Our source of information does not furnish us with any of the particulars which marked his conduct while itinerating through the South in his newly assumed character; yet general accounts went on to say that he had, for a length of time, so conducted himself that he gained much popularity in his ministerial calling, and had a considerable number of adherents. However, this may have been the case for a length of time, yet as the assumption of this new character could not be attributable to any supernatural impulse, but was merely another feature of a character already so singularly diversified, intended as a cloak under which he might, with less liability to suspicion, indulge the prevailing and all controlling propensities of his vitiated mind, it was not to be expected, with all the ingenuity he was capable of exercising, that he would long be able to conceal his real character. Accordingly, some misdemeanor, which we have not been able to trace, at length disclosed the hypocrisy of his character, and placed him before his deluded followers in his true light.
It would appear, whatever might have been the nature of his crime, that legal means were adopted for his apprehension, and that in order to expedite his escape from the hands of justice, he had seized upon a certain gentleman’s coach and horses and was travelling in the character of a gentleman in state, when he was overtaken and apprehended in the State of Maryland. Here he was tried and convicted, and sentenced to seven years imprisonment in the state prison in Baltimore, which, from the nature of the climate, was generally believed would terminate his career. The particulars of this adventure I received in the city of New York in 1827, where I took much pains to obtain all possible information concerning his proceedings in the Southern States while passing under the character of a preacher.
In 1833 it so happened that I had occasion to visit the city of New York again, when I renewed my enquiries concerning him, but to no effect; no sources of information to which I had access yielded any account of him, and the most rational conjecture was that he either terminated his course in the state prison at Baltimore, or that one day, should he outlive the period of his confinement and be again let loose upon the peace of society, some fresh development of his character would point out the scene of his renewed depredations.
In this painful state of obscurity I was reluctantly obliged to leave the hero of our narrative on my return from New York.
Another year had nearly elapsed before any additional light was thrown upon his history; but in an unexpected moment, when the supposition of his having ended his career in the prison at Baltimore was becoming fixed, I received, by the politeness of a friend, a file of the New York Times, one of the numbers of which contained the following article, bringing our adventurer again full into view in his usual characteristic style:
“Police Office—robbery and Speedy Arrest: A French gentleman from the South, (so represented by himself), who has for a few weeks past under the name of Henry Bond, been running up a bill and running down the fare, at the Francklin House, was this afternoon arrested at the establishment on the ungentlemanly charge of pillaging the trunks of lodgers. Since his sojourn a variety of articles had disappeared from the chambers of the hotel, and amongst the rest about two hundred dollars from the trunk of one gentleman. No one, however, had thought of suspecting the French gentleman, who was also a lodger, until this morning, when, unfortunately for him, his face was recognized by a gentleman who knew him to have been in the state prison at Baltimore. However, on searching him, which he readily complied with, not one cent of the money could be found either upon his baggage or his person; but in lieu thereof, they found him possessed of a large number of small keys, through which, no doubt, he found means of disposing of any surplus of circulating medium, whereupon his quarters were changed to Bridewell until the ensuing term of General Sessions.”
Here he remained in confinement until the period of his trial came round, when, for want of sufficient evidence to commit him to the state prison, he was thence discharged, and the next account we hear of him brings him before our view under the name of Henry Preston, arrested in the act of attempting to rob the Northern Mail Coach, as will appear by the following article extracted from the Times:
Police Office, Monday, Feb. 22nd, 1835—Just as this office was closing on Saturday evening, a very gentlemanly looking man, decently dressed, calling himself Henry Preston, was brought up in the custody of the driver and guard of the Northern mail stage who charged him with an attempt to rob the mail. The accusers testified that within a short distance of Peekskill they discovered the prisoner about a hundred yards ahead of the stage, and on approaching nearer they saw him jump over a fence, evidently to avoid notice. This, of course, excited their suspicion, and they kept an eye to the mail which was deposited in the boot. In the course of a short time the guard discovered the rat nibbling at the bait, and desiring the driver not to stop the speed of the horses, he quietly let himself down and found the prisoner actively employed loosening the strap which confines the mail-bag! He was instantly arrested, placed in the carriage and carried to town free of expense. Having nothing to offer in extenuation of his offence, Mr. Henry Preston was committed to Bridewell until Monday for further investigation.
Police Office, Monday morning—This morning, Henry Preston, committed for attempting to rob the Northern Mail, was brought up before the Sitting Magistrates, when the High Sheriff of Orange county appeared and demanded the prisoner, whose real name was Henry Gibney, as a fugitive from justice? He stated that the prisoner was to have been tried for grand larceny, and was lodged in the House of Detention at Newburgh, on Thursday, under care of two persons—that in the course of the night he eluded the vigilance of his keepers, escaped from confinement, and crossed the river on the ice, and had got down as far as Peekskill where he says he attempted to get on top of the stage that he might get into New York as soon as possible.
By order of the judges the prisoner was delivered up to the sheriff of Orange County, to be recognized there for his trial for the offence with which he was originally charged, at the next general session of the Supreme Court. But before the time came round he had, as on most former occasions, contrived to make his escape, and directed his course towards Upper Canada.