Bidwell's Travels, from Wall Street to London Prison Part 26

About six miles to the north was the little town of San Miguel. Between me and San Diego lay fifty miles of wild country swept by fire and sword, without an inhabitant and without food. Hungry as I already was, I felt it would not do to undertake a two days' journey through that wilderness without eating. Of course I made a mistake. I was clear of the toils, and I ought to have taken every and any chance rather than enter the enemy's lines again.

I resolved, soon after night came, to set out for San Miguel, watch my chance to enter a shop and purchase food, then, beating a hasty retreat, strike out across the country straight for San Diego, there to find myself among friends in the rebel camp.

I set out and without any particular adventure arrived about 9 o'clock at San Miguel. It proved to be a hamlet with the houses ranged close together on opposite sides of the streets. The moonlight cast a deep shadow on one side, while the opposite side was almost like day. I stood in the deep shadow watching. The first building was evidently a police or military barrack. The door was wide open, but no one was visible inside. About five doors off was a shop, but the door was closed, and from where I stood there appeared no sign of life within. I waited about ten minutes, and rashly concluding that there was no one save the proprietor there, I stepped out of the shadow into the moonlight and hurrying across the street, put my hand on the door, opened it and stepping within found myself in the presence of twenty soldiers, all gossiping, smoking or gambling. Belts and cartridge boxes along with bayonets decorated the walls or were lying about on boxes and barrels.

All eyes were turned on me. I saw myself in a fearful trap and nothing but consummate coolness could keep them from questioning me. My heart beat fast, but with an affectation of indifference I saluted and said: "Buenos noches, senores." They all returned my salutation, but looked at each other eagerly, each waiting for the other to question me.

I stepped to the counter and asked for bread; two loaves were given me.

I picked up some cakes and paid for them. From the door I turned, and putting all my dignity into a bow, I said: "Good night, gentlemen." They all seemed held by a spell, but they looked and were dangerous as death.

I closed the door, fully realizing my peril, feeling the storm would break the instant I was out of sight. Fortunately there was no one near, and I ran swiftly across the street into the protecting shadow and crouched down in a dark s.p.a.ce between two houses. The cactus-like weeds grew there and p.r.i.c.ked me, but I heeded them not, for that instant the soldiers poured out of the shop, an angry and excited mob, buckling on their belts, cartridge boxes and bayonets as they ran. Some had their muskets, others hastened to get them and all save two stragglers rushed out of the town in the direction from which I had entered. I wondered at this, but soon discovered the reason. Some few women, hearing the tumult, came into the street, but seeing nothing, went in again; the stragglers all disappeared and the street was quiet.

[Ill.u.s.tration: UNDERGROUND Pa.s.sAGE AND STAIRS LEADING TO OLD BAILEY DOCK.]

I came out of my corner and hurried in the shadow down the road in the opposite direction to the course followed by my pursuers. Arriving at the last house at the foot of the street, I found myself confronted by a small river, quiet and apparently deep, with all the s.p.a.ce from the last house to the river one impa.s.sable barrier of giant cactus, I had either to swim the river or turn back, and I ought to have plunged in as I was, revolver and all, the distance over being short; and, as I am an expert swimmer, I could easily have got across, loaded down as I was.

But a contemptible trifle had weight enough to cause me to adopt the suicidal course of turning back.

The fierce animal instinct of hunger was on me, the smell of the food enraged me, and I thought if I swam the stream the cakes and bread I carried would be soaked and probably lost, for I had them loose in my arms; beside, I was overconfident of my ability to escape my pursuers.

They had marched by the road that led behind the village to the bridge crossing the river some distance up; evidently, not seeing me, they took it for granted I knew of the bridge, and had gone that way.

To appease at once my hanger, in a fatal moment I retraced my steps. As I pa.s.sed a house three women came out. They spoke to me, and in my excitement, instead of saying good evening in Spanish (buenas noches), I said good morning (buenas dias). They, of course, saw I was a stranger.

Just then four soldiers came hurriedly into the street from the road, and I was forced to leave the women and crouch down in my former hiding place. Then they did what women seldom do--betrayed the fugitive.

Calling to the soldiers, they pointed out the place I was in. All four came running, and in a moment were almost on top of me. I presented my revolver and snapped the trigger twice without exploding the cartridges; they were too close or too excited to use their muskets, but all four grappled with me, and naturally used me pretty roughly.

There was a terrific hullabaloo, as in response to their cries their comrades came running in. By the time they had hustled me across the street into the shop there was a mob of half a hundred around me. Soon the commander, a captain, appeared. I wish I could say he was a gentleman, but he was not. He was a little, peppery young fellow, apparently with negro blood in his veins, and dictatorial and insulting in manner.

Surely I was an object--a tramp in appearance--but with a diamond ring on my finger (which I had taken from my pocket and slipped on), a revolver strapped to my waist and a splendid chronometer in my pocket.

Such an object had never before loomed on their horizon. Was not one glance enough to show that I must be a notable rebel, and there was but one doom for such.

My desperate situation cast out all fear, and I was cold and haughty.

Flouris.h.i.+ng my police pa.s.sport, I informed him that I was Stanley W.

Parish of New York, a correspondent of the New York Herald, and he had better look out what he was about.

But it was evident that police pa.s.sports made out in Havana had no currency in the face of the enemy; but at any rate it proved that whatever my intentions might be, I had at least hailed last from Havana, and not from the rebel camp, and this would prevent my peppery captain from enjoying the pleasure of standing me up in the morning, to be fusilladed, such being the law for all captives in the savage contest.

Down my gentleman sat on a barrel, pompous and important, and ordered me to be searched. All this time a dozen hands were holding me fast. I told my officer he was a fool and a clown, but my captors began to go through my pockets, and speedily there was a heap of gold and paper money on the barrel, and my little friend fingered it with a covetous eye. I had my $10,000 in bonds pinned in the sleeve of my unders.h.i.+rt. This they missed, but found all else I carried. In the mean time there was an eager audience looking on, absorbed in the interest of the scene.

There was a collection indeed on that barrel. Beside my ring, there were five other valuable diamonds, my chronometer, which with its regular beat and stem-winding arrangement was a great curiosity. Then the heap of money was a loadstone for all their hungry eyes. The captain was making out an inventory and statement, while I stood white with rage to see the half-breeds, blacks, browns and yellows, handle my property so freely. I was especially in a rage with the impudent captain, who had the nerve to put my watch in his pocket. Absorbed by the interest of the scene, my captors had insensibly loosened their hold, and I determined to have some satisfaction out of the captain. Suddenly seizing one of the revolvers before I could be stopped I gave him a stinging blow with it and sprang on him. We rolled on the floor, and there was a scene. I was dragged off by fifty hands, every one trying to seize me, if only by one hand. My captain got up with the blood running down his face, and, rus.h.i.+ng to a peg, he seized a sabre bayonet and flew at me like a mad bull. I shouted at him in Spanish, calling him a cur and coward, bidding him to come on. He was not unwilling, while my captors held me firmly exposed to his a.s.sault. Another second would have ended my life, when a woman spectator, who stood near nursing a child, threw her arms around him; this, joined to my indifference, for I continued my jeers and taunts, changed his purpose, to my disappointment, for I preferred death to going back to Havana.

"From Wall Street to Newgate" is replete with stirring incidents, marvelous adventures, hair-breadth escapes and remarkable experiences, such as few men have met with. They are narrated in any easy, picturesque style, evincing sincerity and candor, with no attempt at sensation or exaggeration. The truth told is stranger than fiction, and history may well be challenged to produce another life into which has come so many varied and bewildering events, or to disclose another character, trained in a religious home, having culture and an unusual business talent, whose deflection from the path of honor has stirred to its very depths the entire civilized world.

CHAPTER x.x.xIV.

ONE LOVELY JUNE MORNING INTO PLYMOUTH HARBOR WE SAIL.

Ten days after the events recorded in the last chapter I sailed once more into Havana. This time a prisoner. Two days after my capture, by order of the Captain-General of Cuba, I was put on board the little gunboat Santa Rita, a wretched little tub that steamed four miles an hour and took eight days going from Puerto Novo on the south to Havana.

I was taken by a guard of soldiers, not to the police barracks, but to the common prison, where an entire corridor was cleared of its inmates to make room for me and my guards. Pinkerton was the first man to call.

He, of course, was delighted to see me. While giving me credit for my escape, he told me he did not purpose to have me leave him again, and having permission from the authorities, he or some of his men intended to keep me company night and day. Of course I respected him for his honest determination to do his duty. He really was an altogether good fellow, and showed me all possible courtesy and consideration; in fact, on his first visit he brought me a letter from my wife, along with a box of cigars and a bottle of wine on his own account.

One of his men, by the name of Perry, used to sleep in my little room with me, and every morning Mr. P. would relieve him, remaining until dinner time. We had many long talks on all sorts of subjects, and he gave me many inside histories of famous criminal cases which he had been engaged in. In time we became very good friends.

He also gave me full particulars of the really extraordinary way in which he discovered my presence in the West Indies and the reason which led him to conclude that F. A. Warren and I were one. William Pinkerton ordered him to look up the New York end of the business and see if he could discover the ident.i.ty of Warren. He was one of the many working on the case, but to him belongs the credit of establis.h.i.+ng my ident.i.ty, also of locating my whereabouts and of effecting my arrest.

When ordered on the case he knew no more about me or the forgery than what he read in the newspapers. He soon made up his mind that I was an American, and that I was a resident either of New York or Chicago. This because I was so young and evidently had a good knowledge of finance and financial matters. So he determined to seek for a clue to F. A. Warren in Wall street. He procured a list of the names of every banker and broker in New York, and then spent some time in interviewing them, his one question being "Now, who is he?" With their a.s.sistance he soon made out a list of nearly twenty possible Warrens, and speedily narrowed it down to four, my name being one of the four. He soon located my home, and began making cautious inquiries on the spot from neighbors and others.

He discovered that I was believed to be in Europe, and had been there before, and that when I last returned I had paid off debts and apparently had plenty of money. He had become convinced of my ident.i.ty, but if I were Warren--where was I?

Without arousing suspicion, he heard from some of my acquaintances a saying of mine that whenever I had a bank account, I should live in the tropics. So he reported to his superiors that in his opinion F. A. Warren and I were one, and he believed that, if in America at all, I might be found at some fas.h.i.+onable resort in Florida.

He concluded to go to Florida, and visit the various resorts. Upon his arrival at St. Augustine, he sent letters to several of the West India islands, including Martinique, Jamaica and Cuba, inquiring for the names and descriptions of all wealthy young Americans lately arrived. One letter he sent to Dr. C. L. Hous...o...b.. then the leading American doctor in Havana, who, replying to his inquiry, gave my name among others. After my arrest Dr. Hous...o...b..told me how grieved he was to have betrayed me, but that he thought that Pinkerton was a newspaper man, and wanted the information as a matter of news.

With this letter in his hand, Pinkerton found a plain path before him.

To go ahead of my story a little, I will say here that eventually the bank authorities made him a considerable present in cash, along with their congratulations over his clever detective work. Capt. John Curtin is to-day well and hearty, a prosperous man and very generally respected by the citizens of San Francisco, where he lives.

About ten days after my arrival he brought me a New York Herald containing these dispatches:

(Special to New York Herald.)

Madrid, April 12, 1873.

The American Amba.s.sador, Gen. Sickles, has formally notified Senor Castelar that the American Government will consent to the surrender to the British Government of Bidwell, now under arrest in Havana upon charge of being concerned in the Bank of England forgery.

(Special to New York Herald.)

London, April 12, 1873.

To the great gratification of the authorities here, official confirmation is given to the rumor that the Spanish Government has concluded to grant the extradition of Bidwell, now under arrest in Havana. There seems to be no doubt that Bidwell is the mysterious Frederick Albert Warren, and there is a very general curiosity to see him. Many conflicting stories have been published of his extraordinary escape and equally extraordinary capture. The Times'

report had it that he was mortally wounded, and that he had on his person when captured diamonds to an enormous value, which had disappeared soon after. Sergeants Hayden and Green of the Bow Street force and Mr. Good of the bank of England sail on the Java to-morrow to escort Bidwell to London.

So the web was closing in on me. Of my daily sad interviews with my wife I will say nothing here. But could I have foreseen that this woman, on whom I had settled a fortune, would have married another soon after my sentence, I should not have felt so sorrowful on her account. In due time Green, Hayden and Good arrived, and were introduced to me. I did not give in, but made, by the aid of my friends, a hard fight to persuade the Captain-General to suspend the order for my delivery, and succeeded for a time.

At last, after many delays and many plans, early one May morning I was taken to the mouth of the harbor. There the boat of the English wars.h.i.+p Vulture was in waiting, and I was formally transferred to the English Government, and Curtin. Perry, Hayden and Green went on board with me.

Soon after she steamed out of the harbor. Later in the day the Moselle, the regular pa.s.senger steamer to Plymouth and Southampton, came out, and about ten miles out at sea was met by the Vulture's boat, and I and my four guardians were transferred to her.

At last I was off for England, and it looked very much as if Justice would weigh me in her balance after all, the more certainly because I found my wife on the Moselle. I had secretly resolved never to be taken back, but intended the first night out of Havana to jump overboard, possibly with a cork jacket, or something to help to keep me afloat. The waters of the gulf were warm, there were many pa.s.sing s.h.i.+ps, and I would take my chance of surviving the night and being picked up. But, very cleverly, Curtin decided to send my wife with me and treat me like any other cabin pa.s.senger, rightly divining I would not kill her by committing suicide or going over the side on chances.

I was well treated all the way over, but every night my prayer was that we might run on an iceberg or go down, so that my wife might be spared long years of agony and me from the misery and degradation of prison life.

I had obtained a position in Havana for one of my servants, but Nunn was returning with me, feeling very badly and most unhappy over the sure prospect of my future misery. I was pleased to think he had held on to the money I had given him. Altogether, he was quite $2,000 ahead, and I wanted to make it $5,000. He certainly deserved it for his constancy and affection.

One lovely June day we sailed into Plymouth, there to land mail and such pa.s.sengers as wanted to take the express to London. I instructed my wife to go to Southampton while I went ash.o.r.e with my guardians.

From the London Times, June 10, 1873: