RECRUITING GROUNDS OF THE WHITE SLAVE TRAFFICKERS.
By Harry A. Parkin, Assistant United States District
Attorney, Chicago.
In all of the articles which have been published, and in all the
addresses made respecting the white slave traffic, the public has been
warned in general terms to beware lest daughters and sisters in their
own towns and villages should become the prey of the white slave
traffickers. In these articles it was undoubtedly thought best to spare
the sense of security which the resident of a peaceful community usually
has, by failing to mention specific cities where it is known that
procurers and panderers of girls secure their victims. In an article
which I wrote in the March number of a magazine, I transgressed to a
slight extent this rule, and gave as an example the story of the little
German girl from Buffalo. Those who read this will remember this
pathetic case of a child widow who was persuaded to come to Chicago,
with her infant in her arms, in search of more remunerative employment,
and who was there sold into white slavery.
Buffalo is not the only city which is a hunting ground of white slave
traffickers. I think it safe to say that every city, village and hamlet
whose daughters are fair to look upon, has been or will be, as time
proceeds, the hunting ground of some procurer or agent for the white
slave syndicate. I do not say this rashly, nor for the purpose of
startling villagers where the church bell and the school bell are
practically the only sounds which break the peace and quiet of the
community, but I make the statement for the purpose of sounding a
warning to that very resident, that very mother, that daughter, who sits
in that schoolhouse or in that church pew and believes that she is safe
from the snares of the traffickers because of the remoteness or the
inaccessibility or otherwise of her peaceful village. It is not alone
the large cities that furnish beautiful girlhood to lives of shame and
debauchery. It is not necessary to go to New York, Pittsburg,
Philadelphia or Kansas City to procure beautiful and attractive girls.
It is well known that out on the prairies, in Texas, in Missouri, in
Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska, in fact all over our great west, there are as
beautiful types of womanhood as ever graced God's footstool. It is these
that the trafficker is seeking. They it is who furnish the easiest
victims for his snares.
As a prosecuting officer I personally can testify to the fact that very
many cities and villages now have in the red light district of Chicago
and other cities, daughters who, if their names were mentioned in their
home cities, would bring shame and disgrace to prominent and honest
people. There are girls from cities in the interior, girls from small
villages with hardly a thousand inhabitants, and girls from villages of
this size and cities of varying population from that on up to cities of
the size of Boston and Pittsburg and other great commercial and social
centers. There are of course some cities which furnish more women for
prostitution than others. I shall not publish a comparative list, but
will suffice by giving a list of cities scattered broadcast from which
have come girls and women to the great white slave market in Chicago
within my own personal experience. Cities which have furnished girls and
women for this purpose are as follows: Toledo, Ohio; Youngstown, Ohio;
Detroit, Michigan; Muskegon, Michigan; Montreal, Canada; Troy, New York;
Milwaukee, Wisconsin; Peoria, Illinois; Bloomington, Illinois; St.
Louis, Missouri; Pittsburg, Pennsylvania; New York; Davenport, Iowa;
Moline, Illinois; Livonia, Pennsylvania; Whitehall, Michigan; Waseca,
Minnesota; Charleston, Illinois. I know that the above statement will
cause a thrill in some of the cities which I have mentioned, but I
believe that the agitation upon the white slave question has reached a
point where false modesty should no longer prevent the public from
knowing the exact situation however much it may cause them to feel a
sense of regret that their city or village has furnished at least one
victim to the sisters of scarlet.
The list of cities is not confined to the great group of cities having
thousands of population, but, as you will note, includes small villages
where it would hardly seem possible that girls could go astray. I might,
if I had the time and space, make a list five or six times as large, but
the one which I have given will serve my purpose--that of sounding a
warning to those who least suspect that their daughters and sisters are
in danger.
To those of you who do not reside in the cities which I have mentioned,
I warn you not to conclude from the fact that I have omitted the name of
your city or village from the list, that no girl has come from your
community. It may be that I shall include your city in a future list--at
any rate do not permit yourselves to be lulled into a false sense of
security.
As I have said, some of the cities, much to their shame, have furnished
for the houses of prostitution in Chicago more girls than others. For
example, I have personally known for a long time that the cities of
Montreal, Canada, Toledo and Youngstown, Ohio, and Pittsburg,
Pennsylvania, have furnished probably a greater average by one-third
than any of the other cities. This of course does not include New York;
for probably more women come from New York to Chicago for the purpose of
entering a house of prostitution than from any other city in the United
States. This is true because it has an extremely large population, and
also because of the fact that it is largely through the port of New York
that the alien prostitutes are brought into the United States, and
thence to Chicago. Some of the other cities which I have mentioned have
furnished one, two three, or more, as the particular case might be. This
to me is sufficient proof of the fact that there is and probably always
will be to a greater or less extent, until we crush it out, a syndicate
or system which is continuously operating and seeking new fields for the
purpose of ensnaring innocent victims and selling them into lives of
shame.
