USA > Ohio > Cuyahoga County > Cleveland > A history of Cuyahoga County and the City of Cleveland, (Vol. 1) > Part 61
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73
The first judge of the United States District Court was Hiram V. Willson, who was appointed by President Pierce. The most celebrated case that came before him was the Oberlin-Wellington rescue case. Judge Willson died in 1866 and was succeeded by Judge Charles Sherman, a brother of Senator John Sherman and General William Tecumseh Sher- man. Judge Sherman after his appointment made Cleveland his home. Agustus J. Ricks served for some time and was succeeded by Judge Robert W. Tayler, who was not a member of the Cleveland bar but became identi- fied with Cleveland and its history by a court decree known as the Tayler grant which provided a plan for the operation of the Cleveland Street Railways by the the city and the company. The provisions of this plan have taken the street railways out of politics and under its benign operation we have the best service in the country. At his death the following tribute was published in the Cleveland Press :
He lived respected and he died revered Unselfish and devoted to the close, All honors were to him but Duty's call, And, walking in her knarled path, he rose.
A citizen, who sought the highest good, A jurist calm, dispassionate and strong,
He toiled with keenest wit to find the right,
And still as patiently to find the wrong.
Vol. I-15
452
CUYAHOGA COUNTY AND
Unswayed by passion and unspoiled by praise, He lent a ready ear and judgment sound Urged on by this with every task imposed : "If wisely sought the truth will here be found."
Too soon the summons came and he is gone And eyes are moist, that seldom shed a tear, And one, who loved him more than he e'er knew, Would lay a wreath of tribute on his bier.
Francis J. Wing served on the Federal bench of Cleveland being ap- pointed by President Mckinley. He was born in Trumbull County, Ohio, in 1850, was admitted to the bar in 1874 and then came to Cleveland. He first practiced alone, then the firm of Coon and Wing was formed, and later Wing and Wing, the partnership being with a brother. Judge Wing was a bright and capable lawyer. In the early eighties he and Andrew Squire in a bar of about seven hundred were looked upon as the two most promising of the younger members. After serving for some time on the Federal bench Judge Wing resigned to again take up the practice of law. Judge William L. Day, who graced the bench for some years, is a son of Judge William R. Day, who was a prominent figure in the state and nation, was judge of the Common Pleas Court, Secretary of State, and Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court, which position he resigned shortly before his death. Judge William L. Day, can trace his ancestry through generations of eminent lawyers. His maternal great, great, grand- father, Zepheniah Swift was the author of "Swift's Digest" and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Connecticut. His maternal great grand- father was Rufus P. Spalding, a Justice of the Supreme Court, and his grandfather, Luther Day, was for two terms a Justice of the Supreme Court. Judge William L. Day resigned to take up the practice of law and the partnership with a brother, Luther Day, was formed. Both of these members are brilliant and successful lawyers. The firm, so illustrious in lineage and successful in the law, is written Day and Day.
Judge John H. Clarke was one of the ablest men who have sat on the Federal bench at Cleveland. A practicing lawyer who had grown up in the law and learned its lessons by practical experience, who had appeared before many judges, who had represented clients in cases involving great sums and great issues, who had the judicial temperament and the integrity and determination, whose hair was turning gray, was appointed by the President of the United States to a position he was qualified to fill. Having served on this bench for a time and made manifest his qualifications he was appointed by President Wilson a Judge of the Supreme Court of the United States. This position he held for some years and retired to private life to have a little play spell in the twilight of his years. A fine banquet was tendered him by the Cleveland Bar Association on his retirement and his address on that occasion was that of a profound thinker, a statesman, and a lawyer.
The present judge of the United States District Court in Cleveland is D. C. Westenhaver, who had practiced law in Cleveland for some years, who had served on the board of education, and been active in public affairs before his appointment. It would be idle to do more than predict for him a place in history with the best, for his record is in the making, but he is able, fearless, and tireless. In the increased business that comes before the court by reason of the vast increase in population and wealth, and especially by reason of the great number of violations of the prohibition laws coming before his court he has proven himself a marvel of judicial efficiency. In
453
THE CITY OF CLEVELAND
closing this brief history of this court mention should be made of the present United States Attorney, A. E. Bernsteen, who, although but a short time in office, has proved himself capable beyond the expectations of his friends, who had placed the mark high. It was while Judge John J. Sullivan was United States District Attorney that the trial of Cassie Chadwick occurred. This was one of the most famous cases ever tried in that court, perhaps in any court, and it received wide publicity. In the magnitude of her operations the defendant in this case was the equal if not the superior of the famous criminal in France, Madam Therese Humbert, and their criminal careers were somewhat alike, both posed as women of great wealth, both were able by extreme snobbery to triumph over the impersonal laws of business, both were consummate actresses and both met the same sad end.
