Hilton told reporters that Jones was under surveillance by the police. He then told both Jones and reporters that he would not hesitate to prosecute any man suspected of having the least connection with the grave robbers or their associates, no matter who he might be, implying even the highly decorated Union army veteran and former New York City postmaster.
Reports that Stewart’s body had indeed been recovered through negotiations with the robbers were disputed in various newspaper accounts and even caused a round of finger pointing and finger wagging. The World claimed that the ransom had been paid, and Stewart’s remains had been recovered. This account was disputed immediately by the New York Herald, which claimed that not only had Stewart’s remains not been recovered, but the thieves had entered into negotiations with an unnamed New York City lawyer (Jones) for the return of the body and were asking $250,000. In response to the Herald story, Hilton acknowledged that Stewart’s body had not been recovered.
The New York Times reported on Jones’s correspondence with the mysterious “Romaine” and his futile attempts at negotiating the return of the remains through Judge Hilton. But the Brooklyn Eagle was quick to place the blame for the ongoing controversy regarding Stewart’s remains squarely on the shoulders of the New York City Police Department. Regarding the erroneous reports in the World that Stewart’s body had been recovered, the Brooklyn Eagle proclaimed, “Let it be very cautious about stating as fact what is in reality only the conjecture of a posse of uniformed and uninformed blockheads and numbskulls, to wit: the police of New York.”
When a New York Times reporter asked Jones if he had been in contact with Mrs. Stewart, Jones said, “I never saw Mrs. Stewart in my life.” But Jones went on to tell the reporter that he had the correspondence between himself and the mysterious Romaine copied into a book and sent to Mrs. Stewart.
“I thought she was entitled to know the exact truth about her husband’s remains, and believed that it was cruel in Judge Hilton to deceive her by pretending that they were recovered; besides, if she saw fit to compromise with the desecrators of Mr. Stewart’s grave, it was none of my business, and, I think, none of Judge Hilton’s business,” Jones told reporters.
Judge Hilton’s efforts to conceal Jones’s negotiations with the mysterious Romaine ended when Jones sent a copy of the correspondence to Cornelia Stewart’s private attorneys at the New York law firm Evarts, Southmayd, and Choatt. The firm, whose reputation was impeccable, examined the letters and decided to turn them all over to Mrs. Stewart. Despite what she read, Mrs. Stewart remained steadfast in her support of Hilton and, at least outwardly, appeared to believe or want to believe what Hilton had told her—that her husband’s body had been recovered and was now resting in the crypt in Garden City.
When Cornelia Stewart’s private attorneys gave her the Romaine letters, she confronted Hilton, who vehemently maintained that the body had been recovered and was in safekeeping until it could be transported to the crypt in Garden City. Hilton went on to debunk the Jones and Romaine correspondence, arguing that Romaine was merely another con artist looking for a big payday. Further feathering his own cap, Hilton assured Cornelia Stewart that he had worked diligently to protect her from scams that men or women like Romaine tried to perpetrate on the grieving widow. Mrs. Stewart, who had grown to treat Hilton as a son, much like her husband, chose to believe Hilton over the obvious facts presented to her. With Mrs. Stewart’s renewed faith in him, Hilton went on the offensive against Jones, who had damaged the judge’s credibility, not only with Mrs. Stewart but also in the public’s eyes.
According to a New York Sun account published in early 1879, Hilton had assured Mrs. Stewart that her husband’s remains had been recovered from the grave robbers after paying a ransom of fifty thousand dollars. Although the robbers were not identified, the Sun claimed that an unnamed law firm had conducted negotiations for the return of the body. The robbers had first demanded one hundred thousand dollars for the return of Stewart’s remains but settled on fifty thousand dollars. Hilton allegedly told the widow that the remains were identified beyond a doubt and that they were immediately placed in a secret vault that was guarded around the clock until they could be interned in the crypt at the cathedral in Garden City. Despite the many rumors to the contrary, Mrs. Stewart seemed willing to believe that Hilton had indeed recovered her husband’s remains and all was right with the world again.
