ARREST OF THE CULPRIT, AND HIS CUNNING ATTEMPT TO PUT HIS CAPTOR OUT OF
THE WAY IN AN EFFORT TO MAKE HIS ESCAPE.
In 1873, Mrs. Boardman, a widow woman with a large family of grown
children, resided on a small farm in Venango County, Pennsylvania, a few
miles east of Oil City. She became acquainted with a Hebrew doctor, who
called himself Dr. Solomon Steinman. He practiced medicine for a short
time in and about Rouseville, Pennsylvania.
There were a number of producing oil wells on Mrs. Boardman's farm, and
she, from the royalty obtained from the products of these wells, had
accumulated quite a sum of money. The doctor, representing himself as a
bachelor, managed to grow into the good graces of the widow,
notwithstanding the fact that she was the mother of two sons who were
almost as old as himself. In a remarkably short space of time the doctor
succeeded in obtaining ten thousand dollars of the widow's money, having
represented to her that he would invest it for her in property that
would yield fabulous profits; but instead of making the investment, he
quite suddenly left for parts unknown.
The widow's sons, on hearing that their mother had been swindled,
reported the matter to me, I being Chief of Police of Oil City. They
requested me to locate and cause the arrest of the doctor on the charge
of obtaining money under false pretense. I undertook the task of
learning his whereabouts, and it seemed impossible to get any trace of
him. He had disappeared from his boarding house, telling no person of
his intention of leaving, and no trace could be found that would
indicate where he had gone. He was at his boarding house for supper on
the evening of his departure, and quietly left, after eating his evening
meal, as though he was going to a cigar store or a barber shop, leaving
what wardrobe he had, grip and other articles, in his room, and
disappeared as effectually as though the ground had opened up and
engulfed him.
The evening trains had all left the town before he had left his boarding
house, so that he was obliged to have left the town on foot. No one
around Rouseville had ever seen a picture of him. He was a small man,
dark complexioned, about forty-five years of age, five feet, six inches
in height, and weighed about one hundred and thirty pounds, was smooth
shaven, had black curly hair sprinkled with gray, and had a decided
Hebrew countenance. About five months after his disappearance, in
looking over one of the morning papers, I noticed a short article,
giving an account of a Dr. Lewis who had been arrested on the charge of
malpractice, at Bay City, Michigan, the day before. This article gave a
minute description of the man arrested, and from this description, which
answered the one that I had of Dr. Steinman, I concluded that I had
found the person I was looking for. I took the first train to Bay City
and found Dr. Lewis in his office, he having been released on a two
thousand, five hundred dollar cash bond, which he had placed in the
hands of the committing magistrate. I also learned that the man giving
the name of Dr. Lewis was none other than Dr. Steinman.
He had already been indicted in Venango County, Pennsylvania, for
obtaining money under false pretense, and the prosecuting officer of Bay
City, being willing to surrender him to me, I had no trouble in
obtaining the necessary requisition papers. After getting the papers I
left Bay City with my prisoner.
I searched him carefully and took charge of all his personal effects. We
took the train for Detroit, Michigan, arriving there in the afternoon. I
locked him up in the police station until ten o'clock that evening, when
I took him to the dock and boarded a steamer for Cleveland, Ohio. It was
the old steamer Northwestern, and our state room was on the upper deck,
pretty well forward.
We left Detroit about ten-thirty o'clock that night, and were due to
arrive at Cleveland in the morning between four and five o'clock. We
retired about midnight. I assigned the upper berth to the prisoner,
while I occupied the lower. As I said before, I had searched him
thoroughly before leaving Bay City.
About two o'clock in the morning, after leaving Detroit, I dozed off to
sleep, when I suddenly awakened and smelled the strong odor of
chloroform. The stateroom was dark, but I reached up towards the upper
berth and my hand came in contact with the doctor's. He was holding a
cone that he had made from a towel, and had reached down from his berth
and was holding this cone over a four ounce bottle of chloroform, and
was trying to put me to sleep for good, but the first breath that I had
inhaled, after he had placed the chloroform over my face, aroused me. I
grabbed his arm, pulled him out of his berth onto the deck in front of
the room, and would have thrown him into Lake Erie, were it not for the
fact that he yelled at the top of his voice, and aroused the lookout on
duty at the forward end of the vessel, and also the wheelman, both of
whom reached us in time to prevent me from drowning the doctor. If I had
carried out my intention of throwing him overboard, nothing could have
saved him from drowning. I then made him dress himself and took him down
to the forecastle, where the captain placed two of the crew to guard him
until we arrived in Cleveland.
I have never learned how, or where, the doctor secured the bottle of
chloroform, as I had searched him thoroughly, and I am positive he did
not have it on him when we left Bay City, and have come to the
conclusion that he must have secured it while he was in the lock-up at
Detroit. Of course, I did not search him there.
During the Civil War, on December 20, 1861, I received a gun shot wound
above the right knee, at the battle of Drainesville, Virginia, and
before the doctor began to dress the wound he administered chloroform to
me. The after effects of the stuff were very disagreeable and I did not
get over it for a long time, and resolved that I would never again take
chloroform under any circumstances. I really suffered more from the
nasty stuff than I did from the wound. This, I presume, accounts for the
shock the odor of the chloroform produced on me.
I arrived with the prisoner at Oil City in due time. He was tried at the
first term of court thereafter, and convicted and sentenced to the
penitentiary for a term of ten years.
I succeeded in locating and recovering nearly five thousand dollars of
the money the doctor had fraudulently secured from the widow. This was
returned to her by due process of law.