An old German, over fifty years of age, who some years ago was in business in Philadelphia, failed and lost all his property. He came to New York where he lived from hand to mouth for a month or two. He was often in the bread line on the Bowery to get enough to keep him from starvation. During that winter he went four days without eating anything. Then in his desperation he broke a window and stole an opera glass. For this he was arrested and sent to the Penitentiary for one year.

When he came out of prison he was determined not to commit another crime. He walked the streets for five days looking for employment, but nobody wanted him, he was too old. Walking along Second Avenue one evening he became exhausted, then desperate and broke a plate glass window that he might be sent to prison where he would get enough to eat. When he was discharged I met him at the prison door. I tried to get him employment but nobody wanted him, then I sent him to Newark on his way to Philadelphia among his friends who would save him from further imprisonment. In both cases poverty drove him to crime to get food. He was not a criminal from choice but only from circumstances.

This last case which I am about to relate was the most pitiful of all. The man lived with his wife and four children in the neighborhood of East Fortieth Street near First Avenue. He was a painter by trade and had been out of employment four weeks. On the first of March his wife gave birth to a child. On the third day afterwards his home was fireless and foodless. On the morning of the fourth day his children cried for food, then he became desperate. He tried to borrow money but nobody would loan him anything, not even a quarter of a dollar. That morning he stood at the Grand Central Depot ready to steal if he got the chance, but there were too many policemen there watching his movements. Then he walked down to Thirty-eighth Street and Park Avenue where he stood watching the people. In a few minutes he saw a lady come along dressed in furs. In her hand was a small wallet. He followed her down the steps into the tunnel, snatched the wallet and ran. But he could not run fast enough as he was weakened from lack of food and was soon captured. It was proved in Court that the man was not a thief; that he was driven to do the crime because of the dire poverty in his home. It was a social rather than a criminal question, but the judge thought he would make an example of this unfortunate and gave him ten years’ imprisonment. I asked him in prison why he had taken such chances; he replied, “I was cold and hungry and my family were in such desperate circumstances when the temptation appealed to me, I could not resist it. That’s all.”

In a large number of cases I have found that men and women were not thieves by choice. They were before the law guilty only technically for some crime, but were driven to it by social conditions and man’s inhumanity to man! When you come to judge all such “criminals” be charitable, and put yourself in their place and ask, What would you do under the same circumstances?

There is an organization in this city called the Charity Society. They receive a good deal of money during the year for charity! Mr. John S. Kennedy gives them free rent in his building. What charitable work they have ever done to aid the worthy poor we have never been able to learn. But some people have not a very high opinion of them. When I have urged people to seek relief from them (before I made an investigation for myself and learned what they are) they replied that they would prefer to jump into the river. Others in speaking of the society use red profanity which would not look well in print. Ask a policeman, priest, rabbi, minister of the gospel, mission worker. They may be able to tell what charity is given by this society to the poor of New York. I know the society for improving the conditions of the poor, the Children’s Aid Society and others that do a good work. Heaven bless them and fill their treasuries!

Copyright Pack Bros., New York.
Ex-police Commissioner Bingham, of New York. General
Theo. Alfred Bingham, born at Andover, Tolland Co.,
Conn., May 14, 1858. Graduated at West Point Military
Academy 1879 and Vale University 1896. For several
years he has been in charge of Public Buildings and
grounds in Washington, D. C. Was appointed Police
Commissioner, by Mayor McClellan, January, 1906. He
brought the Police up to a higher perfection than ever
before.

CHAPTER XVIII
HOW YOUNG MEN BREAK INTO PRISON

One of the most startling facts that face the present day reformer is the great number of strong, healthy and well educated young men that really break into prison, as that is the only way you can speak of it. Various reasons are given for this singular condition of things but which do not satisfactorily explain the difficult problem. We believe the question is worthy of the highest consideration which the State can bestow upon it. It is everywhere demanding a solution at the hands of Christian philanthropists and statesmen. When we think of the tens of thousands of young men in this and other large cities, who are leading prodigal lives, uncared for by their fellow men, and little sought after by Christian agencies, unless they are well dressed and have plenty of money; then the Y. M. C. A. and the Club will compete for their patronage. But if they are poor nobody cares for them, and if they happen to wander into a Christian Reading Room, they will be told that such a place is only for members, and not for them.