Paddington' Pollaky, Private Detective

by Bryan Kesselman

  These were not Pollaky’s detectives. Dublin-born private detective Matthew Maguire had been hired by Adams and Morse and this would later be approved by Thomas Haines Dudley, the Liverpool based US Consul who arrived in England in November 1861. Anderson, who evidently had a great sense of humour and allowed himself the luxury of a bit of teasing of the first detective, had this to say: ‘Mr McGuire was an ugly, red headed villain whose faculties were by no means so acute as those of his metropolitan brother [Brett], and whose propensities for gazing innocently into the sky were remarkable. I used to stand near him on the pavement of the Hotel and admire his efforts to look unconcerned. Upon one occasion he followed me to Mr Crowders quarters and went fast asleep on the stoop.’

  HSS.139.14.19. Pollaky to Sanford

  ‘Liverpool 3th [sic] October ’61’ [Thursday]

  This letter marked ‘Strictly Private’ has much that is hard to decipher owing to the condition of the document. Pollaky implies that Sanford is not telling him exactly what he wants him to do, despite their arrangement to the contrary. Nevertheless, he continues to receive information about the cases of rifles which are still in Greenock.

  HSS.139.14.21. Pollaky to Sanford

  A short report from one of Pollaky’s agents. The information is about the origins of a number of letters received by some of the Confederates (from Yorkshire and Liverpool), and the movements of some of them during the day. The agent (G.Grub) was on watch from 8 a.m. until 5 p.m:

  Oct 7, 1861 [Monday]

  Saw Postman at 8 oclock. morning Deliver Letter at No 58 Jermyn St St James St. Piccadilly

  Captain Huss [Huse]

  1 Liverpool

  1 York

  Major Gore 2

  “ 1 ScarBrough [sic]

  “

  1 Selby, Yorkshire

  Monday, 7th October 1861 arived [sic] at Jermyn St St James St. Piccadilly at 8 oclock morning saw Postman deliver Letters at 58 Jermyn St

  Major Gore

  2 Liverpool

  Captain Huss

  “

  1 Selby

  1 Selby

  1 Hull Yorkshire

  1 Liverpool

  Mr WhyBrow 2 Selby, 1 York, 1 Scarbrough [sic]

  11 am Saw Major Gore and Mr WhyBrow go into park by Piccadilly: 12 saw Captn Huss go into 58 Jermyn St. Left at 12/30 for dinner returned at 2 oclock. remained till 5 pm. saw nothing of any account after 2 oclock – G.Grub –

  HSS.139.13.3. Pollaky to Sanford

  ‘London Tuesday’ [Possibly 9 October 1861]

  Pollaky addresses Sanford as ‘Dear Sanford’, the only letter in which he does so. He wrote from London, but was about to carry out some investigations in Liverpool, where the Princess Royal was berthed. He asks Sanford to urge Morse to arrange for him to have ‘the party political weight to back up my representation, & secure attention’. Pollaky signs the letter:

  I am very hastily Yrs devotedly Vidocq I.

  This is an in-joke – the real and famous French detective Eugène François Vidocq had died in 1857 (the ‘I’ is for Ignatius). There is a postscript:

  a letter directed to the care of the Consul will reach me at Liverpool – dont emasculate your dispatch[.] P. told me he had heard that 20,000 guns were [sic] arrived being for shipment to America – at Hamburg[.]

  HSS.139.13.4. Pollaky to Sanford

  [Undated – Possibly October 1861]

  Pollaky writes hurriedly as he is busy establishing his surveillance, and appointing his agents. The Princess Royal had unloaded her cargo.

  HSS.139.14.22. X to Pollaky

  ‘Liverpool 10th Oct’ [1861 – Thursday]

  A brief note untidily signed ‘X’ reporting the departure for the Southern States of a ship called the Cheshire. Who was X? We may never know.

