ESCAPADES OF "SLIPPERY LETTS."

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 59, 18 June 1910, Page 9

ESCAPADES OF "SLIPPERY LETTS."

A TRUE TALE OF PLUCK AND DARING. "What a pity he didn't run straight and join the police! He would have made a splendid officer, for his .pluck and daring were unequalled." It is not often a detective pays such a tribute to his prisoner; but then it is not often that a lawtbreaker exhibits the pluck and resourcefulness of "Slippery Letts," which led his captor, after the trial, which resulted in Letts taking up a pro-' longed residence in the State prison, to express his regret 'in the words quoted.^ In many respects Harry Letts must be classed as one of the most remarkable criminate of the day. His original offence was not very remarkable, but he led the detectives a pretty dance. Five! times he was captured, and four times he escaped. The fact that the detectives were armed with revolvers, which they never hesitated to use, did not trouble Letts in the least when he saw an opportunity for bolting. In all, during the prolonged chase, which cost over £looo' and covered many thousands of miles, | forty shots were fired at him, most of them at short range. He never received so much as a scratch, and a feeling! amounting almost to conviction prevailed among the officers that some super-' natural power protected him. A CLEVER DODGE. \

Originailly Letts was a booking-agent at Princeton, Kansas, on the line of the great Atchison, Topeka, and Santa ye railway. One night a fire broke out at the booking-office, and, there being no fire-fighting apparatus, it was" quickly reduced to ashes. Letts made a satisfactory report to the company, showing that he had been guilty of no negligence, and after the customary investigation the report was accepted and the incident apparently closed. Shortly after-. wards Letts resigned his position, on the ground of health. Several weeks later, Mr. H. H. Germain, chief of the secret service of the railway company, was sitting at his desk examining a couple of passengertickets. Noting the numbers printed upon the tickets and consulting a large record book he gave a 'low, meaning whistle, for the numbers disclosed the fact that the tickets belonged to the considerable quantity supposed to have been destroyed in the Princeton fire. From that moment the fire incident was reopened, and Harry Letts once more entered into the hearty concern of the great railway company.

ON THE TRAIL. It was positively established that Harry Letts burned the station-house at Princeton, after robbing the ixicevcabinet of all the unused ticket-forms. With the aid and connivance of an expert ticket manipulator the tickets were' prepared for sale through ticket-brokers, and represented a value of aibout 40,000 dollars. The manipulator was easily traced and arrested, and a portion of the tickets were found in his possession and confiscated. Then the officials proceeded to find and arrest Harrv Lews.

Following the trail'of the ex-station agent, the detectives located him in Kansas City, Missouri, and two of them called at his boarding-house one evening and requested hhn to, accompany them to Ottawa, Kansas,' where he was to be tried for his alleged crime. He consented quietly enough, and the three proceeded to the Central Station by boarding a street car, each officer holding an arm of their prisoner, Letts suddenly threw the two men off and bolted. They sprang after him, commanded him to stop without avail, and then, drawing their revolvers, fired point-blank as short range. Letts paid no attention to their commands, but dodged into the crowd and made,his escape,,to the great chagrin of the two officers, who were again ob- l liged to take up the weary trail. i

CAPTURED AGAIN. The pursuit led them hundreds of miles over the country, doubling here and there.' The man had a sweetheart living at Ottawa, and it was surmised that he might go there and visit her. A watch was accordingly set, and sure enough he did the very thing, hazardous and foolhardy as it may seem. He was captured quickly by the local police, who lodged him in the county gaol. Court was about to convene, and it looked as though Letts' journey to the penitentiary could not be much longer delayed. But Letts had no serious thought of digging coal for the State.' He was confined in a small steel cell opening into a steeit corridor, in which during the day he was allowed to mingle with the other prisoners for exercise. One night he rigged up a dummy figure and stood it in his cell. When the gaoler, all unsuspecting, came to lock the prisoners in, Letts flattened himself against the wall in a. dark corner of the corridor and waited. The gaoler, with a careless glance at the dummy, fastened the cell and turned to pass out througTi the corridor door. Letts, following noiselessly behind, actually wriggled under the man's arm and leaped through the office into the street! The gaoler, recovering! instantly from his surprise, dashed after him, revolver in hand, and fired at the fleeing man as he passed under the electric light; but Letts sprang away uninjured and soon escaped from the town. It was then that the baffled pursuers commenced to refer to him as "Slippery Letts."

THE CHIEF TAKES A HAND. | With untiring energy the officers again took up the trail and resumed their weary hunt. Months passed, and Letts was heard of down in the State of Texas. The trail became warm, and he was fin-' ally located in a small town, where he had secured employment. Mr. Germain, the chief, not wishing to take furtner. chances, went himself to arrest the man and convev him back to prison. He' learnt where Letts was boarding, and sent a couple of local officers into the j house while he remained to guard the. door. iSoon the men returned, leading i their prisoner between them. The fugitive evidently did not lutly comprehend the import of his arrest, for] he walked along quietly until he caught] sMit of Germain; then, like a flash, he repeated his former tactics, threw off his two captors, and bolted. Germain knew well the desperate character of the man and was prepared for such an occurrence. His revolver, which he knew well how to use, cme into instant play; hut Letts ran off unharmed, dodging alon°' the street, seeking for cover. It was davlight, and the straggling village afforded him no hiding-place, so that he was quickly run down and captured. DICK TURPIN OUTDONE. Handcuffed and manacled "Slippery Letts" was taken back to Ottawa, and lay in his cell five months awaiting trial. When the court was convened he was tried and convicted, and a day used when he should receive his sentence—a term of vears in the State penitentiary. Before the date arrived Letts again escaped from the gaol. By the use of tools smuggled in by confederates, he accom-' plislied the seemingly impossible feat of tearing a hole through the steel floor of his cell. Then he dug down into the hard earth and tunnelled a long distance to Hie fnu"dstion wall. This Avail was c-iMTuriod tv l<\v<r< v granite, .blocks get in cement.. The enterprising Letts re-

moved one of the blocks and crawiled through to liberty.

Thus the chase went on. Detectives followed ".Slippery Letts" to Canada, then he was traced to the United States, to New York, and other cities of the East, always disappearing just as the officers were about to arrest him. ultimately Chief Germain learnt that Letts was in the IPanama Canal zone, working as a telegraph operator for the United States Government. The clue was correct, and one day a couple of officers I pounced on Letts and handcuffed him [at the muzzle of a. revolver. And from the moment they placed their hands upon him until they delivered him to the penitentiary, one of them was handcuffed' to him day and night. By this means they brought "Slippery Letts" to trial and he was duly sentenced.