Audacious Bank Robbery in America.

Cromwell Argus, Volume 1, Issue 50, 26 October 1870, Page 6

Audacious Bank Robbery in America.

Louisville, Kentucky, has lately been the scene of a robbery of unparalled audacity, that may serve the sensation novelists with an incident. The Mechanics' Bank of that city is a large building occupying a site in the very centre of business activity, and Louisville contains a population of 200,000 souls, with an efficient police organisation—facts that should be stated in order that the boldness of the robbers may be fully apprehended. On the 17th of June the bank had been closed at the accustomed hour of two, but at five o'clock the cashier was seated aloue in the principal hall communicating with the vaults and cash depositories, engaged in counting up the deposits of the day. Tlie outer door of the bank was closed and locked on the inside. Suddenly the cashier was surprised by the noiseless approach of two men, one of whom brandished a knife, threatening him with instant death if he should make the least outcry. Before he could determine upon any course of action, a handful of simfl was thrown into his eyes, a thick shawl saturated with chloroform was thrown over his head, and he was thrust violently iuto the stairway leading up stairs, and locked out of the banking-hall. His assailants then proceeded to seize the money in the vaults and jask-boxes, and made good their escape from the building with 65,000 dollars in gold and currency (about £12,000). In their unnecessary haste they wholly overlooked the money ana securities of the special depositors of the bank, which lay in vaults, to the value of many hundred thousands of dollars. It was nou until three hours after the robbery had been counuutuu that any knowledge of the facts was obtained by persons without. At S p.m., a clerk ot the bank, whose habit it was to sleep in the building, entered the hall, and finding the gas turned down, contrary to the usual custom, and the vaults open, hastily sought the private dwelling of the cashier, to notify hna that, something had gone amiss ; and hearing that the cashier hail not returned to his home, speedily went back to the bank, snd searching the building with the assistance of two policemen, found the officer in a state of insensibility on the staircase, where the robbers had thrown him. After having been carried home and recovering his consciousness, he narrated the circumstances vf the assault and pillage, but no clue could be obtained as to the perpetrators, and the matter yet remains a mystery. Detectives from New York and Boston went to Louisville "to work up the case," and under the stimulus of a great reward for the recovery of i the money, it is just possible they may discover : the guilty parties. At the hour of the day when the crime was committed hundreds of ! persons were walking up and down the place ; outside, and it was just as if two cracksmen of i London had rifled a bank by overpowering and drugging its only occupant, at rive o'clock in the afternoon, in the .Strand or in Pall Mall. It ought to be added that there cannot be the slightest doubt of the truthfulness of the cashier's story, for he has held his position in the Mechanics' Bank of Louisville for thirtyyears, is most highly esteemed as a man of the 1 strictest probity, and, moreover, made a very narrow escape with his life from the effects of the powerful narcotic with the fumes of which he was stifled.