Troy, New York, is a prolific source from which Chicago houses of ill
fame receive women. In a case recently tried in the Federal courts, the
testimony showed that one girl who had been found in a house of ill-fame
in Chicago had originally been taken to a house at Troy and from that
day, when she was eighteen years of age, until she was arrested in
Chicago some five years later, she had been in the clutches of or under
the control of the different members of a single family who had kept her
earning money for them during all these years. The peaceful village of
Charleston, in southern Illinois, has furnished to the panderers of lust
a beautiful Norwegian girl, whose parents imagine that she is engaged in
a legitimate occupation in Chicago, and whose peace of mind I would not
disturb by furnishing them with her name. Muskegon, Michigan, is a
field to which the white slave operator sends at frequent intervals for
fresh girls. It is not a large city, but seldom does the procurer go
there without returning with his victim.
Now a word as to the method used in procuring girls from our American
cities. Some of the various schemes, which are used by the procurer,
have been detailed in these pages in preceding articles, and I need not
worry the reader with a repetition of their details. It is not always
necessary for the procurer to go from the city to the country village to
get the girl he is seeking. Indulgent parents very often permit their
daughters to come to the great city unaccompanied by any protector; the
Sunday excursion, the fat stock show, a world's fair, some theatrical
production, a monstrous convention--these are the lights which allure
the daughter and sister to the city. Perhaps she has never been in the
city before and has no relatives or friends to whose house she may go.
Perhaps she has been in the city once or twice before and has met a
supposed woman friend, who has taken her to her house and shown her
every courtesy. If the former, she will oftentimes be met at the
railroad station by a young man, well dressed, pleasant and affable, who
offers to spend his money to procure her a cab to take her to some
respectable hotel. Unexperienced in the ways of the city, she accepts
only to find that instead of a protector she has found in the affable
young man a procurer for some vile house of prostitution. Many, many
times have instances like this occurred, and the innocent young girl has
awakened the next morning to find herself situated in a gaudy bedroom,
without clothing, the prey and victim of her procurer. Her clothes have
been taken away from her, and upon inquiry she finds that she is in debt
and will not be permitted to leave the house until she has earned
sufficient money to pay back what the affable young man has spent upon
cab fares and hotel bills, and, in addition to that, to repay the price
which the keeper of the house gave to her seducer. An instance of this
kind, in which a girl had been procured by this identical method, was
related by Mr. Sims in a magazine article. She has since been rescued
and is leading a respectable life back home with her parents.
Or it may be that the girl from the country is making a second or third
visit to the city and has been invited to again visit the kind and
elderly lady who met her in a department store and so kindly cared for
her upon her last visit. This kindly elderly lady usually occupies a
flat at some distance but within easy reach of the red light district.
It is sumptuously furnished and, as the elderly woman explains, is a
home for several young ladies who are working in stores in the city.
Here the country maiden is given every luxury free of expense, is
entertained royally, and, alas, very many times before she attempts to
leave for her home has been caught unawares and so compromised that she
dare not face her home folks again. The city of Chicago in certain
sections is full of apartments of this kind, where an elderly lady,
usually a semi-retired keeper of a house of prostitution, has furnished
an apartment and runs a supposed respectable home for working girls.
Three to five girls live with her. Her telephone number is furnished to
hotel employees and elevator operators, to "steer" male inquirers who
are in search of a "pleasant evening" to the flat in return for a
commission of fifty cents or a dollar for each customer. The girls who
live in this class of places are girls who come from the country and who
have fallen, but who are not low enough to go to the regular houses of
prostitution in the red light district. Clerks from department stores,
whose meagre salaries are not sufficient to support them while away from
their parents, seek these houses as a means of supplying the deficiency
in their weekly earnings. They are thus enabled to dress tastily and
just a little bit better than the virtuous girl who works next to them
upon the same salary but who does not sell herself for lust. In such
places as these I have known of girls who came to the city to study
painting, stenography, bookkeeping and other occupations, and who, while
ostensibly pursuing their daily labor, are all of the time going to
these houses of assignation whenever there is a dollar to be gained
which will place them in a position to dress better or go to some place
of amusement which costs money.
What, then, shall we do to protect our daughters and our sisters? That
is the question which is puzzling not only prosecuting officers and
police officials, but one upon which economists and charitable
organizations are spending months debating. One safe and sure protection
we all have. That is, do not permit the daughter or the sister to go
from the country village to the large city unless you know absolutely
and beyond the peradventure of doubt, that the hotel where she shall
stay, or the people whom she shall visit, are absolutely above reproach
of any kind. Advise your daughter and your sister of the snares which
lay in her path before it is too late. Forewarn her so that she shall be
advised in time to spare her the great anguish and the pain to which she
may be otherwise subjected.
If the procurer comes to the village in search of his victim, teach the
daughter and the sister to have no confidence in affable strangers, well
dressed and fluent of speech, but to confide always in her mother when
she makes an engagement to go driving, to visit an ice cream parlor or
to go to the city with a male escort.