Hitting back at Jones’s claim that he had deliberately misled Mrs. Stewart, Hilton told reporters that he believed Jones was in fact one of the robbers and not the go-between, as he claimed to be. According to Hilton, the Romaine letters were fraudulent and did not originate in Canada as Jones claimed but were composed in New York City and made to appear to have been sent from a Canadian address. Hilton provided no proof to back up his claims. According to Hilton, he knew who the grave robbers were and where they were located and said that authorities were closing in on them. Also, again, Hilton offered no substantial proof to back up this claim.
Jones threatened to sue Hilton for slander for implicating him in the grave robbery. The New York City press was divided on the ongoing mystery. The New York Times was content to support Jones in his story about the mysterious Romaine hiding in Canada, and so too was the New York Herald. The World, another New York newspaper, called Jones a “politician” and discredited his entire story. According to the World, Jones’s story was riddled with flaws, including the fact that as a former postmaster, Jones hadn’t contacted the authorities at the Montreal post office from which Romaine’s letters were supposedly mailed. And the newspaper questioned why Jones didn’t ask to have the police stationed at the post office where the mysterious Romaine dropped off and picked up his mail in order to identify the culprit. Given the severity of the crime and its sensational nature, there would be no reason not to apprehend Romaine in Montreal and hold him for questioning. But Jones never made any attempt to do this. The World questioned his motives and called him a fraud. At the least, according to the World, Jones was after some notoriety to further his political career, and at the worst, he was trying to make some easy money off Hilton and the grieving Mrs. Stewart.
“I have told you now all that I know about the business.”
—Patrick Jones, August 1879
10
THE MYSTERIOUS PACKAGE
In which Italian sculptor Giuseppe F. Sala makes a startling claim that he was involved with men who stole Stewart’s body. Sala had previously been mixed up in the infamous Cardiff Giant hoax, in which a giant was reportedly discovered on a farm in upstate New York. The “giant” turns out to be a body carved out of gypsum by Sala. His claim regarding the body of A. T. Stewart turns out to be merely another hoax. In August 1881, new leads come to light when New York City private detective J. M. Fuller reports he has received a mysterious package that includes a painting showing where Stewart’s body is buried in Cypress Hills Cemetery.
No sooner had the Jones involvement in the case of A. T. Stewart’s remains ended than another controversy arose, this time involving Giuseppe Sala, an Italian sculptor. Sala took his story to the authorities and directly to Judge Hilton. Sala claimed that he met several people in 1876 who were planning to steal Stewart’s body from St. Mark’s. He claimed that one of the conspirators was a beautiful young woman who bankrolled the robbery and served as the leader of the gang of thieves. The gang had three other members, all men.
Sala was known to the gang because of his role in several hoaxes, including arguably the most famous hoax in American history, that of the Cardiff Giant. Sala alleged that his participation in the Cardiff scam began when New York tobacconist George Hull hired him to sculpt a ten-foot-tall giant out of gypsum. Hull had the giant buried and then dug up on October 16, 1869, by workers preparing a well behind the barn of William Newell in Cardiff, New York. The “giant” was hailed as a petrified man, and a tent was erected over it. People came from all ov
er to pay fifty cents each to see the famous Cardiff Giant. Hull later sold the giant for thirty-seven thousand dollars to a group of investors, who moved it to Syracuse, New York, to put on display. P. T. Barnum even had an imitation made.
According to Sala, the gang of thieves who stole Stewart’s body knew all about the illicit Cardiff Giant affair, as well as other shady ventures he had participated in. He further claimed that the gang wanted Sala to petrify the bones of A. T. Stewart. Sala told the police that besides his uncanny ability to carve humanlike statues, he was adept at the process of preserving the remains of the dead. Sala said he agreed to join the gang, demanding that his share be paid in advance and that all his expenses be paid for. He said that they had struck a deal and that the gang reportedly first planned to steal the body of Benedict Arnold (1741–1801), the infamous Revolutionary War traitor, who was buried in a cemetery in London.
