Show 1 f I 1 t I 1 by GEORGE BARTON r most mysterious murder mystery in philadelphia s history WS by W G chapman capt james I 1 donagi chief of the detective bureau ol 01 PI ll adelph a la a fine type of the level 1 beaded in est gators ot cr of the present day he hag been in U e departs ent tor 30 years he ne er wore a d seu se of any kind in his I 1 fe he knows e cry ru e of tl e game and has occue ed aery separate position in tl e service fron tl at ot sub pol ceman up to the responsible post chic he now fills with signal su cess he was the conspicuous figure in the famous wh te murder althour alt hoUe he modestly d s balms the cred t saying that the glory belongs to the ent re pol ce force of the quaker city T e story outside of its awn interest Is in as a ta 11 eustrat 01 of tl e unromantic and busl ness ke betl now general used in the detection of cr m nals in the large cities of the un ted states on tl e night of may 19 1900 prof roy wilson white a fellow of the law school of the university of penns vania and a lecturer on roman law at the famous seat of learning was hysteric isly and brutally m ordered prof white although a man of ie a than 30 years of age had already won an international reputation in 1 is cial branch of study he was ah et and unassuming in manner and enjoyed the reputation of being the most popular instructor at the uni hersity so tar as known he did not a an enemy in the world and the ne vs of ins murder came as a terrible shock not only to his family and fi tends but also to the thousands of students with whom he had come into personal contact during the period ot his tutorship on the day of the murder all of his accounted tor from the time he said good by at his home in the coining until the moment he left the class room for the night during the afternoon he had a long talk with one of his associates con berning a work in wh ch the two men here mutt ally interested he took dinner alone at a small hotel near the university and afeei that lectured to the law class under his charge he was confident and enthusiastic and never appeared to better advantage about ten clock at night he left for his home in germantown a suburb of ia he started in the di of the powelton avenue sta tion of the a la broad with the purpose of boarding the 10 1 tram less than an hour later a pol ceman walking along thirty second street ad joining the ra broad tracks stumbled against a body on the sidewalk it was quite dark in that sect on in fact it was afterwards declared to be the darkest spot in all of philadelphia the officer flashed his lantern on the inert mass before him and was shocked to find a man mangled and bleeding his head was crushed and he was unconscious the pockets of the white vest were turned ins de out and his gold watch was missing the little green bag that he always cai ned by his side was spattered with his life blood it contained among other th ns a text bool on plead ing a book from which prof white had been lec g that evening some notes on sheets of paper which he had utilized in his quiz class were also in the bag A pocketbook contained a 1 fe insurance policy an invitation to a class re m on in another state and a sum of poney in greenbacks A few yards awa imbedded in the soft earth was an iron bar quite thick and about 18 inches long it was such a thing as is used on th platforms of freight cars the d corpse was removed to the university hospital and tha best medical and surg cal pid summoned but it was too late the vital spark had fled and all that the and students had left to them was the memory of roy wilson white s gra clous fe the shocking nature of the crime seems to 1 ave aro ed the author aties into instant and universal actie ity superintendent of police quirk and chief of detectives miller held a consultation to determine ahat should be done while they talking james A donaghy a member of the detective staff passed the open door of the outer office quirk esi aed him hello jim he cried it had ben be n raining cats and dogs all ohp afternoon donaghy entered the office water soaked from head to toot weats the mattel with you said miller you ought to know was the re joinder you sent me down to media to get a pickpocket did ou get hima sur was the rejoinder and got in the bargain ell said miller we ve got something bigger than a pickpocket to look after now 1 sten donaghe listened and the more he heard the more absorbs he became he forgot all abo it his wet clothes he forgot everything but a desire to get on the track of the nan or men who had so foully m ordered an ve gentleman while they talked a newcomer the group it was robert J mckenty another member of the detective staff after bards marked out to be a member of the majors cabinet donagh as a result of the confer enoe immediately started for the scene of the m arder it has since been said that the white tragedy wa his case he protests against this distinction it was a case of team work he says thirty detectives and over 2 policemen were en on the white case and they made good at any rate donaghy made good because less than an hour had elapsed before he was in conver bation with a youth named ralph hartman who testified that he had seen two colored men near the scene of the mui der shortly after ten clock and had talked to one of them best of all