Telegraph Bureau. Its Work. Skill and Daring
and Success of its Force. Interesting Incidents. Hairbreadth
Escapes. Detective Force. Its arduous Labors. Its Disguises.
Shrewdness, Tact, and Courage. Narrow Escapes. Hawley, the
Chief Clerk. His exhausting Labors.
One thing Commissioners Acton and Bergen in their
consultation settled must be done at all hazards telegraphic
communication must he kept open with the different
precincts. Otherwise it would be impossible to concentrate
men at any given point, quick enough to arrest the mob
before they spread devastation and conflagration far and
wide. Every hour gained by a mob in accumulating or
organizing its forces, increases the difficulty of
dispersing it. The rioters understood this partially, and
had acted accordingly; but the rich spoils they had come
across during the day, had driven, for the time being, all
other thoughts but plunder out of their heads. Some
communications had already been destroyed, and the rioters
would evidently by morning have their eyes open to the
importance of doing this everywhere, and their efforts must
be foiled, no matter what the risk or sacrifice might be.
They had already cut down over sixty poles, and rendered
upwards of twelve miles of wire useless; and how much more
would share the same fate the next day, no one could tell.
The superintendent and deputy of the Telegraph Bureau,
Messrs. Crowley and Polhamus, with the operators mentioned
before, were, therefore, set at work this very evening in
the storm, to restore the broken lines.
This was a perilous undertaking, for if once discovered,
their lives would be instantly sacrificed.
The details of their operations, their disguises, ingenious
contrivances, deceptions, and boldness in carrying out their
object, would make an attractive chapter in itself. Often
compelled to mingle with the mob, always obliged to conceal
what they were about, not daring to raise a pole or handle a
wire unless cautiously or secretly, they yet restored the
lines in the north section by morning, and those in the
south by Wednesday evening. Sometimes they were compelled to
carry a wire over the top of a house, sometimes round it,
through a back yard; in short, every device and expedient
was resorted to by these daring, sharp witted men. Once
Polhamus had his boots burned off in tramping through the
burning ruins of a building after the wires. Once he and Mr.
Crowley came near being clubbed to death by the police, who
mistook them for rioters, so ingeniously and like them were
they at work among the ruins. Captain Brower rescued them,
or their services might have ended on the spot.
This work was kept steadily up during the continuation of
the riots. On one occasion, Mr. Crowley, hearing that the
wires were down in the Ninth and Tenth Avenues, hastened
thither alone, when he encountered a large mob. Fearing to
pass through it he hesitated a moment, when he noticed a
carriage driving in the direction he wished to go, in which
was a Catholic priest. He immediately hailed it and was
taken in. As the carriage entered the mob, the latter
surrounded it, and supposing the inmates were reporters,
began to yell "Down with the d d reporters;" but the moment
they recognized the priest, they allowed it to pass. Often
the two would take a hack; and passing themselves off as
drivers, go through infected districts, and search points to
which they otherwise could not have gone. One time they were
returning from an expedition through Third Avenue, and had
reached Houston Street, when they were hailed by a gang of
rioters, who demanded to be taken downtown. They had to
comply, for the men were armed with pistols, and so took
them in and kept along Houston Street, under the pretence of
going down through Broadway, knowing that when they reached
Mulberry Street they would be in hailing distance of the
head-quarters of the police. It was just after daybreak, and
Crowley and Polhamus urged on the horses, expecting in a few
minutes to have their load safely locked up. The fellows
evidently not liking the vicinity to which the drivers were
taking them, ordered them to wheel about, which they were
compelled to do, and drive under their direction to an old
house in the Tenth Ward. There they got out, and offering
the drivers a drink and fifty cents, let them go. On one
occasion, Crowley, while examining the wires in Second
Avenue, was suspected by the mob, who fell upon him, and it
was only by the greatest coolness and adroitness he
convinced them he was a rioter himself, and so escaped. At
another time they were going along in a common wagon, when
they were hemmed in by a crowd, and escaped by passing
themselves off as farmers from Westchester. Had they been
discovered, they would have been killed on the spot.
Detective Force.
The duties of this force are well known, but during the
riots they had something more important to do than to work
up individual cases. The force, with John Young as chief,
and M. B. Morse as clerk, consisted in all of seventeen
persons. These men are selected for their superior
intelligence, shrewdness, sagacity, and undoubted courage.