This famous case began in 1905 when Cassie Chadwick was indicted by the Federal grand jury. The trial judge was Robert W. Tayler, the prosecutor, as we have said, John J. Sullivan, and the United States marshal, when the arrest was made, Frank M. Chandler. The attorneys for the defendant were Jay P. Dawley, Francis J. Wing, and S. Q. Ker- ruish, and the jury, who brought in the verdict of guilty, were F. P. Ander- son, James Carr, Butler Crane, Martin Crow, H. A. Haverstadt, O. F. Haymaker, L. E. Humphrey, Elwood Miller, Capt. W. McKray, Willis McGuire, Thomas McMahon and William Stover. The defendant was sentenced March 27, 1905 by Judge Tayler to ten years in the penitentiary. There was some delay by reason of writs of error to the United States Circuit Court. The notorious prisoner was finally taken away in accordance with the sentence and died after three years of prison life.
Cassie Chadwick was born in 1857 in Eastwood, Canada, which little town is about half way between Toronto and Detroit. Her name was Elizabeth Bigley and she was the wayward child of a family of six girls and two boys. Her father was a section boss on the Great Western Rail- way, Daniel Bigley, and the family were in very moderate circumstances. Betsey Bigley was moody at times, and, although quite early in life handi- capped by deafness, began her conquest of men. She was not handsome but seemed to exercise remarkable power over men in connection with crooked transactions. She had apparently employed all the methods of the crook quite early but with added synthesis. Having obtained money probably by theft, she in 1878, when twenty-one years of age, gave out that she was an heiress. She brought a letter which she read to her parents, neither of whom could read, to the effect that an uncle in England had left her a fortune of $18,000, and the letter was supposedly from his English lawyers. She had some visiting cards printed announcing that she was "Miss Lizzie Bigley, heiress to $18,000." She was arrested for forgery and tried in 1879 but declared insane and sent to an asylum. Later she was released and given into the care of her mother.
She came to Cleveland to visit a married sister and stopped at her home on the west side. In the absence of the sister she mortgaged all the furniture under an assumed name. This worked, and so she went to various rooming houses in the city getting money in the same way, using different names at each place. On October 22, 1882 she married Dr. Wallace S. Springsteen, who took her for a woman of wealth. The day after the wedding the bride's trousseau and jewels were seized and Dr. Springsteen discovered he had been duped. He got a divorce. After this she wrote to various friends, sometimes adopting the name of Mrs. Scott, and also the name of Mrs. Wallace. She appeared in various cities under the name , of "La Rose," practicing as a clairvoyant for a time, came to Cleveland and kept some sort of a dubious resort but which was frequented by many
454
CUYAHOGA COUNTY AND
of the wealthy, society men of the city. Here she learned of the double lives of some and their weakness but gave her attention especially to men of wealth. In 1890 she was in Toledo and became known as Madame Lydia De Vere, fortune teller, clairvoyant, mesmerist, and medium. Her place here drew men of prominence, bankers and physicians being her especially favored customers. She had various methods of getting in the wealth which she coveted. A policeman gave her $250 in gold to sleep on that she might tell him something about the girl he wanted to marry. She told him some strange things but he did not get back his money. Madame De Vere had been living in Toledo some three years when she was arrested, tried and convicted for a multitude of swindling operations into which a clerk in the express office was drawn. She was sentenced to nine years in the penitentiary, but her accomplice was acquitted. He died soon after. In 1893 Madame De Vere was paroled from the penitentiary by Gov. William Mckinley, the matron of that institution testifying to her character as a model prisoner. She posed in the prison as a clairvoyant and prophetess. It was related that she told the warden that he would lose $5,000 in a certain business deal, and he did, that he would die of cancer, and he did.
