HOW SNAKES CHARM CANARIES: METHODS OF PROCURERS.
At the end of May, 1907, Rev. Melbourne P. Boynton, pastor of the
Lexington Avenue Baptist Church, was requested by the Chicago Examiner
to make a tour of the vice district at Twenty-second street and write
against its iniquities for the columns of that newspaper. Pastor Boynton
stipulated that I should accompany him, as a recognized worker in the
slums and superintendent of the Midnight Mission. Rev. E. L. Williams, a
Methodist pastor, also accompanied us, with Detectives Considine and
Thomas of the Chicago police.
As we went out I prayed God to give us a thunderbolt to alarm the people
of Chicago. We did not foresee the answer to this prayer, but I have
always felt that it was answered very quickly and in the following
manner:
Shortly after one o'clock on the morning of May 31, we entered a resort
on Dearborn street, whose former owner had come to me at midnight to
tell me that he had not had one happy minute since he took up that
terrible business and that he would quit it, which he did. In this place
among the half-dressed inmates we noticed a modestly gowned young
woman, sitting at a small drinking table opposite something that ought
to have been a man. The thing's name was Neil Jaeger; the girl's name
was Macdonald. I asked the girl if she were an inmate or leading a life
of that sort and she said no. She told me her true name and address and
lied only about her age, as Jaeger had taught her to say she was twenty,
when she was only sixteen, that he might sell her in the white slave
market. The keeper of the resort, convinced that she was under age, had
refused to deal with him. When I began to question the snake, it hissed,
"Mind your own business." I replied that this was my business, and asked
the detectives to investigate. Discerning quickly what it was that we
had discovered, they promptly locked the thing in an iron cage, like any
other wild beast. The girl was cared for. Her anxiety was expressed in
her words, "What will my mother say?"
At the trial of Jaeger before Judge Fake, he himself told brazenly how
he had brought this young girl from her own home in an Illinois town,
her mother supposing that she was going to work in Rockford. While the
girl was giving her testimony I heard the click of a camera, to my
sorrow--for we were doing our utmost to keep the girl's secret and to
send her quietly to her mother. More than half a million copies of her
photograph went out in the great daily papers of Chicago. When the truth
was known, other young girls told what they had escaped by the capture
and exposure of this reptile, for he was luring several of them to
Chicago, one of them only fifteen years old. About half a million pages
were published in the Chicago newspapers at this time against the
traffic in girls. Such, it seemed to me, was the thunderbolt, for which
I had prayed.
LETTERS OF A DESTROYER OF GIRLS.
In a letter written from Rockton, Illinois, on May 27, the hypocrite
Jaeger had said to one of his intended victims: "I have learned to love
you as I never loved a girl before and probably never will again. Now,
sweetheart, I want you to get away from this town and the life you are
leading there as soon as you possibly can. When you are ready let me
know, and I will send you plenty of money to start out on, and will meet
you wherever you say and then we can be together as much as we please
and can live happy ever afterward--that is, of course, if you like me
that well and I certainly hope you do. Be a good girl and God bless you
and keep you from harm. Lovingly, Neil M. Jaeger."
In another letter he wrote: "From our last conversation I feel
determined not to give you up, but to do all in my power to aid you to
free yourself from the bondage that undermines your health and temper
and open to you a life free from care and strife, where you can go
where, when and with whom you please without being kept like a girl in a
convent. Your natural vivacious and care-free nature rebels against the
shackles, which fate has placed upon you, and I am willing to give you
physical, mental, moral and financial support, to give you a life where
none of the troubles which now harass you will be manifest, but instead
will be a life where love will rule supreme. I will further try to prove
myself worthy of your esteem if you will allow me to do something in a
financial way. I am a man of character, honesty and uprightness, possess
an estate valued at $50,000, own an automobile and a private yacht, have
an income of some $2,500 a year and am thoroughly independent. I come
from one of the best families in the west. I am willing to take you to
Chicago, support you, and if you desire, secure employment for you at
Marshall Field & Co.'s, besides taking you to dances, theatres,
automobiling and yachting. Surely anything would be better than the life
you are leading there."
[Illustration: BISHOP OF LONDON PREACHING IN WALL STREET NEW YORK
The best loved man in England. He preaches in the slums at midnight, and
in his cathedral he pleads with the leaders of his church and nation
against the false modesty which keeps young people in ignorance of the
wages of sin.]
