True Stories of Crime From the District Attorney's Office

t Strad

ge Stradivarius," which he had purchased in 1873 for about three thousand thalers-a sum representing practically the savings of a lifetime. Bott had been leader of a small orchest

made up the family-I loved it like a

nt, and no hand but his own was ever permitted to lif

at 355 West Thirty-first Street. But Bott, having the soul of a true musician, cared but little for money and was happy enough so long as he could smoke his old meerschaum pipe and draw the bow across the cherished violin held lovingly to his cheek. The

nothing else-we mus

way her face that her husband migh

delina Patti, was ambitious to own a genuine Stradivarius, and had been looking for one for a long time, and, although he was but an indifferent player, he had, in default of skill to perform, the money to buy. The matte

that I can feel-money that I can count. It was that kin

f insulted, tore the check to bits an

ceive five hundred dollars as his commission, and when, through old Professor Bott's stubbornness, the sa

always removed it before his pupils arrived and never put it back until their departure, thus insuring the secrecy of its hid

e for Hoboken to visit a friend. The violin was left in its customary place. It was dark when they returned, and after throwing off his coat and lighting the gas the old man hast

hair and a small, dark mustache-at about five o'clock. He had waited about half an hour and then had said that he guessed he would go. She had not noticed that he took anything away with him. In his despair the old man turned to his old friend Flechter, and the next day the dealer came to express his sympathy. He

think the old man must be crazy. Sometimes Flechter went with him. Once, the two travelled all the way over to New Jersey, but the scent proved to be a false one. Bott grew thinner and older week by week, almost

uly following the loss of the violin Flecht

f you have that printed and put a rewa

ted and partly written i

OST. $50

n Bott March 31, 1894, 355 W. 31st St. Absolute safety and secrecy guar

d those he could avail himself of seemed harsh and discordant. He had no appetite, and even found no solace in his pipe. Almost penniless they were forced to give up their lodgings and move

ke notice. The sleuth in him pricked up its ears. Why, sure, certainly, Flechter was the one man who knew what Bott's violin was really worth-the one man who could sell it to advantage-and he had been done out of five hundred dollars by the old musician's stupidity. Allen thought he'd take a look into the thing. Now, there lived in the same boarding-house with Allen a friend of his named Harry P. Durden, and to Durden Allen recounted the story of the lost violin and voiced his suspicions of Fl

ties in this country, determined to return to end her days in the Fatherland. On May 21st she wrote to Flechter, who had lost all track of her, that her husband had died, that she had moved to 306 River Street, Ho

, care of H

a genuine Strad. to offer you and would li

pectfull

S. FL

Now that the only person in the world who had been authoritatively able to identif

Southan, Mrs. Bott received the following extraordinary epistle. Like the notice given her

28,

06 River Street

sale being a violin maker and dealer and not being able to sell with safety for such a large sum of money I concluded to wait. I have now thought the matter over and come to the conclusion that a little money is better than none and if you are anxious for the return of the violin and willing to pay a sum of money, sm

, according to Mrs. Bott, was Flechter's. By this time the widow and Allen, were in close communication. The "Cav

valuable instruments are kept; in the front sits Flechter himself, a stoutish man of middle height, with white hair and mustache. But on June 23, 1895, Flechter was out when Durden and Baird called, and only his cl

rius Cremonis feci

en in ink. Durden examined it for some fifte

urden said he desired some experts to pass upon its genuineness. On the way over Flechter guaranteed it to be a genuine Strad., and said it belonged to a retired merchant named Rossman, who wou

d, but the Car of Juggernaut had started upon its course, and that night Flechter was lodged in the city prison. Next morning he was brought before Magistrate Flammer in the Jefferson Market Police Court and the violin was taken out of its case, which the police had sealed. At this, the first hearing in this extraordinary case, Mrs. Bott, of course, identified the violin positively as "The Duke of Cambridge," and several other persons testified that, in substance, it was Bott's celebrated

28th the Grand Jury filed an indictment against Flechter accusing him of feloniously receiving stolen property-the violin-knowing it

e fort, directing his fire upon Osborne and losing no advantage inadvertently given him. The noise of the conflict filled the court house and drowned the uproar on Broadway. Nightly and each morning the daily press gave columns to the proceedings. Every time the judge coughed the important fact was given due prominence. And every gibe of co

t the violin found in his possession was "The Duke of Cambridge"; second, that th

raham corroborated him. He had written it himself sitting in an armchair, all but the words "355 West Thirty-first Street," which had been put in by a certain Mr. Jopling who had been present. Mr. Jopling swore that that was so, too. But, on cross-examination, it developed that Mr. Abraham had been practicing making copies of the notice at the suggestion of the lawyer for the defense, and, when Mr. Jopling took the stand, he was called upon to explain an affidavit made

ination revealed the fact that such an erasure had been made. When the smoke cleared the credibility of the defense appeared badly damaged. But the precise point was of little importance, after all. The great question was: the identity of 'CAVE DWELLER.' On this point a number of witnesses t

bear the test of careful scrutiny. Many an innocent man has paid the penalty for uncommitted crime because he has

