No. 625
Crime, Eccentricity, and the Sporting Life in 19th Century America.
April 05, 2022

Dropping Their Disguise.

How a loving bridal couple were suddenly transformed into a brace of absconding counterfeiters.
April 5, 2022
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Bare arms, visible ankles, a more relaxed waistline—the most fashionable “bathing dresses” of 1868 allowed a woman to strip off her day-to-day corsets, feather hats, and petticoats and luxuriate in the freedom of the seaside. This ad for what were also called “bathing costumes” came from Godey’s Lady’s Book, an influential periodical that helped shape […]
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Ephemeral New York - 7/6/2026
"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
 Welcome to this week's Link Dump, where we wish our fellow Americans a happy 250th birthday!The unveiling of the Victoria Cross.A handy reminder that Robin Hood was no hero.One really freaking long tennis match.The motivations of Richard, Duke of York."Somebody's father" at the battle of Gettysburg.Why we call it a "honeymoon."The dog who loved trains.Now that all other problems on Earth
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Strange Company - 7/3/2026
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
(New Haven Independent) Taylor Ward sings "Found Drifting with the Tide" (excerpt), the tragic ballad of Jennie Cramer's murder.“Found Drifting with the Tide” was a song written by A. C. Willis, "Dedicated to the memory of Jennie Cramer," who was murdered in 1881.When the body of beautiful young Jennie Cramer was found on a sandbar
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Murder By Gaslight - 7/4/2026
Be sure to stop by our Facebook page tomorrow for a Prosecution Marathon of witnesses. Here are the witnesses for Wednesday, June 14th, Day 9 Rufus Hilliard, City Marshal, Mayor John Coughlin, Mrs. Hannah Gifford (seamstress and dressmaker), Anna Borden ( wealthy socialite who was on Lizzie’s grand tour of Europe, distantly related to Lizzie), Lucy Collett (watching the office of Dr. Chagnon day of the murder), Thomas Bowles ( handyman who once rented a room from Addie Churchill and was wa
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Lizzie Borden: Warps and Wefts - 6/13/2026
  [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
A Rattling Main. | A Woman Gambler in Nevada.

Dropping Their Disguise.

Dropping Their DisguiseHow a loving bridal couple were suddenly transformed into a brace of absconding counterfeiters after crossing the border between the United States and Canada, on the A. & G. W. R. R. 

“We’re in Canada now, Mike; I’m going to take of these togs."

This was the remark made by an apparently youthful bride to her companion, a well dressed young bridegroom on his wedding tour.

They were seated in one of the parlor cars on the Atlantic and Great Western railroad, and the train had just passed the boundary line that separates the land where the stars and stripes float supreme and the territory where flaps the crimson ensign of England.

The pair had attracted much attention all the way from Lockport, being very loving and billing and cooing like turtle doves. The rather peculiar expression alluded to above attracted still more attention, and the passengers were somewhat surprised to see the blushing bride disrobe herself, take off a jaunty hat and blonde wig and disclose an underdress of male clothing. Her companion also divested himself of a mustache and a wig. The metamorphosis showed up the travelers in their true light. . They were two counterfeiters escaping from the land of the brave and the home of the free, where things had got too hot for them.


Reprinted from The National Police Gazette, November 19, 1883.