  HSS.139.14.23. Pollaky to Sanford

  ‘10th Oct. 61’ [Thursday]

  Pollaky reports that he has placed a man to watch the premises of Moses Brothers in Leadenhall Street. He again complains that he has had no letters from Sanford (whose communication skills are evidently appalling) and hopes that Sanford has actually received his reports.

  In the meantime, Pollaky received a report from one of his agents, Ed Brennan, who had discovered that a fast steamer, the Fingal, was preparing to leave Greenock for America. The Fingal, which Bulloch had bought in September, was built in Glasgow by James and George Thompson in the Clyde Bank Iron Shipyard in 1861. After being loaded with the ordnance bought by Bulloch, it left Greenock on 10 October carrying supplies to the Confederate States. Brennan had written to Pollaky that day, and reported that he had not seen Bulloch or his friends, and doubted they had gone into the ship, ‘unless they boarded her at dead of night’. He enclosed a sketch of the Fingal, mentioning that she carried a cargo worth several thousand pounds.

  In fact, the Fingal travelled by a devious course to Holyhead where Bulloch boarded and took command on 15 October. His plan seems to have been to take her to America in British colours so as to evade any Union ships that might try to stop her. After an eventful voyage, which included a collision with a brig (the Siccardi), almost running out of water, an attempt by the US Consul in Bermuda to sabotage the mission while the Fingal was anchored there, as well as almost running aground, the Fingal arrived in Savannah on 14 November. It had successfully evaded the blockade that had been put in place by the Union forces. The cargo included a huge amount of weaponry, uniforms, and material for making more.

  Bulloch wrote in his book The Secret Service of the Confederate States in Europe or, How the Confederate Cruisers Were Equipped (Volume 1, 1884) that, ‘No single ship ever took into the Confederacy a cargo so entirely composed of military and naval supplies’, and that his operations ‘were greatly helped by the generous assistance of Messrs. Fraser, Trenholm and Co.’ Of the difficulties he and his associates faced he wrote, ‘It was necessary to act with caution and secrecy, because the impression had already got abroad that the Confederate Government was trying to fit out ships in England to cruise against American commerce, and during the whole period of the war all vessels taking arms on board, or cases supposed to contain arms or ammunition, were closely watched by agents and spies of the United States Consuls.’ He remained with the Fingal until the middle of January 1862, and then returned to England, arriving in Liverpool on 3 March, to carry on with his work there. The 1891 English census lists Bulloch, who by that time had become a naturalised British subject, as a ‘Retired Naval Officer’. His half-sister would become the mother of President Theodore Roosevelt.

  Once in the Confederacy, the Fingal was converted into an ironclad vessel and renamed the CSS Atlanta. In 1863, the cumbersome and overweight Atlanta was captured by the USS Weehawken, and became part of the Union fleet.

  HSS.139.14.24. Pollaky to Sanford

  ‘Private to Mr.S. “London 11th October 1861”’ [Friday]

  This is a longer and more detailed report into the movements of the Fingal which had now departed British shores. Pollaky reports that he had given a full descriptive sketch of the ship to Morse who would be sending it to the United States. Bullock and other Confederate agents were busy inspecting and buying rifles; Pollaky now knew all the channels towards their ultimate destinations.

  An important paragraph includes the information that the Confederates now knew they were being watched – ‘Captain M. said that he cannot move a step without a detective on his heels’ – and that their telegrams were being interfered with:

  This later assertion is not mere suposition [sic] of M … ‘vous comprenez’ It is impossible my dear sir to watch a house unfortunately so situated like B. for 3½ months without attracting some notice in such a neighbourhood.

  You may rely on me – nothing will be left undone to secure success – I told You that I don’t work in this matter for money but for an ultimate consideration – I assure You that the money I receive is in all insufficient for the work in hand; but I make it do the best I can.

  Neverthe
less, money, or the lack of it being forthcoming did trouble him, though it was like Pollaky to have nobler considerations in his mind – or at least to say that he did, which may amount to the same thing.