Sala and his colleagues abandoned their scheme when they discovered that the English police were far more vigilant in protecting the dead than the police were in America. They then discussed several other options, including an attempt at replicating the infamous Cardiff Giant with a sculpted figure they would bury near the Giant’s Causeway in Ireland. It would be unearthed and hailed as the petrified remains of Finn McCool, the giant of the causeway.
The Giant’s Causeway, on the northeast coast of Northern Ireland, is a mesmerizing mass of tightly packed stone columns. According to the Northern Ireland Tourist Board, “The tops of the columns form stepping stones that lead from the cliff foot and disappear under the sea. Altogether there are 40,000 of these stone columns.” Irish legend has it that Finn McCool was a giant who built the stone causeway as a path to take to Scotland to battle his Scottish counterpart and archenemy, the giant Benandonner.
The gang decided to proceed with the Irish endeavor, and Sala reportedly sculpted their giant Finn McCool. This time, however, when the giant stone hoax was unearthed and rumors swirled that it was the petrified remains of Finn McCool, the Irish press and scientists immediately uncovered the attempted deception, and the gang fled back to America to hatch another plot.
Still under the leadership of the unknown beautiful woman, the gang discussed stealing Stewart’s body and holding it for ransom. According to Sala, he had a falling out with the woman and parted ways with the schemers. Shortly after that, Sala told authorities, he read the newspaper accounts of the theft of Stewart’s remains. He knew immediately it was the work of his former colleagues.
Sala agreed to take the police to Troy, New York, where he claimed he would be able to identify the woman and her accomplices. He told the police that one of the gang members was named Ford and that the beautiful unnamed woman was Ford’s wife or mistress. Sala and several New York City detectives went to Troy, but upon arrival, Sala had a change of heart, claiming that he feared for his life and wanting assurances from Hilton that he would pay for his personal protection. Hearing this, Judge Hilton was reported to have said, “Let the matter rest.” And rest it did. Sala was not heard from afterward.
SALA’S REMARKABLE STORY
AN ITALIAN STONE-CUTTER’S QUEER EXPERIENCES—
One Series Of Clues Given To The Police
Shortly after the robbery in St. Mark’s Church-yard, Judge Hilton was visited by Giuseppe F. Sala, an Italian sculptor, who now has a studio at No. 141 West Thirty-fourth-street, on the site of the old Gospel tent. Sala speaks English poorly, and when he visited Judge Hilton he tried his patience by his inability to talk as quickly and distinctly as the Judge, who is at times impatient, desired. Sala, however, told part of his story to Judge Hilton, and the rest to a person in his confidence. It was an extraordinary one, and its entire verification involved the expenditure of a large sum. It was, however, considered of sufficient importance to warrant an outlay of about $75, to enable Sala to go to Troy and point out some persons, who, according to him, were implicated in the grave robbery. Sala went to Troy, but failed to do what he promised.
—New York TimesAugust 14, 1879
“There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bear children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown.”
—Genesis 6:4, King James Bible
MORE FACTS ABOUT SALA
The Man Who Thought He Knew Who
Stole Stewart’s Body—His Friends In Troy
Troy, Aug. 14—Sala, who was mentioned in THE TIMES to-day as the exposer of a band of resurrectionists, lived in Troy about 10 years ago. He was born in Italy, and is a man of ability, but was a slave to liquor during his residence here. He went to Ireland a few years ago with E.J. Ford and a stone-cutter named Dye. They took with them a stone image, which they subsequently endeavored to pass upon the Irish people as the petrified body of Finn McCool. They returned about three years ago and Ford, whose father had meantime been elected Superintendent of the Poor of this county, made him his clerk. Last year a committee of the Supervisors reported that grave frauds marked the administration of the Poor Department, in consequence of which the senior Ford resigned, and he and his son and others were charged. They are now out on bail awaiting trial. While Ford is tricky and unprincipled, it is not believed by his acquaintances that he would dare to embark in so great an undertaking as the stealing of Stewart’s body. It is thought here that Sala has told the truth on non-essential and falsehoods on essential points.
