SOME INSURANCE EXPERIENCES.
In the course of the ordinary routine of a fire insurance office,
circumstances are frequently occurring that may well figure in a
sensational novel. One or two such may not be uninteresting here. I
suppress the true names and localities, and some of the particulars.
One dark night, in a frontier settlement of the County of Simcoe, a
young man was returning through the bush from a township gathering, when
he noticed loaded teams passing along a concession line not far distant.
As this was no unusual occurrence, he thought little of it, until some
miles further on, he came to a clearing of some forty acres, where there
was no dwelling-house apparently, but a solitary barn, which, while he
was looking at it, seemed to be lighted up by a lanthorn, and after some
minutes, by a flickering flame which gradually increased to a blaze, and
shortly enveloped the whole building. Hastening to the spot, no living
being was to be seen there, and he was about to leave the place; but
giving a last look at the burning building, it struck him that there was
very little fire inside, and he turned to satisfy his curiosity. There
was nothing whatever in the barn.
In due course, a notice was received at our office, that on a certain
night the barn of one Dennis ----, containing one thousand bushels of
wheat, had been burnt from an unknown cause, and that the value thereof,
some eight-hundred dollars, was claimed from the company. At the same
time, an anonymous letter reached me, suggesting an inquiry into the
causes of the fire. The inquiry was instituted accordingly. The holder
of the policy, an old man upwards of sixty years of age, a miser,
reputed worth ten thousand dollars at least, was arrested, committed to
---- gaol, and finally tried and found guilty, without a doubt of his
criminality being left on any body's mind who was present. Through the
skill of his counsel, however, he escaped on a petty technicality; and
considering his miserable condition, the loss he had inflicted on
himself, and his seven months' detention in gaol, we took no further
steps for his punishment.
A country magistrate of high standing and good circumstances at ----,
had a son aged about twenty-seven, to whom he had given the best
education that grammar-school and college could afford, and who was
regarded in his own neighbourhood as the model of gallantry and spirited
enterprise. His father had supplied him with funds to erect substantial
farm buildings, well stocked and furnished, in anticipation of his
marriage with an estimable and well-educated young lady. Amongst the
other buildings was a cheese-factory, in connection with which the young
man commenced the business of making and selling cheese on an extensive
scale. So matters went on for some months, until we received advices
that the factory which we had insured, had been burnt during the night,
and that the owner claimed three-thousand dollars for his loss. Our
inspector was sent to examine and report, and was returning quite
satisfied of the integrity of the party and the justice of the claim,
when just as he was leaving the hotel where he had staid, a bystander
happened to remark how curious it was that cheese should burn without
smell. "That is impossible," said the landlord. "I am certain," said the
former speaker, "that this had no smell, for I remarked it to Jack at
the time."
The inspector reported this conversation, and I sent a detective to
investigate the case. He remained there, disguised of course, for two or
three weeks, and then reported that large shipments of cheese to distant
parts had taken place previously to the fire; but he could find nothing
to criminate any individual, until accidentally he noticed what looked
like a dog's muzzle lying in a corner of the stable. He picked it up,
and untying a string that was wound around it, found it to be the leg of
a new pair of pantaloons of fine quality. Watching his opportunity the
same evening, while in conversation with the claimant, he produced the
trowser-leg quietly, and enquired where the fellow-leg was? Taken by
surprise, the young man slunk silently away. He had evidently cut off a
leg of his own pants, and used it to muzzle his house-dog, to silence
its barking while he set the factory afire. He left the country that
night, and we heard no more of the claim.
A letter was received one day from a Roman Catholic priest, which
informed me that a woman whose dying confession he had received, had
acknowledged that several years before she had been accessary to a fraud
upon our company of one hundred dollars. Her husband had insured a horse
with us for that amount. The horse had been burnt in his stable. The
claim was paid. Her confession was, that the horse had died a natural
death, and that the stable was set on fire for the purpose of recovering
the value of the horse. In this case, the woman's confession becoming
known to her husband, he left the country for the United States. The
woman recovered and followed him.