oung hartman who had intel beyond his years was able to give a avid deac option of the two men hartman was employed as a messenger in the powelton avenue station of the pennsylvania railroad and knew every foot of the ground in that neighborhood donaghy felt in that the knowledge pos hessed by this boy would prove to be 27 SV 70 7 za the foundation on which they would build their case he hastened back to the city hall the doors of the little private office were closed and for a long while don aghy mckenty and quirk had their heads together As a result of their deliberations a most singular order was telegraphed to ever police station in the cit of philadelphia it was to arrest every colored man found in or near any railroad station ferr house or freight yard within the city limits it was the biggest drag net ever spread by the department donaghy in the meantime continued his investigations near the scene of the murder several conclusions were forced upon him one was that the murder was committed for n that the murderers were startled and ran away before they secured all of their boot the footprints in tie soft da large alums clums hea looking footprints indicated that more than one man had fled across the load leading to the ra broad tracks the dreadful man ner in which they had mutilated the body i roved that they were brutes capt donaghy given credit for businesslike solution of tangle which con jilted and hanged three men legal formalities overcome besides this donaghy was convinced that they were men totally devoid of I 1 ed cation he ded isted this from the fact that they had evidently not even bestowed so much as a passing glance on the books in prof white s green bag it is a known fact that a man of education or refinement is irresistibly attracted by a book if a volume is lying on a table even in the house of a stranger he can no more resist pick ing it and going agh the pages than a moth can avoid the flame the murderers murd eiers evidently had not the slight est toward the little work in the green bag the detective s summary therefore was that the crime had been commit ted by tv or three men that they were negroes that they were brutal and uneducated and thai the motive was money how near he was correct shall presently be seen the murder occurred on saturday night between that time and sun day morning the 30 detectives and 2 policemen and donagh had been industrious As the chuich bells were call ng the people tc worship the officers to bring in colored men from all parts of the city they came from north and south from eabe and west they came singly they came in pairs they cane in squads and when the chief finally counted hiss prisoners he found that he had colored men all suspected of the mur der of prof white what if they were all minnows and the big elsh had slipped through the nef ralph hartman the youth was on hand to assist in the identification he was in a separate room and did not see the prisoners piso ners as they were brought in the city hall the au thon ties were keyed up to a high pitch everything depended on the experiment they were about to make it it failed they would be all at sea and the ends of just ce defeated when the last ot the prisoners had been brought in the work of ellmina tion began donaghy and mckenty were In trusted with this delicate task some of the suspects were obviously out of the question for instance mulattoes were set aside so were sev eral one eyed persons so was a lame man and the work kept on until the list of possibilities was reduced to 16 these 16 were lined up with their hats on and young hartman was brought into the room it was a mot ley gathering probably 16 uglier men had never been assembled before they looked brutal and all of them seemed capable of murder could the boy tell one from the othera could he identify the man who had spoken to him the night before would he be confused 7 would the crowd puzzle him ralph said donaghy point out the man who spoke to you on thirty second street last night the boy looked over the row of negroes fearlessly II 11 s glance lighted on one and then another everybody in the felt the strain he was silent silent for what seemed to be many minutes but what in reality was only seconds presently he went over and touched a burly negro on the shoulder that s the man the fellow indicated gave a shudder and rolled his eyes all of the others in the line heaved a sigh of relief the marked man began to protest deed I 1 ain t done euthin wl said you did anything 9 asked the detective sharply the man proved to be henry ivory he had been arrested at daylight on the railroad near germantown june alon he was subjected to a severe cross examination and finally admit ted being near the powelton avenue station the night before and even ac speaking to hartman but protested vehemently that he had nothing to do with the murder of I 1 prof white ivory was short in stature with i skin as black as anthracite coal and very repulsive features fists pronounced him to be the low est type of the cuned negro the detectives resorted to every device known to the profession to force a confession from the man finally after an hour of the sweat ing he blurted out I 1 done told you I 1 was there but it gasn wasn t me that struck the blow he was put in a cell and donaghy and his