—New York Times
November 10, 1878
When news of the police findings hit the front pages of New York City’s newspapers, numerous stories about wagons being seen in the vicinity of the churchyard on the night of the robbery began to flood into police headquarters. One witness reported seeing a rickety open wagon along Eleventh Street near the cemetery fence around 11 p.m. According to the witness, the single horse drawing the wagon appeared to be in a heated condition, steaming with sweat. He told the police that he saw no one around the horse and wagon but that it stayed parked at the rear of the church unattended for the entire time it took him to walk home that evening.
Another unidentified man reported to the police that he saw a black painted wagon parked along Eleventh Street near the rear of the church around 3 a.m. on Thursday, the morning after the grave robbery reportedly took place. He too reported seeing no one in the immediate vicinity of the dark wagon but made no mention of the condition of the single horse that was attached to it.
A third report stated that a covered wagon, with side gates similar to those on delivery wagons, was seen parked on Stuyvesant Street near the front of the church. Although the reported wagon sightings tied into the theory of how Stewart’s body had been spirited away, the police were no closer to identifying the robbers than they had been before.
Other curious incidents were also reported to the police. A well-dressed gentleman asked for a meeting with Police Superintendent George Walling claiming that foreign phrenologists had stolen the body so that they could dissect Stewart’s brain for the purpose of obtaining information about how Stewart became such a wealthy man. The secrets to his success, the gentleman maintained, were hidden deep within Stewart’s brain. He said that the body had been shipped overseas on a cargo ship and told Walling that if he wanted to locate it, he should wire overseas to several ports to have the cargoes of ships searched on arrival. Walling found the man’s claim absurd and politely refused the meeting request. When the gentleman became angry at Walling’s refusal, the superintendent had him escorted from police headquarters.
Captain Thomas Byrnes of the Fifteenth Precinct brought a boy into police headquarters for questioning, claiming that the boy had evidence that would break the case wide open. Byrnes, who had a penchant for generating publicity for himself, also told newspaper reporters that the boy’s testimony would prove to be important in solving the case. When asked by the press what the boy had to say, Byrnes refused to divulge the information, claiming that revealing the boy’s testimony might jeopardize the ongoing investigation.
Walling and Commissioner Nichols told reporters that the entire police department was working on the case and that they hoped to be able to apprehend the criminals shortly. They were both noncommittal on what evidence they had gathered that would prompt them to make their claim. Like Captain Byrnes, they suggested that divulging any information might harm the investigation.
What was clear was that the police had begun to focus their investigation on the boardinghouse courtyard at 129 East Tenth Street. Detectives questioned Erasmus Garnsey and his wife, tenants at the boardinghouse. They occupied the bedroom closest to the courtyard. Garnsey reported that sometime between 1 and 2 a.m. on Thursday morning, he and his wife were both awakened by a loud thud that sounded as if a heavy body had fallen against their window shutters. According to Garnsey, immediately after they heard the noise, they heard a man’s voice say, “Come. It’s about time for us to be out of here.”
Garnsey said he paid no attention to it thinking it was simply some young lovers in a secret early morning rendezvous.
The police questioned Mary Newton, the owner of the boardinghouse, who reported that her sister and brother-in-law, who lived at the house, came home around 10:30 on Wednesday night and didn’t report seeing anything unusual about the church, churchyard, or along the street.
The greasy, foul-smelling droplets that had been left behind at the crime scene were analyzed and were identified as decomposing flesh. The stains clearly marked the trail. The grave robbers carried Stewart’s rotting remains from St. Mark’s Churchyard over the iron fence on the far western end of the cemetery, across East Tenth Street and into the boardinghouse courtyard, where they placed it in a waiting wagon to transport it.
The New York Herald was quick to dispute the police theory about the stains. According to a Herald reporter, the stains more likely came from the chemical Allekton, a liquid used to preserve decomposing bodies. The chemical, which had previously been written about in the Herald, was a new discovery being sold to undertakers by the company of Middleton and Warner, located on Bond Street. Detectives, following up on the Herald’s lead, questioned C. N. Middleton, one of the business’s owners, who told the police that in October 1878, around the time of the first attempted grave robbery at St. Mark’s, an unidentified man came to his Bond Street address asking to buy a supply of Allekton and all the apparatus needed to inject it into a body. Since he only sold the new chemical to professional undertakers and since the man could not produce any professional credentials, he refused to sell him the body preservative. According to Middleton, the man left and never returned to his business again.
