision does the value of the Santa Barbara prop- | mean that the President and Secretary | RS LS WIDELY KNOWN WIDOW OF A FFERED A FORTUN & LATE SAN FRANCISCO CAPITALIST WHO | E FOR HER SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA | ) HAS BEEN O LANDS HERETOFORE SUPPOSED TO POSSESS BUT ORDINARY VALUE. ious that the facts should get into the newspapers. “It is. true,” said he, “that the Bell estate has some land in Northern Santa Barbara County and that we hope that it will prove as valuable In the produc- tion of oil as others are inclined to be- Heve. It is possible that these lands may be our final means for liquidating the indebtedness of the Bell estate”— and then the discreet legal adviser of Mrs. Teresa Bell relapsed into silent mood, finally remarking, “I must not discuss this matter further, for it con- cerns my client’s interests, which I am. employed to protect.” Young Bell admitted that an offer had been made for the southern oil property, and added: “An East- ern syndicate has agreed to give my mother $100 an acre for the land, which means that her estate would be enhanced in value $1,400,000 should the sale be effected. From what I have learned our property is sur- | rounded by wells that are producing large quantities of oil and the experts who have been examining our land seem to be of the opinion tHat it will prove as good a producer as the ad- joining sections.” . WILL NOT BOY " FOREIN SHrs WASHINGTON, May 19.—Secretary ‘Taft has decided not to buy any foreign- built ships at present, nor to purchase abroad any material for the Panama ca- nal construction beyond that needed for not Taft have in any degree changed the policy recently announced to govern pur- chases for the canal work, it being ex- plained that they do not intend to take advantage of the present situation by by Congress at its next session. | ous Charige. B b e S e e 0 o R T VALLEJO, May_ 1');.—-111 the county ‘%‘m&n Bell ldnl“' tted - that represen- e .'l-o":':n‘)!-e“ mn—s INCH jul st Faiacia ave conined John | istives of an Eesters syndlests heve b 3 Handley and John two _res- | been I - over Santa Morris ldents. of Vacaville, who are bara property and after making a | WM Succeed Juatice : vl with assaulting a Httle 10-year- number of tests they have pronounced Distriet ¢ Columbin Court of that\town. Lents is - the grand- [it:an exceedingly valuable possess ~__of Appeals. father of the child in question. He | A little-later it was learned that T. Z.| = WASHINGTON, May 19.—Judge Mar- swore to a complaint against Hi 7, | Blakeman, Mrs. Bell's attorney, had re- | tin F. Morris of the District of Co- who I-Vn‘mm-‘t&mwtm. ' | celved fi.:.(: wm“m‘&?“’“‘ Iumbia mo;"mm-l'-.mn;l:u.::- Keys went. 3 land in Santa B & 3 - a| dicated s intention mm..:mqt. T E »mrg:{‘q.‘:umc per arrest of Lents, 3 ; he will appoint former that he was the Senator McComas of Maryland as Jus- ‘Handley 18 tice Morris’ successor. SCHWAB NOT CIVIAG ANY INFORMATION Silent Concerning Contract With (zar. B | e Special Dispatch to Tae Call. NEW YORK, May 19.—Cheerful and ap~ parently in the best of health, but reti- cent when questioned regarding a re~ port that he had obtained a $100,000,000 contract from the Russlan Government for a new fleet of ten warships, Charles M. Schwab returned on the belated Baltic of the White Star line to-day. “Any news of that character would necessarily have to come from St. Pe- tersburg,” was his non-committal reply when asked about the reported contract. That his trip was not unpleasant, how- ever was evident from his greeting to his secretary, who met him at the pier. *“I had the finest time ever,” said Schwab. “Bverything came my way." Among other friends whom Schwab met while abroad was John D. Rocke- feller Jx. who lately returned without having entirely regained his heaith. Ac- cording to a story told by Schwab aboard the Baltic, he took occasion to advise Roekefeller to have more regard to his own welfare. - - “You want to brace up, John,” is what Schwab said he told the son the head of the Standard OQil pany. @ Have a good time and let Pgople save their own sows.” . * 34 e —e Marchioneas of Waterford Dead. . -. LONDON, May 15. — Christiania, Marchioness of Waterford, mother of Vice Admiral Lord Charles Beresford, dled to-day. She was a daughter of r'hu Colonel Charles Powell Lealle, 3 X ¥