Mysteries of the missing

by Edward H. Smith

Investigation brought out romantic and pathetic facts concerning the husband. He had apparently had no better employment in New York than that of motorman in the hire of an electric cab company then operating in that city. But this derelict was the son of distinguished parents. His father was Judge John C. Barrow of the superior court of Little Rock, Arkansas, and the descendant of other persons politically well known in the South. George Beauregard Barrow—his middle name being that of the famous Confederate commander at the first battle of Bull Run or Manassas, to whom distant relationship was claimed—had been incorrigible from childhood. In early manhood he had been connected with kidnapping threats and plots in his home city and with assaults on his enemies, with the result that he was finally sent away, cut off and told to make his own berth in the world. Judge Barrow tried to aid his unfortunate son at the trial, but public feeling was too sorely aroused.

George Barrow and Bella Anderson were tried before Judge Fursman and quickly convicted. Barrow was sentenced to fourteen years and ten months, and the Anderson girl to four years, both judge and jury accepting her statement that she had been no more than a pawn in the hands of shrewder and older conspirators. Mrs. Barrow, sensing the direction of the wind, took a plea of guilty before Judge Werner, hoping for clemency. The court, however, said that her crime merited the gravest reprehension and severest punishment. He fixed her term at twelve years and ten months.

These trials were had, and the sentences imposed within six weeks of the kidnapping, the courts having acted with despatch. While the cases were pending, Barrow, Mrs. Barrow, and the Anderson girl had again and again been asked to reveal the names of others who had induced them to their crime or had financed them. All said there had been no other conspirators, but the feeling persisted that Barrow had acted with the support of professional criminals, or of some enemy of the Clarkes, either of whom had supplied him with considerable sums of money.

This belief, which was specially strong with some of the newspapers, was predicated upon two facts.

On the morning of Thursday, May 25, four days after the abduction of Marion Clarke, there had appeared in the New York Herald the following advertisement:

“M. F. two thousand dollars reward will be O. K. in Baby Clarke case. Write again and let me know when and where I can meet you Thursday evening. Don’t fail—strictly confidential.”

Neither the Clarkes, the newspapers, nor any persons acting for them knew anything about a two-thousand-dollar-reward offer or had communicated with any one who had been promised such a sum. Hence there were only two possible explanations of the advertisement. Either it had been inserted by some unbalanced person who wanted to create a stir—the kind of restless neurotic who projects his unwelcome apparition into every sensation—or there was really some dark force moving behind the kidnapping.

A second fact led many to persist in this latter notion. In spite of the fact that George Barrow had been disowned at home and driven from his town, and opposed to the circumstances that he had worked at common and ill-paid jobs, had been unable to pay his rent for eleven months, had been seen in the shabbiest clothes and was known to be in need—the only force that might have prompted him to attempt a kidnapping—he was found to have a considerable sum in his pockets when searched at the jail; he informed his wife that he would get plenty of cash for their defense, and he was shown to have expended a fairly large sum on the planning of the crime, the traveling and other expenses, the rent of the farmhouse, the needs of Bella Anderson, and for his own amusement. Where had this come from?

Not only the public and the newspapers, but Detective Chief McClusky were long occupied with this enigma. Barrow himself gave various specious explanations and finally refused to say more. Hints and bruits of all kinds were current. Many said that Arthur Clarke could furnish the answer if he would, an accusation which the harried father indignantly rejected.

In the end the guilty trio went to prison, the Clarkes removed to Boston, the public interest flagged, and the mystery remained unsolved.