Prison Escapee Foiled in Effort to Kidnap Two Small Boys in North Pelham in 1900

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A hardened career criminal who had escaped from the Westchester County Jail attempted to kidnap two young boys in North Pelham on a May evening in 1900. The kidnapping was foiled by a quickly-formed posse led by the boys' father and Constable Marks. The events were described in an article that appeared in the May 15, 1900 issue of the New-York Tribune. The text of that article follows.

"TRIES TO KIDNAP TWO BOYS.

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ESCAPED JAILBIRD CAUGHT AFTER AN EXCITING CHASE.

After an exciting chase last evening in North Pelham Constable Marks captured Edward Keller, alias Edward Kelly, who escaped from the Westchester County Jail in 1898 in company with two other convicts. Keller was in the act of kidnapping two boys, Peter and John O'Connor, ten and twelve years old.

The boys were playing near their home when Keller came along. After giving them candy he enticed them into the woods. As soon as he was under cover the convict grasped the boys' arms roughly and told them they would have to go with him to New-York. Peter O'Connor says that Keller choked him because he would not go into a house and beg for money. The boys were near the Hutchinson River when Constable Marks, accompanied by their father and a posse of citizens, came in sight. When Keller saw them he left his captives and ran into the woods. Constable Marks finally brought him to a halt after firing several shots. Judge Lyon last night held Keller for the Westchester Grand Jury.

Keller is well known to the police of Westchester County. He has served time in the Elmira Reformatory and in the penitentiary, and was awaiting trial for horse stealing when he broke jail two years ago."

Source: Tries to Kidnap Two Boys, New-York Tribune, May 15, 1900, p. 2, col. 5.

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Findings of the Coroner's Inquest That Followed the Pelhamville Train Wreck of 1885

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Today I am continuing a series of postings that transcribe news articles that appeared following the train wreck that occurred in Pelhamville in late December 1885. See:

Monday, September 24, 2007: The Pelhamville Train Wreck of 1885

Tuesday, September 25, 2007: More About The Pelhamville Train Wreck of 1885

Wednesday, September 26, 2007: The Pelhamville Train Wreck of 1885 Continued . . . .

Today's posting transcribes a news story that appeared in The New York Times on January 17, 1886. That item detailed the findings of the coroner's inquest that followed the accident. It read as follows:

"THE COMPANY CENSURED.

FINDING OF THE CORORNER'S JURY AS TO THE ACCIDENT AT PELHAMVILLE.

The inquest before Coroner Tice relative to the death of Fireman Eugene Blake, in the railroad accident at Pelhamville on Dec. 27, was resumed in the station at that place yesterday afternoon. The first witness was Riley Phillips the engineer, who testified that his train reached the Pelhamville station at 5:55 in the morning, and was running at the rate of 35 miles an hour. It was dark as pitch and the air was full of sand raised by the storm. As soon as he felt the shock of the platform in the track he shut off steam, and the next moment was hurled down the embankment with his engine. It had no flanges on the forward driving wheels, but he believed that flanges would not have saved the engine.

John Heeney, Jr., Superintendent of Motive Power on the New-York and New-Haven Railroad, testified that two -thirds of this engines ran without flanges on the forward driving wheels to enable them to round curves with the least possible strain on the axles. Flanges on all the wheels could not have kept the engine on the track after striking the overturned platform. S. E. Lyon, a Pelhamville carpenter, who had examined the platform posts after the accident, could not swear that there were nail holes in them, and was sure they were not securely spiked to the platform. William Barry, a Road Commissioner of the town, found no other evidence that the platform was fastened down than a spike in one of the uprights. William E. Barnett, counsel for the railroad, admitted that the station property belonged to the company.

Coroner Tice then turned the evidence over to the jury, and in half an hour they found a verdict' That the said Eugene Blake came to his death by a railroad accident at Pelhamville Dec. 27, 1885, through the criminal negligence of the New-York, New-Haven and Hartford Railroad Company in failing to secure the platform of the above station."

Source: The Company Censured, N. Y. Times, Jan. 17, 1886, p. 7.

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