Full of resources, they must also be cool, collected, and
fearless. During the riots they were kept at work day and
night, obtaining knowledge of facts that no others could
get, and thus supplying the different precincts and
head-quarters with invaluable information. Their duty was a
most perilous one, for it called them to go into the very
heart of the turbulent districts; nay, into the very midst
of the mob, where detection would have been followed by
death, and that of the most horrible kind. Chief Young, with
his clerk, was engaged at head-quarters, so that fifteen men
had to perform the required work for the whole city.
Sometimes alone, sometimes two or three together, they
seemed omnipresent. In all sorts of disguises, feigning all
sorts of employments and characters, sometimes on horseback
and again driving an old cart or a hack, they pressed with
the most imperturbable effrontery into the very vortex of
danger. Ever on the watch, and accustomed to notice every
expression of the countenance, they would discover at a
single glance when they were suspected, and remove the
suspicion at once by some clever device. Sometimes one of
them, seeing himself watched, would quietly ascend the steps
of a residence, and ringing the bell, make some inquiry as
though he were on business, and then deliberately walk off;
or if he thought it would not do to have his face too
closely scanned, he would step inside and wait till the
crowd moved on. Sometimes, with a stone or club in their
hands, they would shout with the loudest, and engaging in
conversation with the ringleaders themselves, ascertain
their next move; then quietly slip away to the nearest
station, and telegraph to head-quarters the information.
When the telegraph had been cut off, they had to take the
place of the wires, and carry through the very heart of the
crowd their news to the department.
On their ears again and again would ring the fearful cry,
"There goes Kennedy's spies;" and it required the most
consummate acting and self possession to allay the
suspicion. Often on a single word or act hinged their very
lives. Some of these men were in the mob that made the first
attack on Mayor Opdyke's house, and while apparently acting
with it, learned of the intended movement down to police
head-quarters, and at once telegraphed the fact, which
enabled Carpenter to prepare for them, and give them the
terrible beating we have described. At the burning and
sacking of different buildings they were present, and often
would follow unnoticed the ringleaders for hours, tracking
them with the tireless tenacity of a sleuth hound, until
they got them separate from the crowd, and then pounce
suddenly upon them, and run them into the nearest station.
The lawlessness that prevailed not only let loose all the
thieves and burglars of the city, but attracted those from
other places, who practised their vocation with impunity. To
lessen this evil, the detectives one night quietly made
visits to some half a dozen "lushing cribs," as they are
called, in Eighth and Fourteenth Streets, and seized about
thirty noted thieves, burglars, and garroters, and locked
them up for safe keeping. They also warned the negroes of
threatened danger, and directed them, to places of safety;
and in case of emergency acted as guides to the military in
their operations. In short, they were ubiquitous,
indefatigable, and of immense service. They played the part
of unerring pointers to the commissioners, telling them when
and where to strike; yet strange to say, such was their
skill, their ingenuity, and exhaustless resources, that they
all escaped being assaulted, save one named Slowly. He was
passing through the very heart of the riotous district, in
Second Avenue, when some one who had evidently been once in
his clutches, recognized him, and pointing him out, shouted
"Detective!" Instantly a rush was made for him, and he was
knocked down, and kicked and stamped upon. Regaining, with a
desperate effort, his feet, he sprang up the steps of a
house, and fought his assailants fiercely, till the lady of
the house, seeing his perilous situation, courageously
opened the door and let him in, and then bolted and barred
it in the face of the mob. Through some strange
apprehension, the baffled wretches, though they howled, and
swore, and threatened, did not force an entrance, and he
escaped.
In this connection, while speaking of those whose duties
were uniform and running through the whole period of the
riots, might be mentioned Seth C. Hawley, the chief clerk.
Like Acton, he has a nervous, wiry temperament. This often
makes a man rash and headlong, and hence not reliable; but
when combined, as in him, with perfect self possession and
self control, imparts enormous power. It matters not how
nervous and excitable a man is, if danger and responsibility
instead of confusing and unsettling him, only winds him up
to a higher tension, till he becomes like a tightly drawn
steel spring. Excitement then not only steadies him, but it
quickens his perceptions, clears his judgment, gives
rapidity to his decisions, and terrible force to his blow.
Mr. Hawley's duties were of a various and exhausting kind,
so that during all the riots, he allowed himself only one
hours' rest out of every twenty-four. Besides his ordinary
supervisory duties over the clerks, etc., he had to see to
the execution of the almost incessant orders of the
commissioners, provide and issue arms, see to the refugees
and prisoners, and act as commissary to over four thousand
men on duty in and around head-quarters. Two men more
perfectly fitted to work together in such a crisis as this,
than he and Acton, could not well be found.
Great Riots of New York 1712 to 1873, Including a Full and Complete Account of the Four Days' Draft Riot of 1863