—New York Times
August 15, 1879
As the case of Stewart’s missing corpse dragged on and on, it was becoming increasingly obvious that the New York City Police Department was simply not competent. The entire matter became the subject of ridicule and parody. Puck, an irreverent New York City–based humor magazine, ran a series of unflattering cartoons depicting Henry Hilton as a self-indulgent puppet master with the missing remains of A. T. Stewart as the puppet, pulling the strings in the ongoing investigation fiasco. The cartoons leveled the harshest criticism upon Hilton’s arrogant behavior in his dealings with the city’s Jewish community and his handling of the Jones affair. Many felt privately what the cartoons expressed publicly—that Hilton was manipulating the case to feather his own financial nest, while at the same time, running A. T. Stewart’s once prosperous retail empire into the ground.
As if Puck’s indictment of him wasn’t enough, none other than America’s premiere humorist, Mark Twain, decided to get in on the act. His parody of the Stewart affair, written in 1879 and called “The Stolen White Elephant,” was published in 1882. The story features an Indian elephant that disappears in New Jersey just before it is to be shipped to Britain as a gift from the King of Siam to the Queen of England. In Twain’s story, the local police and the case of the missing elephant are headed by Chief Inspector Blunt. Twain reportedly modeled Blunt after Allan Pinkerton, the director of the famous Chicago-based Pinkerton National Detective Agency, and gave Blunt an assistant named Burns, reportedly modeled after New York City’s top cop, Captain Thomas Byrnes.
The story is replete with satirical headlines from various New York City newspapers, similar to the real headlines that appeared during the coverage of the Stewart case, and absurd letters similar to the ones sent by Romaine and others claiming to know where the body was hidden. In the tale, the police undertake a massive investigation, but the mystery ends badly for everyone involved. The story was originally to appear in Twain’s book A Tramp Abroad, published in 1880, but was left out of that work. In a preface to the short story, Twain wrote that he left it out of A Tramp Abroad because it was feared that some of the particulars had been exaggerated and that others were not true. Before these suspicions had proven groundless, the book had gone to press.
In the story, the overconfident Inspector Blunt orders his men to search for the missing white elephant throughout New York and in other neighboring states. The bungling police are u
nable to locate the elephant despite paying out a sizable ransom to the elephant thieves. Ultimately the missing elephant is found right beneath the very noses of the police, in a hidden vault—a vault in which police officers played cards and slept—but the poor animal is dead. Still, the incompetent Blunt is hailed as a hero. The story was a scathing indictment of the entire Stewart disaster, the police, the Pinkertons, and Henry Hilton.
“Now, what does the elephant eat, and how much?”
“Well, as to what he eats,—he will eat anything. He will eat a man, he will eat a Bible,—he will eat anything between a man and a Bible.”
“Good,—very good indeed, but too general. Details are necessary.—details are the only valuable things in our trade. … How many Bibles would he eat at a meal?”
“He would eat an entire edition.”
“It is hardly succinct enough. Do you mean the ordinary octavo, or the family illustrated?”
—Mark Twain, “The Stolen White Elephant,” 1879
For two long years, the A. T. Stewart case languished. If indeed there was any investigation, neither Hilton nor the police spoke of it, and the city’s newspapers had little to publish. Cornelia Stewart appeared to be at peace, although no one knew why. Speculation was that Hilton had convinced her of a miraculous recovery of her husband’s stolen body, which he told her lay at rest in the crypt at the cathedral being built for him in Garden City. Meanwhile, Hilton brushed away any questions regarding the case as arrogantly as he brushed aside the ongoing dispute with the Jewish community. By then, the police were on to more pressing matters, including the apprehension of the thieves who broke into the Manhattan Savings Institution in October 1878 and stole close to three million dollars in cash and securities.
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