After reading about the grave robbery, Middleton immediately contacted Judge Hilton and William Libbey, informing them of the incident and suggesting that the man who had tried to buy the Allekton might somehow be mixed up in the robbery. Middleton agreed to go to police headquarters and look at the police department’s “rogue’s gallery”—a collection of photographs of known criminals—to see if he could identify the man who came in to buy the chemical. Middleton carefully went through all the photographs and finally identified twenty-two-year-old Thomas McCarty, a petty criminal known for being a pickpocket. More damning than that, when the police showed the photograph of McCarty to the clerk at Seymour’s Hardware, where the police had traced the shovel and lantern found at the crime scene, the store clerk also identified McCarty as the man who purchased both items. McCarty was picked up for questioning, and after a lengthy interrogation, the police concluded that he knew nothing about the case and that Middleton and the hardware store clerk had been mistaken in their identification. McCarty, as far as the police were concerned, was a simple-minded petty thief and nothing more.
Perhaps angered by the police department’s refusal to pursue the two sextons or with their lack of success in uncovering any leads, Hilton hired his own Pinkerton private detectives to conduct an investigation. He didn’t bother to consult with the police about the Pinkertons’ findings. Hilton had his private detectives follow up on every lead, no matter how absurd. They too remained stymied.
Letters began to pour into Hilton’s office ranging from missives penned by spiritualists who claimed to have been in touch with the ghost of A. T. Stewart and knew the whereabouts of the missing remains, to angry letters saying that Stewart got what he deserved. Some claimed the “Jews” had committed the crime as retribution for Hilton’s prejudice against them.
An anonymous letter sent from Rutland, Vermont, on November 13, 1878, to police headquarters stated: “In one hour I will be in Canada with A.T. Stewart’s body. A woman has his remains.”
The letter was composed from letters and words cut from newspapers.
Another message sent directly to Judge Hilton on November 9, 1878, stated:
Proper and honorable negotiations will be made with yourself and the widow of the late A.T. Stewart, Esq., and in the meantime, let me assure you that the remains of this gentleman are safe beyond the possibility of detection and have been for some time. We will require the most substantial reward before you can hope to obtain the return of the body. … To be brief, when a reward of $1,000,000 shall be paid and perfect immunity from prosecution be most thoroughly guaranteed, then, and not till then, shall we for the instant entertain any idea of opening negotiations with yourself or any of the friends of the decea
sed.
The letter was signed by “Oswald Baxter.”
Another letter dated November 8, 1878, written decidedly in the handwriting of a woman, was sent directly to Mrs. Stewart (although intercepted by Hilton).
Mrs. Cornelia Stewart:
Dear Madam: Your terms are unsatisfactory. Whenever you wish to make the sum $100,000, you will place a personal in the Herald as follows:
Agreed to —S.H.H.C.
Until then you will not hear again from us.
The letter was unsigned.
Another letter complete with a hand-drawn skull and crossbones and the words DEATH written in huge letters was addressed to Mrs. A. T. Stewart, Judge Hilton, and Mr. Libbey. The letter stated: “If this reward is not given in 5 days it shall be lost” and was signed SAM, Pres., WILL, Vice-Pres., MICH, Tres. And CONNERS, Sec.
Yet another among the glut of missives sent to Hilton stated: “Dear Sir: If you will promise not to lock me up, and give me $10,000, I will tell you where the body and robbers of the late A.T. Stewart is.” It was signed: ONE OF THE ROBBERS. At the end of the letter, the author wrote: “This is private.”
A letter sent to the New York Herald from a source identifying itself as “A Company” advised: “If the executors of the late A. T. Stewart will donate $500,000 for some needed public charity in the city of New York the whereabouts of his remains will be immediately divulged and not one penny will be asked for the expense we have incurred.”
A brief, small, enigmatic ad appearing in the Herald stated: “NICHOLS & HILTON.—CALL OFF BLOODHOUNDS and discipline the Police. P. X. Y-$100,000.00.”
In yet another unsigned letter sent to Judge Hilton, the author advised: “Privately offer the Roman Catholic Bishop from $1,000 to $5,000 for the return of A.T. Stewart’s body and I think it will be returned without the thieves being rewarded for their labors.”
The police and Hilton considered none of the letters to be reliable, or, in fact, the true ransom note for which they had been waiting. Still, the correspondences flooded into the hands of the authorities, Hilton, and newspapers from places as far away as Canada and London, England.
Anything more depraved in the way of journalism than the behavior of the press during the past few days on the subject of the Stewart grave-robbery it would be difficult to conceive. The facts which have been published do not concern the public in any way. The thieves, having made away with the body, appear to have opened negotiations, as everybody knew they would do, with the Stewart family, through ‘counsel,’ and, the family having refused their terms, the matter was dropped. Is this any reason why we should now have column after column of the body-snatchers’ letters, the replies of their ‘counsel’ through the Herald ‘Personal’ column, accompanied by details as to the condition of the corpse, followed by an acrimonious controversy as to whether Judge Hilton did or did not deceive Mrs. Stewart about the return of her husband’s body, and persuade her that it had been returned while it had not? Some of the newspapers, while publishing all the details of the negotiations, dwell feelingly on the agony that the whole affair must have caused Mrs. Stewart, and the consequent heartless brutality of the thieves. What sort of work is this.
—Nation, July–December, 1879
It appeared to most that the Stewart case was at a standstill, but then suddenly, five days after the grave robbery and despite an endless stream of dead-ends, the New York Times erroneously reported on November 12, 1878, that the hiding place of Stewart’s remains had been discovered. Where the body was, how it arrived there, and who stole it remained a mystery, and neither the police nor Judge Hilton would provide any answers.
Superintendent Walling released no new information to reporters. With the news of Stewart’s body being located, police officials maintained that the culprits would now be in a race to turn state’s evidence to avoid prosecution.
Hilton said, “I have nothing to say,” when asked by reporters if indeed Stewart’s body had been located.
The unfounded and sensational rumors abounded. According to the police, they had followed up on more than 150 leads, all of them leading nowhere. It had been rumored that Stewart’s body had been found in Newark, New Jersey, in the home of a man named J. B. Hayes. An investigation by Newark police turned up nothing.
SEEKING FOR THE GHOULS.
MR. STEWART’S BODY LIKELY TO
BE RECOVERED
Indications That The Robbers Have Been
Traced—Extreme Reticence On The
Part Of The Police—A Promising
Trail Struck—An Explanation By The
Sexton
Yesterday was a day of mysteries in the Stewart body-snatching case. The surface indications were all corroborative of the information drawn from Judge Hilton’s manner and language on Sunday night that the hiding place of the body had been discovered. The Police were busier than ever and went briskly about with countenances aglow with suppressed exultation. Judge Hilton was in unusually good spirits all day.
—New York Times
November 12, 1878
In a development that may or may not have been a ploy to get the robbers to tip their hand to authorities, it was reported that Cornelia Stewart had become bedridden because of the shocking news of the theft of her husband’s body and that her health was failing rapidly. According to the New York Times, “Should she die, the probabilities are, it is said, that Judge Hilton will immediately withdraw his offered reward, and refuse to entertain any propositions for the return of the body except in connection with the arrest and conviction of the perpetrators.”
It was clear to most that the twenty-five thousand-dollar reward initially offered by Hilton had been done to appease Mrs. Stewart and was not a reflection of his own sentiments. In the five days since the robbery, no credible ransom note had been sent to either Hilton or the police.
The reports on November 12, 1878, that the police had located Stewart’s body were short-lived. In the next day’s edition of the New York Times, Captain McCullagh said that, despite all the investigative work done on the case, the police “had not succeeded in tracing the body beyond the curbstone of 129 East Tenth-street.”
Without any resolution in the case, the New York City Police Department came under fire from publications inside and outside the city. An editorial in the New York Evening Telegram called the police good at locating crimes but not criminals. It referred to the police as “dogberries” and hailed the force as a collection of poorly educated incompetents. The New York Evening Express wrote: “That the body of the merchant millionaire should have been carried away from a teeming center in this populous city set every soul agog.” It urged the police to solve the case quickly to put the city’s mind at ease. The Herald berated the authorities for moving too slowly on the case. An editorial in the Chicago Tribune called the police investigation incompetent and the work of the grave robbers a radical political trend aimed at striking back at the wealthy with its roots in the principles of Communism. The Tribune editorial called on citizens to resort to vigilantism if the police were unable to protect them from these radicalized grave robbers.
Despite the criticism from the papers, in public Judge Hilton steadfastly maintained his faith in the police investigation.
I have the best detective talent of all kinds that I could find engaged to assist me, but I am really depending largely on the regular Police force. I have every reason for the greatest faith and confidence in the earnestness and zeal of their efforts. They could not possibly do more than they have done and I am entirely satisfied with them.
—Judge Henry Hilton, —New York Times
November 14, 1878
7
THE SEARCH CONTINUES
In which the motive for the theft continues to elude the police while clues suggest it is the handiwork of professional grave robbers, most notab
ly George Christian, a notorious “resurrectionist” who steals bodies for medical research. Yet, neither Christian nor the flood of mysterious letters claiming to know the location of Stewart’s body lead the police to the culprits. Stewart’s body remains missing.
Despite the endless number of dead-ends, the New York police continued their investigation into the A. T. Stewart grave robbery, pursuing every possible lead. They questioned hundreds of people, traveling across the city from one end to the other and beyond. The usual known suspects—criminals of every ilk—were rounded up, brought to police headquarters on Mulberry Street, questioned, and released. Despite their dedication, the police remained stymied by the theft.
The grave robbery took precedent over every case on the police dockets, and hundreds of officers and detectives were assigned to it. No stone would be left unturned according to Police Superintendent George Walling. Henry Hilton’s twenty-five-thousand-dollar reward had produced nothing except one outlandish lead after another.
Bag of Bones Page 13