associates barted out for more evidence they obtained a alon of the watch that had been stolen from prof white the number of the case was 39 and that of the move ment these numars were graphed to every pawnbroker and every watchmaker in the city the response came much sooner than was anticipated A negro named buddy brown was arrested while trying to pledge the watch with a pawnbroker in west philadelphia drown said the watch was not his but belonged to a man who had a room in his mother s house lie had only lived there a few daya and had given buddy the watch to pawn tor him the strange negro was promptly lo 10 bated and arrested he proved to be william perry of georgia perry was not very communicative at first but finally admitted that he was in the neighborhood of thirty second street on the night of the murder he said that a third man had been in his corn pany these adm solons while imbor tant were not conclusive there were still links to be fitted in the chain at this period of the investigation new character came on the scene in the person of john leary an employ of the city water arks he had been reading a great deal about the murder and he felt impelled to step forward and give his own experience on the night of the murder he had quit work at midnight and was crossing the girard avenue bridge when he met two colored men they stopped and one of them asked him for a match one of these men answered the de of ivory perry he did not recognize while the authorities were browsing avei the evidence they had on hand tl ey received word that a number of s looking negroes who had been picked up on the railroad near trenton were now in the mercer coun ty workhouse donaghy and me kenty determined to go to the new je sey capital and look at the men tl ey took young hartman and leary with them tor purposes of identified alon the colored men were lined up in the borki ouse just as they had been in the city hall in philadelphia one of the negroes was a tall shambling fellow he was stoop shouldered and knock kneed and otherwise lacking in symmetrical beauty both hartman and leary immediately picked him out as one of the men they had met on the night of the tragedy he had given the trenton authorities the name of william fields but after wards admitted that his right name was amos stirling stirling was taken from the line and brought into a private room here he was stripped and it was found that his underclothes were covered with hu man blood when his attention was called to this damaging fact he said unconcernedly oh nothing my nose was bleeding stirling was not in the state where the crime was committed hence legal formalities were necessary before he could be taken to philadelphia don aghy made an attempt to break the record in the matter of requisitions he took a special train to harrisburg went to the executive mansion and roused gov stone from a sound sleep in order to get his signature on the papers from harrisburg he has bened back to trenton only to find that some over willing lawyer had filed an objection to the removal of the prisoner although trivial it took several hours to overcome but in spite of all the obstacles donaghy complied with all the formalities and had his prisoner in the philadelphia city hall in just 32 hr uis three prisoners were now in cus tody could thy be proven guilty two were silent stirling lo 10 idly pro tested his innocence he said that it he were tree he could prove an alibi I 1 m free rejoined donaghy and if you 11 give me the names of your i witnesses work it out for you if its any good be the first to ad mit it ahe negro finally said that a tain lady of color named dolly gray who lived in harrisburg could prove that he was at the state capitol on tho night of the murder donaghy patient ly traveled up the state la search 0 ellsa gray by a certain humorous humo ious and et grotesque coincidence the hand organs at that time were grinding out dolly gray by the ream and as donaghy came to the little street where the dolly gray 0 another color ched two street pianos on either end of the thoroughfare struck up good bye dolly cray im going to leave sou with a vehemence that threat ened to turn an unusually affecting tragedy into a roaring farce dolly however who weighed pounds calmly washed her hands of stirling and declined to assist in proving his alibi on the very day of ivory s arrest donaghy had taken him to the scene of the murder the street where tha body was found was a little traveled thoroughfare and the footprints where the men had escaped by leaping the little iron fence were still visible in the soft earth the right shoe was re 1 moved from ivory s foot and the heel and toe fitted to a nicety into the foot prints in the lall road yard the marka were there as clearly as though they had been stenciled in the meantime evidence was all ing up in other directions mrs mary boyle who was employed as a wait ress in a restaurant near thirty second and market streets testified that she had served all three of the men on the day of the crime this wag import ant as establishing the fact that they vere together but this was not all gardener named lutz eald that barller la the evening all three of the negroes had surrounded him at a point five or six bloc rs from where the white crime was committed they did not use |