Forty Centuries of Ink Part 25

THE books contain no clearer or more forcible exposition of "Chemico-legal" ink, in its relations.h.i.+p to facts adduced from ill.u.s.trated scientific testimony, than is to be found in the final opinion written by that eminent jurist Hon. Edgar M. Cullen on behalf of the majority of the Court of Appeals of the State of New York, in the case of De Frees Critten v. The Chemical National Bank. It was the author's privilege to be the expert employed in the lower court about whose testimony Judge Cullen remarks (N. Y. Rep., 171, p. 223) "The alteration of the checks by Davis was established beyond contradiction," and again, p. 227, "The skill of the criminal has kept pace with the advance in honest arts and a forgery may be made so skillfully as to deceive not only the bank but the drawer of the check as to the genuineness of his own signature."

The main facts are included in the portion of the opinion cited:

"The plaintiffs kept a large and active account with the defendant, and this action is to recover an alleged balance of a deposit due to them from the bank. The plaintiffs had in their employ a clerk named Davis. It was the duty of Davis to fill up the checks which it might be necessary for the plaintiffs to give in the course of business, to make corresponding entries in the stubs of the check book and present the checks so prepared to Mr. Critten, one of the plaintiffs, for signature, together with the bills in payment of which they were drawn.

After signing a check Critten would place it and the bill in an envelope addressed to the proper party, seal the envelope and put it in the mailing drawer. During the period from September, 1897, to October, 1899, in twenty-four separate instances Davis abstracted one of the envelopes from the mailing drawer, opened it, obliterated by acids the name of the payee and the amount specified in the check, then made the check payable to cash and raised its amount, in the majority of cases, by the sum of $100. He would draw the money on the check so altered from the defendant bank, pay the bill for which the check was drawn in cash and appropriate the excess. On one occasion Davis did not collect the altered check from the defendant, but deposited it to his own credit in another bank. When a check was presented to Critten for signature the number of dollars for which it was drawn would be cut in the check by a punching instrument.

When Davis altered a check he would punch a new figure in front of those already appearing in the check. The checks so altered by Davis were charged to the account of the plaintiff s, which was balanced every two months and the vouchers returned to them from the bank. To Davis himself the plaintiffs, as a rule, intrusted the verification of the bank balance. This work having in the absence of Davis been committed to another person, the forgeries were discovered and Davis was arrested and punished. It is the amount of these forged checks, over and above the sums for which they were originally drawn, that this action is brought to recover. The defendant pleaded payment and charged negligence on plaintiff's part, both in the manner in which the checks were drawn and in the failure to discover the forgeries when the pa.s.s book was balanced and the vouchers surrendered. On the trial the alteration of the checks by Davis was established beyond contradiction and the substantial issue litigated was that of the plaintiff's negligence. The referee rendered a short decision in favor of the plaintiffs in which he states as the ground of his decision that the plaintiffs were not negligent either in signing the checks as drawn by Davis or in failing to discover the forgeries at an earlier date than that at which they were made known to them.

"The relation existing between a bank and a depositor being that of debtor and creditor, the bank can justify a payment on the depositor's account only upon the actual direction of the depositor.

'The question arising on such paper (checks) between drawee and drawer, however, always relate to what the one has authorized the other to do.

They are not questions of negligence or of liability to parties upon commercial paper, but are those of authority solely. The question of negligence cannot arise unless the depositor has in drawing his cheek left blanks unfilled, or by some affirmative act of negligence has facilitated the commission of a fraud by those into whose hands the check may come.' (Crawford v. West Side Bank, 100 N. Y. 50.) Therefore, when the fraudulent alteration of the checks was proved, the liability of the bank for their amount was made out and it was inc.u.mbent upon the defendant to establish affirmatively negligence on the plaintiff's part to relieve it from the consequences of its fault or misfortune in paying forged orders. Now, while the drawer of a check may be liable where he draws the instrument ill such ill incomplete state as to facilitate or invite fraudulent alterations, it is not the law that he is bound so to prepare the cheek that n.o.body else call successfully tamper with it. (Societe Generale v. Metropolitan Bank, 27 L. T. [N. S.] 849; Belknap v. National Bank of North America, 100 Ma.s.s. 380) In the present case the fraudulent alteration of the checks was not merely in the perforation of the additional figure, but in the obliteration of the written name of the payee and the subst.i.tution therefor of the word 'Cash.' Against this latter change of the instrument the plaintiffs could not have been expected to guard, and without that alteration it would have no way profited the criminal to raise the amount. . . ."

A Pinkerton case of international repute, best known as the "Becker" case, included the successful "raising" of a check by chemical means from $12 to $22,000. The criminal author of this stupendous fraud was Charles Becker, "king of forgers,"

who as an all round imitator of any writing and manipulator of monetary instruments then stood at the head of his "profession." Arrested and taken to San Francisco he was brought to trial. Two of his "pals" turned state's evidence, and Becker was sentenced to a life term. Through an error on the part of the trial judge he secured a new trial on an appeal to the Supreme Court. The jury disagreed on a second trial, but on the third trial he was convicted.

Becker pleaded for mercy, and as he was an old man and showed signs of physical break-down, the court was lenient with him. Seven years was his sentence.

After his incarceration in San Quetin prison, he described in one sentence how he had risen to the head of the craft of forgers. "A world of patience, a heap of time, and good inks,--that is the secret of my success in the profession."

On completing his sentence, his reply to the question, "What was the underlying motive which induced you to forge?" was one word, "Vanity!"

The detailed facts which follow are from the "American Banker:"

"On December 2, 1895, a smooth-speaking man, under the name of A. H. Dean, hired an office in the Chronicle building at San Francisco, under the guise of a merchant broker, paid a month's rent in advance, and on December 4 he went to the Bank of Nevada and opened an account with $2,500 cash, saying that his account would run from $2,000 to $30,000, and that he would want no accommodation. He manipulated the account so as to invite confidence, and on December 17 he deposited a check or draft of the Bank of Woodland, Cal., upon its correspondent, the Crocker- Woolworth Bank of San Francisco. The amount was paid to the credit of Dean, the check was sent through the clearing-house, and was paid by the Crocker- Woolworth Bank. The next day, the check having been cleared, Dean called and drew out $20,000, taking the cash in four bags of gold, the teller not having paper money convenient. He had a vehicle at the door, with his office boy inside as driver, and away he went. At the end of the month, when the Crocker-Woolworth Bank made returns to the Woodland Bank, it included the draft for $22,000.

Here the fraud was discovered, and here the lesson to bankers of advising drafts received a new ill.u.s.tration. The Bank of Woodland had drawn no such draft, and the only one it had drawn which was not accounted for was one for twelve dollars, issued in favor of A. H. Holmes to an innocent- looking man, who, on December 9, called to ask how he could send twelve dollars to a distant friend, and whether it was better to send a money order or an express order. When he was told he could send it by bank draft, he seemed to have learned something new; supposed that he could not get a bank draft, and he took it, paying the fee.

Here came back that innocent twelve-dollar draft, raised to $22,000, and on its way had cost somebody $20,000 in gold.

"The almost absolute perfection with which the draft had been forged had nearly defied the detection of even the microscope. In the body of the original $12 draft had been the words, 'Twelve ........ Dollars.' The forger, by the use of some chemical preparation, had erased the final letters 'lve' from the word 'twelve,' and had subst.i.tuted the letters 'nty-two,' so that in place of the 'twelve,' is it appeared in the genuine draft, there was the word 'twenty-two' in the forged paper.

"In the s.p.a.ce between the word 'twenty-two'

and the word 'dollars' the forger inserted the word 'thousand,' so that in place of the draft reading 'twelve dollars,' as at first, it read 'twenty-two thousand dollars,' as changed.

"In the original $12 draft, the figures '1' and '2' and the character '$' had been punched so that the combination read '$12.' The forger had filled in these perforations with paper in such away that the part filled in looked exactly like the field of the paper. After having filled in the perforations, he had perforated the paper with the combination, '$22,000.'

"The dates, too, had been erased by the chemical process, and in their stead were dates which would make it appear that the paper bad been presented for payment within a reasonable length of time after it had been issued. The dates in the original draft, if left on the forged draft, would have been liable to arouse suspicion at the bank, for they would have shown that the holder had departed from custom in carrying, such a valuable paper more than a few days.

"That was the extent of the forgeries which had been made in the paper, the manner in which they had been made betrayed the hand of an expert forger. The interjected hand-writing was so nearly like that in the original paper that it took a great while to decide whether or not it was a forgery.

"In the places where letters had been erased by the use of chemicals the coloring of the paper had been restored, so that it was well-nigh impossible to detect a variance of the hue. It was the work of an artist, with pen, ink, chemicals, camel's hair brush, water colors, paper pulp and a perforating machine. Moreover the crime was eighteen days old, and the forger might be in j.a.pan or on his way to Europe. The Protective Committee of the American Bankers' a.s.sociation held a hurried consultation as soon as the news of the forgery reached New York, and orders were given to get this forger, regardless of expense--he was too dangerous a man to be at large. It was easier said than done; but the skill of the Pinkertons was aroused and the wires were made hot getting an accurate description of Dean from all who had seen him.

Suspected bank criminals were shadowed night and day to see if they connected with any one answering the description, but patient, hard labor for nearly two months did not seem to promise much."

Not satisfied with their success in San Francisco these same bank workers began a series of operations in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota. This information by chance reached the Pinkertons who laid a trap and captured two of the gang. Shortly afterward Becker on information furnished by them was also arrested, taken to California and after three separate trials as before stated, sent to San Quetin.

This triumph of the forger's art, I examined in the city of San Francisco and although it was not, the first time I had been brought into contact with the work of Becker, was compelled to admit that this particular specimen was almost perfect and more nearly so with a single exception than any other which had come under my observation. Becker was a sort of genius in the juggling of bank checks. He knew the values of ink and the correct chemical to affect them. His paper mill was his mouth, in which to manufacture specially prepared pulp to fill in punch holes, which when ironed over, made it most difficult to detect even with a magnifying gla.s.s. He was able also to imitate water marks and could reproduce the most intricate designs. He says he has reformed.

During the last twenty years quite a number of cases have been tried in New York City and vicinity in which the question of inks was an all important one.

The t.i.tles of a few not already referred to are given.

herewith: Lawless-Flemming, Albinger Will, Phelan- Press Publis.h.i.+ng Co., Ryold, Kerr-Southwick, N. Y.

Dredging Co., Thorless-Nernst, Gekouski, Perkins, Bedell forgeries, Storey, Lyddy, Clarke, Woods, Baker, Trefethen, Dupont-Dubos, Schooley, Humphrey, Dietz-Allen, Carter, and Rineard-Bowers.

CHAPTER XXV.

INK UTENSILS OF ANTIQUITY.

THE GRAVING TOOL PRECEDES THE PEN--CLa.s.sIFICATION UNDER TWO HEADS, ONE WHICH SCRATCHED AND THE OTHER WHICH USED AN INK--THE STYLUS AND THE MATERIALS OF WHICH IT WAS COMPOSED--POETICALLY DESCRIBED--COMMENTS BY NOEL HUMPHREYS--RECAPITULATION OF VARIOUS DEVICES BY KNIGHT--BIBLICAL REFERENCES--ENGRAVED STONES AND OTHER MATERIALS THE EARLIEST KINDS OF RECORDS--WHEN THIN BRICKS WERE UTILIZED FOR INSCRIPTION PURPOSES--METHODS EMPLOYED BY THE CHINESE-- HILPRECHT'S DISCOVERIES--THE DIAMOND AS A SCRATCHING INSTRUMENT--HISTORICAL INCIDENT WRITTEN WITH ONE--BIBLICAL MENTION ABOUT THE DIAMOND-- WHEN IT BECAME POSSIBLE TO INTERPRET CHARACTER VALUES OF ANCIENT HIEROGLYPHICS--DISCOVERY OF THE ROSETTA STONE AND A DESCRIPTION OF IT--SOME OBSERVATIONS ABOUT CHAMPOLLION AND DR. YOUNG WHO DECIPHERED IT--ITS CAPTURE BY THE ENGLISH AND PRESERVATION IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM--EMPLOYMENT OF THE REED PEN AND PENCIL- BRUSH--THE BRUSH PRECEDED THE REED PEN--THE PLACES WHERE THE REEDS GREW--COMMENTS BY VARIOUS WRITERS--METHOD OF FORMING THE REED INTO A PEN--CONTINUED EMPLOYMENT OF THEM IN THE FAR EAST--THE BRUSH STILL IN USE IN CHINA AND j.a.pAN--EARLIEST EXAMPLES OF REED PEN WRITING-- WHEN THE QUILL WAS SUBSt.i.tUTED FOR THE REED--REED PENS FOUND IN THE RUINS OF HERCULANEUM--ANECDOTE BY THE ABBE, HUC.

THE instruments of antiquity employed in the art of writing belong to two of the most distant epochs.

In the first period, inscriptions were engraved, carved or impressed with sharp instruments, and of patterns characteristic of a graving tool, chisel or other form which could be adapted to particular substances like stone, leaves, metal or ivory plates, wax or clay tablets, cylinders and prisms.

The ancient a.s.syrians even used knives or stamps for impressing their cuneiform writing upon cylinders or prisms of soft clay which were often glazed by subsequent bakings in kilns.

The other period was that in which written characters were made with liquids or paints of any kind or color. The liquids (inks) were used in connection with a pen manufactured from a reed (calamus), while the paints were "painted" on the various substances with a brush. The writing executed with both of these instruments was on materials like the bark of trees, cloth, skins, papyrus, vellum, etc.

The ancient as well as modern pens, though of many sorts and kinds, are to be cla.s.sified under two general heads, those which scratch and those which use an ink.

There is no authority to dispute the generally conceded fact that the "scratching" instrument was the first one used. Its most popular form seems to have been the stylus or bodkin, which was made of a variety of materials, such as iron, ivory, bone, minerals or any other hard substance, which could be sufficiently sharpened at one end to indent the various materials employed in connection with its use. The other end was flattened for erasing marks made on wax and smoothing it. From it the Italian stilletto took its origin.

The stylus is best described in the following lines:

"My head is flat and smooth, but sharp my foot, And by man's hand to different uses put; For what my foot performs with art and care, My head makes void, such opposites they are."

Relative to the employment of marking instruments which belong to the most venerable antiquity, Noel Humphreys observes:

"Before the growth of wealth and luxury had taught nations to raise magnificent temples and stately palaces, whose walls the hieroglyphic sculptor covered with records of the pomp and pride of princes, more purely national memorials had found their place upon the native rock, the most convenient surfaces of which were smoothed for this purpose. Where no such rock existed in the situation required, a ma.s.sive stone was raised by artificial means and the record, whether referring to a victory, a new boundary, or any other event of national interest was engraved upon it. Such memorials have been described by Hebrew writers as aumad or ammod, literally, the lips of the people, or, the words of the people, but actually meaning a pillar. Records in this form and the early name they bore account for the strange legends of mediaeval times referring to speaking stones--a name by which such monuments were probably still called long after time had effaced the speaking record, and the original purport of the defaced stone was forgotten. In semi-barbarous epochs, like the era which followed the partial extinction of Roman civilization, popular curiosity and superst.i.tion combined would seek to give a meaning to the name of such 'speaking stones,' and as an example of the legends which thus arose, the itinerarium cambriae of Geraldus may be cited, in which a stone is mentioned at St. David's as the 'speaking stone'

(lech lavar) which was said to call out when a dead body was placed upon it. The most remarkable rock inscriptions still remaining are those of a.s.syria and Persia, but many national tablets of more recent date are still in existence. For the execution of such records and those of the palaces of Egypt and a.s.syria, some kind of steel point must have been used, as no softer substance would have served to engrave them in granitic and basaltic slabs with the sharpness they still exhibit, which proves that the art of hardening steel, long thought a comparatively modern invention, was known to the ancient people of Asia and Africa."

A list of the various devices of different countries, by which characters could be legibly portrayed with a scratching implement, is best recapitulated by Mr.

Knight, who presents them in the following order:

"The tabula or wooden board smeared with wax, upon which a letter was written by a stylus.

"The Athenian scratched his vote upon a sh.e.l.l as did the lout when he voted to ostracize Aristides.

"The records of Ninevah were inscribed upon tablets of clay, which were then baked.

"The laws of Rome were engraved on bra.s.s and laid up in the Capitol.

"The decalogue was graven upon the tables of stone.

"The Egyptians used papyrus and granite.

"The Burmese, tablets of ivory and leaves.

"Pliny mentions sheets of lead, books of linen, and waxed tablets of wood.

"The Hebrews used linen and skins.

"The Persians, Mexicans, and North American Indians used skins.