[Illustration: BARRED WINDOW AND DUNGEON DOOR
No state prison is more securely barred than was this house where many
white slaves were kept. This dive was a rendezvous for thieves and other
disreputable characters.]
Denying rumors of his evil character, he wrote: "I did not go to Davis
to see another girl. I went to sign up some policies which I wrote up
there a couple of weeks ago. And if you heard anything I said about you,
it was some lie those kids made up, like the one about the girl in
Davis. I never spoke to the girl in my life and probably wouldn't know
her if I met her on the street. I do care very much for you and I love
you much more than I profess and I don't run after other girls. I would
like to take you with me, but since you say that was impossible, I
will be true to you. If you ever want to come to me I will send you the
money and will take as good care of you as if you were my own sister."
In another letter the wretch complains: "Say, why did you tell Effie
about my writing to you and wanting you to come to Chicago? Please keep
these things to yourself if you value love."
Needless to say, the scoundrel had no wealth, and when Judge Fake fined
him two hundred dollars, all the punishment our backward laws provided
at that time, he had to go to prison until his father could send the
money from his home in the state of Washington.
The letters quoted above were obtained by Miss Niblo, a missionary, from
the intended victims, and were published by the editor of the Freeport
Evening Standard, July 31, 1907.
A very young girl who just escaped this tiger's claws wrote this letter
of inquiry and gratitude:
"---- Street.
----, Illinois, August 8, 1907.
Rev. Ernest Bell:
Dear Sir:--Could you tell me if Neil Jaeger is in the
bridewell yet or has he been released? I am a girl
that he tried to persuade to go away with him, but he
did not succeed in getting me to go. You have my
heartiest congratulations for capturing such a
wretch.
Yours Truly,
----"
There are hundreds of such smooth scoundrels occupied all the time in
replenishing the dens of shame in Chicago. They travel, to our positive
knowledge, as far as Ohio and Tennessee and in all the nearer states.
Fathers and mothers and brothers of girls, and the girls themselves,
should be ceaselessly vigilant against these murderous deceivers. They
always profess to be in some legitimate business and are apt to transact
some honest deals as a blind. Every city that keeps up a red light
district breeds these destroyers of girls. Every divekeeper employs such
agents, and the principal is worse than the employee.
Mrs. Charlton Edholm, in her book "Traffic in Girls," writes the
following confession made to her by a converted bartender: "Mrs. Edholm,
I believe I am a converted man now, and that the Lord Jesus Christ has
accepted me and I will dwell with him forever, but when I realize how
many girls I have sent to houses of shame, I wonder if God ever can
forgive me, and I would give my life if I could undo it.
"When I was a bartender for years in a saloon with wine rooms, these
procurers used to come there, and often I've seen one of these men bring
a beautiful girl to the ladies' entrance, and of course he would try to
get her to drink wine or beer, but oftentimes having been brought up in
a Christian home, or having signed the total abstinence pledge in the
Sunday school,--for you W. C. T. U. women have done so much for the
children by having temperance taught in the day schools and Sunday
schools,--and she would refuse to touch the wine or beer, then he would
wink at me, and I knew that meant an extra dollar for me, and I would
drop a little drug into whatever that girl had to eat or drink, and in a
few moments she would be unconscious and that fellow would have a
carriage drive to the door, that girl would be placed in it and driven
straight to a haunt of shame; he would receive his twenty-five or fifty
dollars, and that girl would be as surely lost as if the earth had
opened and swallowed her. Hundreds of times I've done this, and, Mrs.
Edholm, do you think God can forgive me?"
Young men, and older men, who patronize houses of shame should be made
to see and feel that all this hellish traffic goes on at their instance
and at their expense. The keepers and procurers are the paid agents of
the men who foot the bill. Every dollar, with the burning name of God
upon it, that any man spends there makes him a stockholder in the white
slave market and a partner in the traffic in girls. The men who support
the hideous business are the ultimate white slave traders, and when
their hired men, the divekeepers and procurers, come to judgment and
condemnation, the men who supported them in crime will be arraigned
beside them and punished with them.
PERIL OF STAGE-STRUCK GIRLS.
The corruption of the present day theatre is generally admitted.
