Rensselaer Union, Volume 1, Number 20, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 February 1869 — Gift Swindles and Lottery Enterprises. [ARTICLE]

Gift Swindles and Lottery Enterprises.

There arc over two thousand of those dwindling establishments in New York. There are about thirty heavjL concerns, w’hich do the principal business. Thesecbang'e their location and their names often. By a flourishing concern the nnmbrer of ’letters received daily is from two hundred to five hundred. These letters come mainly from the country—many from the West, more from the South. The swindles are based on some pretended benevolent ■scheme. -X- ***** * A favorite mode of swindling is carried on by men whose “sand* of life have almost run out.” Trie party represents himself as a retired clergyman; one who has suffered long from asthma, or from a bronchial affection, or one nearly dead withdyspepsia, or wasting away with consumption. Through a recipe from an old doctor, or an old nurse, or an Indian, the party obtained relief. Out of gratitude for the recovery, the healed clergyman or individual gives notice that he will send the recipe “without charge” to any sufferer who may desire it. Circulars by the thousand are sent to the address of persons in all parts of the country. Each person is required to put a postage stamp in his letter, for the transmission of the recipe. Thousands of letters conie back in response. The recipe is sent, attached to which is the notice that great care must be taken in securing the right kind of medicine.— Not one apothecary~ht a hundred in the country has the medicine named. The benevolent holder of the recipe adds to other things, that should the party riot be able to get the medicine, if he will enclose three or five dollars, as the case may be, the New York party will make the purchase and send it on by express. Dreaming of no fraud, the money is sent as directed. If the medicine is sent on at all, it costs about fifty cents to the buyer, and a handsome business is done. If the swindle takes, the party will pocket from twenty to fifty thousand dollars, break up the concern, and be out of the way before the victim can visit New York. The thirty large gift establishments receive about live hundred letters a day. Full three-fifths of these letters contain money. Some of the letters detained by the authorities were found to contain sums as high as £3QO. Directed to different parties, they are taken out by the same persons. The medicine swindle, and gift enterprises are run by the same parties. This advertising for partners is worthy of especial notice. A man with a capital of from one hundred to five hundred dollars is wanted. He can make one hundred dollars a day and run no risk. The victim appears. lie has a little money, or his wife has some, or he has a little

JJI aCv llv C *lll 111 V L* A 11V swindle is open to Him. The basket of letters is opened in his presence. He is offered a share in the dazzling scheme. He pays hisjneney, helps open the letters for a day or two, and then the scheme dissolves in the night. Almost all thestf large* swindles have smaller ones that go along with them. The names of the parties who are carrying on these gigantic swiudles are well known to our police. The managers have been arrested a dozen times. Broken up in one place, under a new name they open again. Thousands of letters are sent to the police headquarters from victims asking for redress. But not one of these letters is a complaint. Without a complaint the police are powerless. The victims belong to the country. Most of them have a respectable standing. They knew the thing was illegal when it was presented to them. It was a lottery, and nothing more. When they sent their ten dollars to secure the prize, they knew it was a cheat on their part, for they had bought no ticket, and if there was a prize they were not entitled to it. They dare not commence a suit against Ifiese parties and come to Nq>v York and prosecute it. The swindlers understand this perfectly well and defy the authorities. If gentlemen from the rural districts swindled and will be parties to the cheat, refuse to make a complaint or back up the complaint in the courts, they must take the consequences. > • - In almost every case gift enterprises are carried on under 'an assumed name, and when arrested the parties prove that they are not the men who carry on the business. — When goods are seized an owner appears, not before? named, to replevin the f|t,ack. A. A. Kelly seems to have been the originator of this method of swindling. He began in Chicago with the Skating Rink. He then catne to New' York and began the gift enterprise and dollar lottery scheme. He got up a Mock Turtle Oil Stock Company. He swindled a man in Erie county, who had him indicted. He was arrested by the P2*j ce on * bench warrant, sent to Erie county to be trfed, and is now serving the State in prison. Read & Co<> ChnI ton Hall, how’ doing tholargeMgfl

lottery business in the city, cannot | be found, though the police have arrested the subordinates a dozen times. One of the great firms in New York was run by Clarke, Webster & Co. The police came down on tho establishment and took away six truck loads of books, circulars and goods? They fonnd directories for every town and city in the country. What were not printed were written. No ijiuch individuals as Clarke, Webster <fc Co. existed. A man known as Wm. M. Elias appeared as the owner of the goods, and demanded them on a writ of replevin. The police refused to give them up, and gave bonds. The goods still remain at the headquarters. Many victims who receive notice that their ticket, which they never bought, has drawn a prize, and who are requested to send on the ten dollars to pay expenses and percentage, try to do a sharp thing. They send the ten dollars on to General Kennedy, the Superintendent of the Police, with the request that he will pay it and take the present if all right. Such parties generally get a sharp answer from the official, telling them that gambling is unlawful; that the business they arc engaged in is gambling; that the whole concern is a swindle; and that they had better put their money in their pockets and mind their business.— Advertisers Gazette.