After being released from prison Betsy Bigley went back to her home town in Canada, giving her name as Mrs. C. L. Hoover of Cleveland. She stated that she had decided to settle down in the old town. This was merely method for she came to Cleveland and in 1896 was recognized as Madame De Vere by the officer, who had her in custody in Toledo, as she drove up to the Hollenden Hotel in magnificent style. She admitted the identity to him and thanked him for his courtesy while she was his prisoner. Two years after this she was married to Dr. Leroy S. Chadwick, a widower and mem- ber of a prominent Cleveland family. He had an interesting daughter and his mother was living. The Chadwick marriage occurred in 1896. The doctor had a fine residence at Euclid and East Eighty-second Street. The woman with many aliases he met as Mrs. Hoover, just where is not recorded. It was while the wife of Doctor Chadwick that her largest financial efforts were put forth, and they were all fruitful. She was constantly securing new additions to her apparently mammoth fortune. We quote: "She sailed the billows of fortune with swelling canvas. She played the role of society queen and played it with the grace of a Modjeska." The truth is this remarkable woman could don or doff the purple with the ease of a lightning change artist. Her home was a plain structure viewed from the outside, but within the most gorgeous luxury reigned. She ordered everything that struck her fancy, and never asked the price. She bought jewels as she bought market truck. If a tray of pearls or diamonds pleased her she bought. She had a chest containing eight trays of diamonds and pearls. They were pledged to a New York banker at one time, and were inventoried at $98,000. She played with diamonds as a child would with beach-sand letting them trickle through her fingers. She had a rope of pearls valued at $40,000.
Cleveland merchants welcomed her presence in their stores as the silver lining to the cloud of dull times. One of the sights of Cleveland was Mrs. Chadwick shopping, tricked out in gorgeous raiment with her liveried servants and semi-equipage. One of her orders at a Cleveland piano store was for eight grand pianos, to be sent to as many different friends as tokens of her regard. Her first act on engaging a maid was to take her to the tailor and outfit her with suits and wraps. She made her cook a present of a sealskin coat reaching far below the knees. She invited her husband to go with her on Christmas Eve, and to a supper afterwards, and on their return home, Doctor Chadwick was dumbfounded on entering what appeared to be an entirely different house from the one they had left.
455
THE CITY OF CLEVELAND
While the Chadwicks were at the theatre furniture men, decorators and artisans had been engaged in refitting and refurnishing the house from top to bottom. Turning to her husband, Mrs. Chadwick said : "This is your Christmas gift." Then she topped her generosity by giving the doctor a fur lined overcoat that cost $1,100. She surrounded herself with gold; it was the dominant color in her house. Gold clocks ticked every- where, and golden figurantes peeped out from golden cabinets. A massive piece of ivory carving represented a bull-fight. Carved in the solid block of pure ivory by a master hand could be seen the bull in full charge, a matador, a toreador, and the great amphitheatre with thousands of spectators. Scat- tered on the floor were rich rugs from Persia and India, and overlapping them were gaudy imitation Smyrnas. On the walls were exquisite works of art, and side by side were daubs.
The music room was not large, and the great pipe organ with its 365 stops, one for each day in the year, took up all of one side. Its cost was $8,000. In a golden cage was a golden bird that sang golden notes when a golden spring was touched. Cut glass was piled high as in a store-room. One set of tableware was of imported silver studded with rubies. Another contained over 900 pieces. The cups alone cost $65 each. The soup-plates concealed music boxes that played when the plates were lifted and stopped when they were put down. Gilded chairs had the same mechanical oddity. When one sat on them they played sweet music. There were cloisonne and Genori vases that cost small fortunes. She presented her friends as wed- ding presents imported French automobiles and touring-cars. Once she had the automobile fad herself, selling or giving away her machine at every stop of importance and buying a new one. On one occasion Mrs. Chadwick induced the parents of twelve young ladies in Cleveland's smart set to permit their daughters to accompany her to Europe. What extrava- gances were indulged in on that trip were known only to those who accom- panied her but upon her return home, the chaperon called upon Cleveland's most fashionable jeweler and had framed in gold, solid, twelve exquisite miniatures painted on porcelain by a great Parisian artist. One of these went to each of the guests of her transatlantic party.