  From this letter, we may gather that Sanford had communicated with Pollaky on the matter of Moses Brothers, as he writes, ‘Your directions as to Moses Brothers are attended to.’ Pollaky seems to have had an agent infiltrating the Confederate circle, as he mentions that his ‘Literary Man’ had been reporting on matters told him by Yancey.

  My Literary Man is going slowly ahead in fact he has made no progress – as I believe only half I see and ¼ I hear I take his Reports as what they are worth trash. There is no evidence to prove their ‘correctness nor do I see the immense importance of what Yancy may ungardedly [sic] say to him’.

  We note Pollaky’s characterful English: ‘I take his Reports as what they are worth trash’, and smile, but it does make one wonder about how he decided who to recruit.

  HSS.139.13.11. Pollaky to Sanford

  12th Saturday [October 1861]

  Watched Moses Brothers premises 58–59 Leadenhall St. but nothing has arrived since Thursday worth noticing.

  At this time in his career, Pollaky was actively engaged on the stake-outs himself, despite employing agents to work for him. This would change by 1875. Pollaky writes that Moses Brothers had been receiving rifles, and then sending them to Chatham, Kent. At 4 p.m. he added, ‘We have now secured a clerk in the employ of Mrss Isaac & Campbells the Army & Navy Contractors.’

  HSS.139.14.25. Pollaky to Sanford

  ‘14 Oct. 61’ [Monday]

  Pollaky enclosed a copy of the official cargo list of the Fingal, writing, ‘the source is most reliable and every Item is correct and beyond a shadow of doubt.’

  The quantities were evidently huge and consisted of almost all of Bulloch’s purchases made while in England. It also seemed that the Confederates were hoping to be recognised by the French government.

  HSS.139.13.10. Pollaky to Sanford

  Dated ‘Oct 15, 1861’ [Tuesday] by the Archivist.

  Pollaky had that day received reports from his agents in Hartlepool, Stockton-on-Tees, and Scarborough, but they contained no useful information. He writes that, ‘from Liverpool we hear of large quantities of blankets being stored up’, and that rifles are, ‘being manufactured in Glasgow for the South.’ A number of Confederate agents were becoming very active. Pollaky enclosed a newspaper clipping with this letter, probably from the Liverpool Times:

  RIFLED CANNON FOR THE STATES. – It is asserted that ‘several shiploads’ of Captain Blakely’s rifled cannon have been recently shipped for the American States – North and South.

  The ‘several shiploads’ must be an exaggeration, but if the American papers are to be believed, there can be little doubt that the Federal army, at last, is supplied with a number of the Blakely guns. It is just possible too, that the rifled cannon that formed a portion of the terrible cargo of the Fingall [sic], which cleared so mysteriously, the other day, at Greenock for ‘Madeira and the west coast of Africa’, were specimens of Captain Blakely’s destructive weapon.

  HSS.139.14.26. Thomson to Pollaky

  Another rare communication from one of Pollaky’s agents, James I. Thomson, and addressed to Pollaky at Devereux Court. This letter is written in several directions with lines of text crossing over each other, and bears the mysterious inscription: ‘Peruana = for Valparíaso’ on the reverse.

  15/10/61

  London 19 George Street Euston Square. NW.

  Tuesday evening October 15th 1861.

  Sir I arrived at Leadenhall street at 12.45 pm today, leaving at 4.pm.

  I paid the greatest attention [to] the premises of Moses Bros as also the wharehouses [sic] of Messrs. Candler & Sons, but nothing transpired to give me a clue of any kind.

  Messrs. Candler & Sons are (I presume you are aware of the fact) ‘beer merchants’, but opposite to theirs are the premises of Messrs. Single & Jacobs, Bonded Carmen, who appear extensively Connected.

  I attend again tomorrow at mid-day. My fee will be 4/ [4 shillings] per diem, including all minor incidental expenses.

  I am Sir

  Faithfully Yrs.

  James I. Thomson

  HSS.139.14.27. Pollaky to Sanford

  ‘London 15th Oct 61.’