Durden's house, and asked Mrs. Bott and her witnesses what they thought of it. Mrs. Bott could not identify it, but she swore no less positively that it was an entirely different violin from the one which she had seen before the magistrate. Then Osborne hurled his bomb over his enemy's parapet and cried loudly that a monstrous wicked fraud had been perpetrated to thwart Justice-that the defense had "f

in substance, that he belonged to a family which had been making violins for three generations and had himself been making them for twenty years, that he was familiar with Bott's Stradivarius, having seen it three times, and that he firmly believed a large part of the violin produced before the magistrate was the missing Bott-certainly the back and scroll. Moreover, he was able to describe the markings of

use, Grenecher Castle, in Germany; that he had repaired it in this country in 1885; that the instrument in court was not a Strad. nor even a good imitation of one, and, of course, was no

to a man named Palm, the only element of conflict being as to whether or not the violin which Fle

esert of dry evidence gave them passing refreshment, when a picturesque witness for the defense, an instrument maker named Franz Bruckner, from South Germany, having been asked if the violin shown him was a Strad., replied, with a grunt of disg

ow!"-an answer which was probably true, and equally so of the jury who were shouldered with the almos

tt's, but his own; that he had first seen it in the possession of Charles Palm in 1886 in his house in Eighth Street and St. Mark's Place, New York City, had borrowed it from Palm and played on it for two months in Seabright, an

though it had been changed in some respects since it had been stolen. It had originally been made of baked wood by one Dedier Nicholas (an instrument maker of the first half of the nineteenth century), and stamped with the maker's name, but this inscription was now covered by a Stradivarius

sold to Eller. Upon the question of the identity of the instrument then lying before the jury this evidence was conclusive, but, of course, it did not satisfy the jury as to whether Flechter

d as tending to show that the suit had not only been compromised but that he and Flechter were engaged in trying to put off the Palm violin

SE, CHICAGO

23,

nd Mr. Meyer arranged with myself for the half, four hundred and fifty dollars, which he proposed himself and have been expecting a settlement on their part lo

ost sin

N E

Opera Co.,

e was, nevertheless, upon his own evidence, guilty of having "faked" a cheap Nicholas violin into a Strad., and of having offered it for

the violin offered in evidence at the trial was not the one produced in

edibility of the witnesses than upon anything else. It is likely that most of the testimony, on both sides, in regard to the ide

gust Gemunder, to whose evidence attention has already been called, and who swore that it was "The Duke of Camb

"Cave Dweller" letter and state therein that he was "a violin dealer or maker," thus pointing, unmistakably, to himself, and to further state that for one in his position to dispose of it would be difficult and dangerous. The only explanation fo

he shouted: "This is no laughing matter, Colonel Allen. It is a very serious matter whether this man is to be allowed to-night to go

t would have been a piece of incredible folly and carelessness upon his part to leave it in such an exposed place

y that he was the victim of a conspiracy upon the part of his enemies, assisted by a too credulous prosecuting attorney. Everybody admitted that it was an extraordinary case, but the press was consistent in its clamor against Flechter, and opinion generally was that he had been rightly convicted. On May 22nd he was sentenced to the penitentiary for twelve months,

have taken it from the jury on that account. But a printed page of questions and answers carries with it no more than a suggestion of the

the great Stradivarius had brought only sorrow. But for him the world had no pity. Surely the strains of

that a second trial would be considered advisable upon the same evidence. But to his great disappointment his conviction was sustained by a divided court, in which only two of the five justices voted for a new trial. Again Fortune had averted her face. If only one more judge had thought the evide

Stradivarius, and when his conviction was affirmed little notice was taken o

the dealer and his witnesses the amazing discovery occurred in this wise. A violin maker named Joseph Farr, who at one time had worked for Flechter and had testified in his behalf at the trial (to the effect that the instrument produced in the police court was not Bott's Stradivarius) saw by chance a very fine violin in the possession of a family named Springer in Brooklyn, and notified Flechter of the fact. The latter, who was always ready to purchase ch

small advance over the sum for which it had been pawned. It lay exposed for purchase on Fox's shelf for some months, until, in December, 1895, a tailor named James Dooly visited the shop to redeem a silver watch. Being, at the same time, in funds, and able to satisfy his taste as a virtuoso, he felt the need of and bought a violin for ten dollars, but, Fox urging upon him the desirability of getting a good one while he was about it, was finally persuaded to purchase the Bott violin for twenty dollars in its stead. Dooly took it home, played upon it as the spirit moved, and whenever in

between the current trials in his court, dragged along for months, but which finally resulted in establishing to the Court's satisfaction that the violin discov

and his lawyer, Mrs. Springer and her son, the attorneys for the prosecution, and lastly old Mrs. Bott. The seals of the case were broken and the violin identified by the widow as that of her

Court to give the violin to you. You have suffered

the old lady, clasping

f pleasure in its possessi

violin dealer and his family had endured the agony of disgrace, he had spent a fortune in his

shake their heads wisely, as if to say that the whol