Here the iron horse began to manifest indications of impatience, and shaking hands with the worthy Squire, we went our several ways.
CHAPTER IV.
High Crimes in low Places—Honest Baggage-masters—Suspicious Circumstances—Watching the Suspected—Shunning the Dust—Honesty Triumphant—An Episode—Unexpected Confession—The Night Clerks—Conformity to Circumstances—Pat the Porter—Absents himself—Physician consulted—The Dead Child—Hunting Excursions—"No Go"—Pat explains his Absence—His Discharge—The Grave-stones—Stolen Money appears—The Jolly Undertakers—Pat at the Grave—More Hunting—Firing a Salute—Removing the Deposits—Crossing the Ferry—Scene at the Post Office—Trip to Brooklyn—Recovery of Money—Escape—Encounter with a Policeman—Searching a Steamer—Waking the wrong Passenger—Accomplices detained—Luxuries cut off—False Imprisonment Suit—Michael on the Stand—Case dismissed.
Public confidence in the United States Mail, and in the integrity of those connected therewith, never perhaps received a severer shock than that which it suffered from the extensive robberies committed in the Summer and Fall of 1853, by Pat R., at that time a night porter in the New York Post Office. The range of his ambition was by no means commensurate with his humble station in life and the post office, and his menial occupation did not repress aspirations which could render him a fit rival to such men as Swartwout and Schuyler, both by the extent of his schemes of villany, and the success with which they were carried on.
He was no petty thief, content with doing a small but comparatively safe business at filching, or at least, satisfied to begin with the "day of small things;" but he had hardly taken the oath of office before its strength was tested, and it proved no greater restraint to him than a spider's thread to a wild buffalo. He at once plunged into the tempting field which lay before him, and grasped with a greedy clutch at every opportunity to enlarge his increasing store of ill-gotten wealth. He would sometimes add thousands to his hoard in a single night, and carried on these bold depredations for some time unsuspected, not because he was above suspicion, but because he was below it.
In other words, after these robberies had been pretty satisfactorily traced to the New York office, it was necessary to establish the innocence, so far as these losses were concerned, of a large number of clerks, before suspicion fairly rested on the guilty party. Thus, when the investigation was commenced, he was buried up, so to speak, beneath so many protecting layers, all of which were removed before he came to light. I will not attempt to give any idea of the quantity of labor necessary in this and similar preliminary investigations.
Some of the numerous complaints made to the Department and the post master of New York, involved large sums of money. Among them was a package of $2000 in bank-notes, mailed at Middletown, Conn., for Philadelphia, Penn. Another of $1800 from Bridgeport, Conn., to Zanesville, Ohio. Still another of $1400 from Joliet, Ill., to New York, and many other smaller sums, from $50 to $1000; also drafts, notes, checks, &c., to an enormous amount in the aggregate. None of these valuable remittances had been seen by any persons properly interested in them, after they had passed out of the hands of the senders.