  Pollaky in a hastily written letter reports on the movements of various ships, in particular the Princess Royal that departed for Rotterdam. He offered to go there himself in the event that Sanford was alone, and again requested an interview with Sandford.

  HSS.139.14.28. Pollaky to Sanford

  ‘18th Oct 61.’ [Friday]

  Now preparing to keep a close watch on the north-east coast of England, Pollaky reports further on ship movements, and also warns that Yancey, now in Paris, had written to Bulloch that he was making good headway. Bulloch, however, was already on the Fingal, en route for America.

  HSS.139.14.29. Pollaky to Sanford

  London 19th Oct 61. [Saturday]

  By enclosed Rpt You will see that ‘they are at it again’ large quantities of Rifles are deposited at Billiter St. previous their being shipped – They dont give us ‘breathing time’ and are at it day & night –

  Surveillance had become very difficult as the Confederates were aware they were being spied upon. Pollaky still hoped for communication from Sanford:

  I am without a letter from You & I hope you will excuse me in referring after to this but I would consider it a personal favour if You could only find time enough for one line to say You receive my letters, as it would do away with caution which I must otherwise necessarly [sic] use in my leters [sic].

  HSS.139.13.2. Pollaky to Sanford

  [Undated – Possibly October 1861]

  Pollaky reports that a Mr E.N. was trying to buy 120,000 metres of cloth, presumably for making army uniforms:

  Mr E.N is still in Paris – he is bearer of letters of Credit on Rothschild of Paris & London and on Peabody amounting altogether to £300,000. He is trying to get at once in England 80,000 meters of Blue army Cloth & 40,000 meters of Blue Grey army Cloth – he offers to give orders intending for a period of 3 months the deliveries to be made monthly – I have not been able yet to ascertain the prices he pays, but shall know it in a few days – If he orders these goods delivered in London, Southampton or Liverpool.

  He sent yesterday a dispatch to a friend of his whom I am acquainted with, calling him to Paris – That gentleman left by the mail train last night to return on Friday morning to London. I shall then know the purpose of that journey & will inform you without any delay.

  HSS.139.14.30. Pollaky to Sanford

  ‘20th Oct 61.’ [Sunday]

  Having received two letters from Sanford, and feeling that he was therefore empowered to continue his surveillance, Pollaky wrote detailing more rifle acquisitions. He gives more information about ship movements, and also mentions that Brennan, ‘who was so fortunate about the Fingal’ will proceed to Scarborough and Hartlepool in search of a steamer said to be fitting out there.

  HSS.139.14.31. Pollaky to Sanford

  ‘25th October 61’ [Friday]

  Pollaky used headed writing paper for this letter - not his own, however, but headed ‘Mansion House, Justice Rooms, London E.C.’ below a crest with the Latin inscription Domine Dirige Nos. He did not use this as the header for his letter, however, but turned the paper upside down and wrote on it as if it were a piece of scrap paper.

  He had travelled to Leeds on Wednesday 23 October, where he ‘discovered a large quantity of blanquets [sic] ordered by the Southeners [sic] to be shipped in Liverpool’, and the next day had gone to Hartlepool, where he had spent the whole day going around the harbour, but without making any discoveries. On Friday he travelled back to London where he discovered that Candler & Sons had received more cases of rifles. It was reported that Bulloch and others were in Liverpool, though in this last piece of information he must have been misinformed
by his agent, since Bulloch was by then on the Fingal bound for America.

  The letter includes his usual advice to Sanford that he should come to England as soon as possible so that they could meet. Pollaky offers to go himself to Ostende or Antwerp to meet Sanford there, should his original suggestion not be possible. Naturally, Sanford remained silent.

  HSS.139.14.32. Pollaky to Sanford

  [Letter undated, but written on a Saturday at the end of

  October 1861]

  Pollaky enclosed two substantial newspaper cuttings. The first, from a Saturday edition of the Express is entitled: ‘POLITICAL ESPIONAGE IN LIVERPOOL’, and describes in very negative terms the watch that was being kept on Confederate agents: