CAPTAIN SMITH’S CAREER

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXIV, Issue 4614, 15 October 1923, Page 4

CAPTAIN SMITH’S CAREER

EXPLOITS IN NEW ZEALAND. AN INTERNATIONAL TRICKSTER. According to the story in the Christchurch Sun Christchurch once provided funds for .the mysterious “Captain Smith,” who was at first thought to be identical with the William Warren detained by the Paris police recently in connection with huge robberies and frauds in several European countries. Later, however, smith’s individuality as the real leader of the “ Rogues’ Corporation,” an international band of swindlers and robbers, was established. “ Captain Smith ” is an Australian, and operated in Christchurch and the rest of New Zealand in 1909 and 1910. In those days bookmakers were licensed to operate on racecourses, and with two other Smiths, who also went under the aliases of Dalton and Howell, he worked a number of betting frauds- He was an expert “ broad-tosser,” the “technical ” name for card-sharping, and he took down many innocent persons Who vied with him in trying to pick the lucky card in the old swindle the "three-card trick.”

His fall came* when he worked the trick on a leading Maori on a Kaiappi train, winning a substantial cheque. The Maori informed the police and stopped payment of the cheque. The police officer who arrested Smith on that occasion, and who came in contact with him several times afterwards, describes him as a man of great personality and appearance, which he made full use of in working confidence tricks. Smith had a keen sense of humour, as was evidenced on his arrest for the train episode. He telegraphed to Mr T. M. Wilford, M.R., asking him to defend him, but Mr Wilford replied that only a miradle could get Smith and his accomplice off. To this Smith sent the following telegram: " Come down and perforin the miracle.” However, the miracle could not be performed, and Smith, or Dalton as he was then, was sentenced to twelve months in gaol. On his release he went tp Sydney, where he was not then known, though the Queensland police wanted him for fraud. The police officer who arrested him for the car-sharping affair had to go to Sydney to fetch back a man wanted in Christchurch for embezzlement. He arrived back a week after Smith, and seeing him on a Sydney racecourse, told the Sydney police who he was. They arrested Smith for vagrancy, and he got a sentence for that. On that occasion Smith’s sense of humour again came to the surface. He learned who it was that the Christchurch police officer had come over for, and remarked to the officer: “ You won’t get anything back from him. I took all the money he had at poker coming over.” The sum he had won was between £2OO and £3OO, and very little was recovered from the man who had embezzled it, and who got three years when he was brought back. The sentence for vagrancy made Smith known to the police, and on his release he packed his bag and went to England, where he was not known. He served in the war, and lost a leg at Passchendaele.

At Home Smith worked some big frauds, chiefly in the way of betting swindles, and his operations* SfCem to have been confined mostly to confidence schemes and card-sharping. Smith’s personality and appearance gave him the confidence man’s best asset, and he has the reputation among the police of a great part of the world of being able to tell any confidence story convincingly. About two years ago Smith, who by this time had gathered round him a gang, worked a huge betting swindle in England. The country was flooded with prospectuses offering fabulous returns for small investments, the promoters claiming that they had no difficulty in 'picking the winners of all the important races. Thousands of pounds poured in to the gang, which seems to have emulated O. Henry’s Gentle Grafter, and paid the fabulous prices to some of the earlier subscribers out of the contributions of later victims, They could not last indefinitely, arid when the bubble burst it was found that the gang had obtained several hundred thousand pounds. After that Smith flitted to the Continent, .where he extended his operations, until now he is apparently one of the most soughtafter criminals ip the world. One of Simthjs accomplices in New Zealand was Harrison, who is now serving a sentence of six years for sheep-dip frauds in Auckland. Harrison made a sheep-dip put of limestone, and escaped, in spite of wartime restrictions, to Vancouver, whence he was brought back to New Zealand.