IDENTIFICATION OF A LITTLE GIRL FROM A DESCRIPTION GIVEN OF HER FATHER,
LEADS TO THE LATTER'S ARREST.
Identification of criminals from descriptions is not always an easy
task, for two reasons. First, there are but few men who can
intelligently describe a person from memory. This is an art within
itself. The second reason is, it takes so little to change the general
appearance of a man to such a degree that it is hard to pick him up from
a mere description, that is, unless the man wanted has some peculiar
feature or form that is very noticeable. The ordinary man, to change his
general appearance, has to do but little. A change of shape or style of
hat or clothing, the cutting off or growing of a mustache, or even a
haircut or shave will often serve the purpose. I have never claimed to
have what is today called "a camera eye" but I did a piece of
identification work while special agent of the Allegheny Valley Railroad
in the early '70s of which I have always been proud, for the reason that
there has absolutely never been another case like it in the police
annals of the entire country.
During the spring 1874, a man giving the name of Joseph Chalfont applied
to Mr. Thomas M. King, the Division Superintendent of the Allegheny
Valley Railroad, at Pittsburg, Pa., for a situation as locomotive
engineer. This man, Chalfont, was a rather remarkable person, appearing
to be about thirty-six years of age. He stood more than six feet in
height, with extremely long arms and legs. His complexion was dark and
sallow, and his hair coarse and black. His neck was very long, with a
noticeable "Adam's Apple." His cheek-bones were high, and his nose
straight and long. His eyes were beady and black, being set far back in
his head and very close together; they were crowned with a bushy pair of
eyebrows, which met above the ridge of his nose. Then to make the
picture more complete, his forehead was low, giving his head a small,
bullet-like appearance. The reader can see that a description of this
man, if given accurately and with any care could be almost as good as a
photograph.
Chalfont presented a letter of recommendation from the Master Mechanic
of the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern Ry., at Buffalo, N. Y. The letter
was very good, and stated that Chalfont had been in the employ of that
company for a couple of years, and that he had left its service of his
own accord, because he hoped to benefit himself by a change of climate.
Supt. King was a close observer, and a good judge of human nature. He
was badly in need of men at the time, and being rather impressed with
Chalfont's appearance and manner, he examined him as to the rules
governing the movement of trains. He stood a fair examination and was
engaged. It is usual for an engineer who has not been promoted on a
road, or who comes from another road, to spend several weeks in riding
on the engines back and forth over the portion of the road on which he
is expected to run. In this way a man could become familiar with all the
grades, switches, side-tracks, curves, signals and so forth. Chalfont
was given a copy of the company's rules and an order to learn the road.
When he had done this he was given freight engine No. 42 to haul freight
between South Oil City and Pittsburg. One day he was given a train of
empty oil tanks at Pittsburg, and started for South Oil City with them.
He arrived there in due time and turned the cars in safely. The
following evening he was given a train of forty-five full oil tanks with
orders to take them to Pittsburg. When he reached Sarah's Furnace, about
half the distance to Pittsburg, he received orders to run upon the
side-track there and allow a north-bound freight to pass him. He took
the siding as he had been ordered, and in due time the first section of
the freight met and passed him there. The engine on this section carried
two red lights, which is the warning to railroad men that another
section is following the first one, and it has the same roadway
privileges as the first section. It therefore became the duty of
Chalfont to remain upon the siding until the second section had passed
him. Instead of doing this, however, Chalfont pulled out on the main
line and started for Pittsburg. About one and a half miles south of
Sarah's Furnace there is a curve known as Hard Scrabble Curve, which is
one of the shortest and most dangerous curves on the road. Here on this
curve Chalfont's train collided with the second section which was going
north. Both engines were about the same size and weight, so when they
met the force of ninety-five empty cars going north and forty-five
loaded cars going south caused the engines to rear up in front, crushing
the machinery of both. The fire from the boilers immediately spread, and
soon the oil tanks were a mass of flame. As the heat grew greater the
tanks exploded, scattering the blazing oil over the surface of the
Allegheny River. The current was quite strong and it carried the blazing
oil down-stream for miles, spreading destruction as it went. The heat
from the oil changed the wreckage into a mass of molten metal.
Chalfont's fireman was crushed to death, as was his front brakeman. The
same fate overtook the engineer, fireman and brakeman of the north-bound
train. The bodies were cremated in the blazing oil.
At this time oil was worth from $7.00 to $8.00 per barrel. The amount of
oil lost totals up to nearly $200,000 in value. The company's loss in
property was not less than $500,000, besides being responsible for the
loss of the five lives. All this destruction was caused by the
incompetency of Chalfont and the negligence of his conductor.
Chalfont luckily, or rather unluckily, escaped with his life by
springing from his engine cab out upon the bluff side of the track. Here
he climbed an almost perpendicular cliff about 400 feet high. The blaze
from the oil had burned nearly all the clothing from his back, and had
singed the back of his head and neck into a blister. He escaped into the
hills.
The officers of the company at Pittsburg were notified immediately by
wire, and a wrecking train and crew were sent to the scene post haste,
in charge of Supt. King. They arrived at the wreck early the following
morning. Here Supt. King learned what facts he could as to the cause of
the wreck. He then wired to me to come to the wreck on the first train.
I was at Oil City at the time, and left immediately, arriving at the
wreck about noon. On my arrival Mr. King walked a little distance down
the track, out of earshot from the noise of the wrecking crew, and sat
down upon a log. He then told me what he had learned and as to the cause
of the wreck. He also proceeded to describe Chalfont to me. He was so
deliberate and careful in this description that it took him nearly an
hour to do it. He had that rare faculty of being able to describe one
person to another with accuracy. He then said, "Tom, do you think you
could recognize this man from the description I have given you?" I
answered, "Yes, I believe I could. The description you have given me
reminds me very much of 'Morg' Erwin, a passenger engineer on the road."
At this Mr. King, usually very quiet and sedate, grew very excited and
clapped his hands as if in joy, exclaiming, "Why didn't I think of that
before? He looks like 'Morg' Erwin."
I then said, "No, Mr. King, he looks very much like Erwin, but not
exactly like him. He is very much like him in some respects, though,
being taller than Erwin. Chalfont's neck is longer and his 'Adam's
Apple' is much larger and more prominent. His eyes are not so large and
are set back farther in his head than Erwin's. Chalfont's cheek-bones
are much higher, while his hair is more coarse and much like horse hair.
In short, Erwin is a more refined man than Chalfont."
To this Mr. King replied, "Tom, I feel sure that you will be able to
identify that man on sight, and I want you to get him at all hazards.
Spare no time or trouble, but 'GET HIM.' Take him to Katanning (the
county seat of Westmoreland Co., Pa., where this wreck occurred) and
lodge him in jail."
Mr. King then told me that I would find the letter of recommendation
Chalfont had given him on file in his office at Pittsburg. I took the
first train for Pittsburg, where I applied to Mr. Joe Reinhart, Mr.
King's chief clerk, who was later President of the great Atchison,
Topeka and Santa Fe System, and he turned the letter over to me. I then
concluded to go to Buffalo and see the Master Mechanic of the Lake
Shore, from whose office the letter purported to come. At Buffalo I
found the Master Mechanic and showed him Chalfont's letter. After
reading the letter he told me that the letter head was genuine, but the
letter itself, with stamp, seal and signature, were forgeries. He had
neither written the letter nor authorized it, but he identified
Chalfont's hand-writing. I learned that Chalfont had been a country
school teacher earlier in his life, and that he received such small pay
as such that he could not support his wife and children. He came to
Buffalo, where he applied for work in the round-house of the Lake Shore
shops there. He was given a position at wiping engines in the
round-house. Here also his salary was too small to support his family
and pay rent at the same time, so he was forced to move once a month to
avoid paying rent. One day he got into the Master Mechanic's office and
stole a part of a block of the official letter heads of the company. He
then wrote himself a letter of recommendation which he had shown to Mr.
King, and when the chance offered he stamped and sealed the letter,
after stealing the stamp one night from the office. About this time he
became so lazy and indolent that he was reprimanded by the Master
Mechanic.
The Master Mechanic told me that he had discharged Chalfont, previous to
his going to Pittsburg, because of failure to pay his grocery bills and
his rent. The grocers and landlords were garnisheeing his wages, and as
the company did not tolerate such things, he was discharged. He also
said that Chalfont's family was somewhere in Buffalo, but he did not
know their whereabouts because they had moved so often. I thanked him
for this information and then decided to see the Superintendent of
Police.
I called at the office of Superintendent Phillips, and asked him to give
me an officer who was more familiar with the haunts and dwellings of
railroad men in Buffalo than I was. He gladly assented and assigned
Detective Tony Collins to assist me. We started out by canvassing the
grocers, butchers and milkmen in the neighborhood where the Lake Shore
Railway men resided. During the forenoon we found many who knew of
Chalfont's family, but did not know where they were at present. About
3:00 P. M., as Collins and I were going down a side street called
Hayward St., I noticed a group of six or eight children playing before a
row of wooden cottages, or more properly, shacks. One little girl in a
dirty blue dress attracted my attention because of the likeness she bore
to Chalfont, according to my description of him. I also noticed a
grocery on the corner below us. When we got to the grocery I told the
man with me, Detective Collins, to go back to the group and ask the
little girl in the blue dress to deliver a package to his wife. He was
to tell her that he lived in the large white house down the street. I
then told him to return to the grocery with the girl so that I could get
a chance to speak to her without exciting her. He returned in a few
moments with the little girl, who looked uncommonly like a little Indian
squaw, and who proved to be the living image of her father. While
Collins was inside the store examining the vegetables I said to the
girl, "Why, hello, sis, where is your uncle Charlie now?" She smiled and
said, "Oh, do you know Uncle Charlie?" I said, "Oh, sure; I know him
well." She then said, "He is down in Pennsylvania firing on a railroad."
(Uncle Charlie was Chalfont's brother-in-law, and had gotten a position
as fireman at the same time Chalfont got his job as engineer.) I then
said to her, "Is your father home now?" She looked up and said, "Yes, he
got home a couple of days ago, but he is sick, and--oh, he said I
mustn't tell any one." I said, "That's all right, but tell me which one
of those houses do you live in?" She said, "We live in that middle one,
with the bunch of rags stuffed in the window."
[Illustration: "Oh, do you know Uncle Charlie?"]
I attracted Collins' attention, and told him to send the girl away on
some pretext. We then went up to the house the girl had pointed out. I
sent Collins around to the back door and I went to the front door and
knocked. Mrs. Chalfont opened the door, and when I asked for Joe
Chalfont she attempted to slam the door in my face. I pushed the door
open and entered the house. Seeing no one in the front room I walked
through it to the door of the back room. Here I saw Chalfont seated
before a window with his head and neck all swathed in bandages. As I
entered the room he said, without moving, "Well, Mr. Furlong, you have
got me." I answered, "Yes, Joe, I am sorry to say I have." This showed
conclusively that I had been pointed out to him while he was on the road
without my knowledge. Here I will state that up to the time I entered
that room I had never seen Joe Chalfont himself, nor a picture or
photograph of him. He had seen me and had heard me speaking so that he
knew my voice. I had suspected from the first that Chalfont might know
me, so when I saw the little girl, whom I believed was his daughter, I
did not stop in front of the houses in which I supposed the children
lived, but kept on to the grocery store.
This is the only case of its kind on record in which an officer picked
out a child from a group of children and recognized her from a
description of her father, whom the officer had never seen.
I arrested Chalfont and took him to Katanning, as Mr. King had ordered.
I then went to Pittsburg and reported in detail to General
Superintendent J. J. Lawrence. Meanwhile it dawned upon me that I had
done a rather commendable thing in arresting this man Chalfont, and I
was expecting a little praise from the General Superintendent. Imagine
my surprise, upon being ushered into his office, at his beginning to
reprimand me for arresting Chalfont. He said, "Furlong, you have gotten
this company into a lot of trouble by arresting this man."
To this I replied, "Why sir, Mr. King ordered me to get him at all
hazards, and I simply carried out his orders."
He then went on, in a most bitter tone, "Well, you should not have done
it. I think I shall be forced to discharge you for so doing. From your
reports from Buffalo I see that Chalfont was not an engineer, and,
therefore, an incompetent employe. That makes this company liable to
damages for the lives lost, and for all the property destroyed in that
wreck. Don't you see what you have done?"
I was angered at his words, and said, "Col. Lawrence, if you did not
want that man arrested Mr. King should not have ordered me to get him. I
believe I am entitled to some little credit for the capture of this man,
in view of the fact that the feat is so far unparalleled. So far as
discharging me goes, that will be unnecessary, for I have already quit
the service of a company which does not approve of my work."
To this Col. Lawrence replied, "Furlong, I beg your pardon, and want to
compliment you on your good work on this and other cases, but when this
case comes to trial all the facts of Chalfont's incompetency will be
laid bare, and it will cost us a lot of money."