Her charity was boundless. She was known to purchase enough toys to give one or more to every inmate of a Cleveland orphan asylum. She picked out worthy families among the needy and sent them presents and food. No beggar was ever turned away from her door. She took a fancy to her butcher boy. Driving around to his home one morning she had him climb into the carriage. She took him to a tailor, ordered more than a dozen suits for him; took him to a haberdashery and fitted him out there, went to the jewelers and bought watch and chain, rings and jewels. She thought nothing of spending $10,000 in a day's shopping. Whenever she started from Cleveland to New York, she telegraphed ahead for a suite at a prominent hotel. She did not always use the suite she had ordered but was just as likely to go to some other hotel, but she never cancelled the first order and invariably paid the bill for the rooms she had not ordered as well as for the others. One winter she took a party of friends from Cleveland to New York in a private car to hear "Parsifal."
When they searched the premises after her arrest they found in the loft of the barn, covered with dust, with the Custom House seals unbroken, an exquisite "Old Master" packed in a case and stored away like junk. Crates of other pictures, tumbled into the basement, testified to her reckless mode of buying. There was a Steinway piano that had never been unpacked : there were vases that had never been disturbed ; pictures that were never hung ; carpets that were never laid ; and a hundred boxes of hats, many of them of costly furs to match suits, and all of them bearing the label of a
456
CUYAHOGA COUNTY AND
fashionable New York milliner. This eccentricity of splendor and gener- osity she carried out in all her relations of life. Her servants were numer- ous and loyal. There were French maids and Swedish maids, and when the night gathered around her, they were faithful to the end."
"If one had any curiosity in watching the entourage of Fifth Avenue, New York, on a certain day in the spring of 1902, he might have seen a carriage drive up to the residence of Andrew Carnegie. Looking closer, one might have noticed that the occupants were a rather large, handsomely gowned woman of distinguished, if showy, appearance, and a well nourished, florid-faced man of prosperous and professional air. Shortly before this in Cleveland Mrs. Chadwick had called upon her companion, a Cleveland lawyer of prominence, and told him that she was a niece of Frederick Mason. a life-long associate of Andrew Carnegie, who at his death had bequeathed her upwards of seven million dollars in securities. Mason had asked Andrew Carnegie to act as her trustee. Under the latter's skillful man- agement, the fortune had increased to eleven millions. And now that Mr. Carnegie had given up all his own business cares, he wished to be rid of this trust. Mrs. Chadwick said that Mr. Carnegie had suggested that perhaps a great banking and trust company might be established in Cleve- land with her fortune to back it, and it was for this purpose that she came to consult him. A few weeks later this lawyer was summoned to New York for the purpose of arranging a settlement with Mr. Carnegie, whom Mrs. Chadwick, meanwhile, in a moment of unguarded confidence, had hinted was her natural father. This to the lawyer's mind accounted for the strange story of the trusteeship. As they approached the Carnegie mansion, Mrs. Chadwick turned to her Cleveland lawyer and said : 'It might be well for you to remain in the carriage while I sound the coast. Mr. Carnegie may resent your presence.'
"Mrs. Chadwick entered the mansion. She reappeared in the course of twenty minutes or half an hour and exhibited to the lawyer a package which she said contained Caledonia Railway bonds of Scotland and two notes aggregating ten millions of dollars, signed by Mr. Carnegie, whose signature thereto she exhibited with feverish elation. The purpose of the trip being achieved the two returned to Cleveland. Though Mrs. Chadwick took pains to impress upon her lawyer the necessity of secrecy as to her birth and wealth, it was impossible, as she knew, for this to remain inter nos in a city of the size of Cleveland. It would find its way, as she knew, through the very innermost recesses of the highest social and financial circles and it would not be likely to become vulgarly public. The standing of the lawyer in Cleveland was such as to assure verisimilitude for the story. Had he not driven up to the Carnegie mansion on Fifth Avenue with Chadwick and had he not seen the notes with Mr. Carnegie's signature. What had hap- pened was that Mrs. Chadwick had the forged notes in her possession when she drove up Fifth Avenue to the Carnegie mansion. It is certain that she did not see Mr. Carnegie."
"Iri Reynolds was secretary of the Wade Park Banking Company of Cleveland, of which Frank Rockefeller, a brother of John D. Rockefeller, was president. He was an old and intimate friend of Doctor Chadwick. One day Mrs. Chadwick called him on the telephone to her house. When Mr. Reynolds repaired to the Chadwick mansion, he found Doctor and Mrs. Chadwick engaged in preparing a package of papers for deposit in the safety- deposit vault. In the presence of her husband and of a gold-framed life- like portrait of 'her dear dead Uncle Mason' which hung in the parlor, Mrs. Chadwick said she wished to entrust to Mr. Reynolds some valuable securities which she had been advised should be placed in the possession of some third party. She showed Mr. Reynolds what was to be enclosed in the
457
THE CITY OF CLEVELAND
package, the principal items being a trust deed for ten millions, two hundred and forty-six thousand dollars, a note for five million dollars, and another one for one million, two hundred and fifty thousand, all in favor of Cassie L. Chadwick and signed 'Andrew Carnegie.' These documents were enclosed in a large envelope, carefully fastened with sealing-wax, and en- dorsed, 'Papers of Cassie L. Chadwick-for safe keeping only.' The party now proceeded to the bank. A drawer was selected and the package locked up. Before leaving the bank Mrs. Chadwick gave to Mr. Reynolds a memor- andum of the contents of the package containing the items that he had seen put into the package. On returning home she telephoned to Mr. Reynolds, apparently in some alarm, saying that she had forgotten to keep a copy of the memorandum she had given him, and asking him if he would not kindly send her a copy, so that she also might have a memorandum of the contents of the package to place with her papers, against the possibility of her death."
"Mr. Reynolds took a sheet of the bank paper with its lithographed heading, copied the memorandum on the sheet and signed his name. She had not asked him to sign it; that may have been a mere force of habit, unless the reader is prepared to believe that Mr. Reynolds was a confederate, a supposition that all Cleveland rejected. Had he not signed it, Cassie Chad- wick's path of glory might not have led to so many graves. Being now in whispered possession of the same mystery concerning Mrs. Chadwick's birth that had come to the knowledge of the Cleveland Attorney, Mr. Reynolds was convinced that he was not only the custodian of securities worth over sixteen millions of dollars, but of an astounding secret, which if known would stir a continent."
Having laid the foundation for unlimited credit the history of the subsequent transactions of this notorious woman, up to the time of her arrest, reads like a fancy of the brain. We have told of her extravagance in expenditures. By liberal bonuses and the arts that she possessed she borrowed over $1,000,000 from banks and bankers in ninety days on worth- less securities. Bankers went down before her in rapid succession. The saddest case being that of Charles T. Beckwith of the Citizens National Bank of Oberlin.
After torturing the soul of Mr. Beckwith, wrecking the bank, drawing large sums from many sources, she turned her attention to Pittsburgh. Here she played upon the fact that Mr. Carnegie had some enemies there, rivals in business. She had a meeting there described as having occurred at the apartments of Mrs. Chadwick at the hotel. When the millionaires entered the room they were amazed at the sight that met their eyes. Flowers, diamonds and pearls in careless profusion. Mrs. Chadwick told them that Mr. Carnegie was a great friend of her mother and that the unnatural father of a natural daughter had tied up her fortune temporarily, which was the occasion of her wanting a loan. She got $300,000.
The final denouement was near at hand, when, after a confession was secured from Mr. Beckwith by District Attorney, John J. Sullivan, a war- rant was issued for her arrest on a technical charge connected with her transactions with the Oberlin bank. As we see it now this was the thing to do but it required some nerve in view of the fact that the newspapers of the city and the banks generally and many of the leading citizens were still of the opinion that all would be made right. The arrest came in time to prevent further losses and possibly the escape of the now hunted debtor to foreign lands. The trial was on a charge somewhat difficult to sustain and with eminent counsel on the defense it was widely published. The District Attorney Mr. Sullivan and his assistant T. H. Garry were kept busy in this most interesting trial. Andrew Carnegie appeared as a witness. The district attorney said to the jury: "Gentlemen, I say to you in my closing
458
CUYAHOGA COUNTY AND
argument, in my closing words, as a final appeal to your judgment, your intellect, your courage; that the evidence in this case conclusively proves, beyond existence of a reasonable doubt, the allegations of this indictment, the proofs that you have before you a criminal of such conspicuous note- notorious and dangerous character-the fate of whom never was determined before by any jury in any court."
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.