Archbishop Farley, in a sermon at St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York, on
Sunday, February 7, 1909, said that "the stage is worse today then it
was in the days of paganism." He added: "We see today men and women--old
men and old women--who ought to know better bringing the young to these
orgies of obscenity. Instead of that they should be exercising a
supervision over the young and should look carefully after their
companionship."
Actresses of character are among the foremost to warn young women of the
perils of the modern stage. Shakespeare and the older dramatists taught
virtue, often with the spirit and energy of a prophet. Multitudes of
present day plays are of such moral character and tendency that no one
can defend or excuse them. President Taft recently walked out of a
theatre to express his disapproval of the play.
Low theatres exist merely to inflame those who visit them. They go to
the awful length of naming the vice district as part of the merriment of
the performances. Other so-called theatres are a part of the combined
saloon and den of shame. I have conversed personally many times with
girls who were deceived into going to such places, thinking they were
going on the reputable stage.
Mr. Arthur Burrage Farwell, Chicago's well-known reformer, here tells
briefly the story of two young girls, whom I have often met in his
office, who were lured by a false theatrical agency to go to a vile
resort. The agency of a wicked woman, or two of them, will be noted in
this case, along with the base deeds of an unscrupulous man. The keen
eyes and wise head of a good hearted Scotch woman saved the girls from a
terrible doom. Mr. Farwell writes as follows:
"About December 1, 1907, I received a special delivery letter from the
managing editor of one of the oldest daily papers in Springfield,
Illinois, informing me that two girls had been sent back to Chicago and
suggesting that the police department be informed of the facts. I
immediately communicated with the assistant general superintendent of
police, Hon. Herman F. Schuettler, and the girls were located. The
theatrical agent who had sent them from Chicago was arrested and work
was started against some of the evil practices of false theatrical
agents.
Taking the story from the girls and from their testimony in court, it is
as follows: These two girls worked in a large department store in the
city of Chicago. One of them was approached one day by a well-dressed
woman who requested the judgment of this young lady upon some material
to be used in theatrical work. The result was that this woman gave the
name of a theatrical agent and told the girl that she could make $25.00
a week by going on the stage, as she had a good voice, etc., etc.
This girl spoke to another friend, working in the same store, and
together they called upon this theatrical agent whose name was given
them by the woman. After being taken to a saloon, an attempt being made
to compromise them, they were given tickets to the city where they were
supposed to go upon the stage. They reached the city and providentially
were guided to a boardinghouse of a Scotch woman who lived next door to
the alleged theatre, which proved to be a saloon in the front and a
vaudeville in the rear and upstairs a most awful place.
The proprietor of the alleged theatre declined to employ the young
ladies unless they would stay in the rooms over the saloon or theatre.
On the advice of the Scotch woman they declined to stay over the
theatre, and the woman furnished them tickets and they returned to
Chicago.
The preliminary hearing of the People vs. ---- was held in the Municipal
Court of Chicago before Judge Wells, January 14, 1908, and lasted about
five days, and twenty-seven witnesses were heard, the testimony covering
373 pages. The theatrical agent ----, was held to the grand jury. His
license to operate a theatrical agency was revoked by the state.
The sworn testimony showed a condition of affairs that would be a
disgrace to the most ignorant, vicious and debased people. That such
things are allowed in a republic where the people rule, as were allowed
in Springfield and in other cities, is a sad commentary upon the average
indifference of the authorities and the people, which should be called
criminal indifference.
The theatrical agent and one of the owners of the property in
Springfield were indicted for conspiracy, but in the criminal court
these charges were not sustained.
The two girls were living with a woman and one day when they were needed
as witnesses it was found they were not there. A letter with no
signature was received by the president of the Chicago Law and Order
League, informing him that the two girls were living under assumed names
in Milwaukee, and immediately representatives of the Chicago Law and
Order League and of the State of Illinois, went to Milwaukee and found
the girls and brought them back.
The men who were responsible for sending these state's witnesses away
were indicted and were found guilty and the woman re-indicted.
The expense in this one case to the Chicago Law and Order League and the
State of Illinois was probably not less than $2,000.
If the young girls who are seeking a living upon the stage could know of
the pitfalls that are in their way, I believe many of them would seek
other employment. One of the girls is now married and living very
happily.
Arthur Burrage Farwell,
President Chicago Law and Order League."
E. A. B.