No. 64
Crime, Eccentricity, and the Sporting Life in 19th Century America.
January 17, 2012

A Characteristic Present

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January 17, 2012
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JOSEPH GORMAN
alias: BROWN, CLIFFORD
PICKPOCKET

The Welsh Servant

The 1883 book “Shropshire Folk-lore: A Sheaf of Gleanings” included a story about what we today would call a “poltergeist” which appeared to center around an enigmatic farm servant.  While the tale purports to be true, at this distance of time it is impossible to say how much of it is fact, and how much is legend.  Still, it’s such a quaintly charming little curiosity that I wanted to
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Strange Company - 8/24/2026

Convicts to Maryland, 1773 by Peter Dickson

  [Editor’s note: Guest writer, Peter Dickson, lives in West Sussex, England and has been working with microfilm copies of The Duncan Campbell Papers from the State Library of NSW, Sydney, Australia. The following are some of his analyses of what he has discovered from reading these papers. Dickson has contributed many transcriptions to the Jamaica […]
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Early American Crime - 2/7/2019
Amen.

Artifact #93: Soapy's son, hires attorney to stop the slurring of his father's name.

"As his son I am proud of hisefforts to succeed in life"Jefferson Randolph Smith IIIArtifact #93-2Jeff Smith collection(Click image to enlarge) oapy's son hires a legal firm to stop the defamation of his father's name. At age 30, Jefferson Randolph Smith III, Soapy and Mary's oldest son, was protecting his father's legacy and his mother's reputation from "libel" and scandal. He was also
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Soapy Smith's Soap Box - 10/13/2025

The Attleboro Sensation.

(Illustrated Police News, April 3, 1886.)Agnes Anastasia Long moved out of her parents’ home in East Attleboro, Massachusetts, in April 1882. With her many male suiters, she was considered the black sheep of the family. Her father had enough of her bad behavior and, according to the Boston Herald, “refused to permit her to darken the threshold of his humble home.”She took a job at Streeter
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Murder By Gaslight - 8/22/2026
On the Russians.

1617: A miller of Manberna, the hangman’s last

Youth With Executioner by Nuremberg native Albrecht Dürer … although it’s dated to 1493, which was during a period of several years when Dürer worked abroad. November 13 [1617]. Burnt alive here a miller of Manberna, who however was lately … Continue reading →
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Executed Today - 11/13/2020
A Plucky Elberon, N. J., Girl | The Sawdust Game

A Characteristic Present

Buffalo Bills Present

Wasington, D.C., October 1886 - Buffalo Bill bestows a Mexican bronco pony on the youthful son of Secretary Lamar, Washington, D.C. [more]

The unusual sight of a cowboy in full costume, wearing a sombrero, and a Mexican bronco pony, was afforded the officials at Washington of Post Office and Interior Departments the other afternoon. The bronco was a present to young Mr. Lamar, son of Secretary Lamar. Buffalo Bill had sent the bronco pony with his compliments, and for awhile the story got abroad that it was a wedding gift to Secretary Lamar, but this was denied. The cowboy, after he dismounted, went into the Interior Department and presented the pony, and they took it around to the department stable.

Reprinted from The National Police Gazette, October 21, 1886.

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