Lights and Shadows of New York Life: or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great CityMcCabe, James Dabney
History
Lights and Shadows of New York Life: or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City
McCabe, James Dabney
New York (N.Y.) -- Description and travel; New York (N.Y.) -- Social life and customs -- 19th century
E. A. Woodward was a deputy clerk to the Board of Supervisors, and as
such received a moderate salary. As far as is known, he had no other
means of acquiring money. He was at the beginning of the investigations
the owner of a magnificent estate near Norwalk, Connecticut, a partner in
the firm of Vanderhoef & Beatty, to the extent of $75,000; and the owner
of property variously estimated at from $500,000 to $1,000,000. It was
charged by the New York papers that the endorsements of the name of
Keyser & Co. on warrants amounting to over $817,000, and which
endorsements Mr. Keyser pronounced _forgeries_, were mainly the work of
Woodward. The money drawn on the fraudulent warrants was divided between
Woodward and Tweed. Conclusive evidence of this was afforded by Mr.
Samuel J. Tilden, who, by a happy inspiration, made a personal
examination of Tweed's bank account at the Broadway Bank, and there
discovered that Tweed, Garvey, Ingersoll, and Woodward had divided
$6,095,319.17 of the public funds between them.
Commenting upon this discovery, the New York _Tribune_ remarks: "Of the
total amount of these warrants, $6,312,541.37, three dependents and tools
of Mr. William M. Tweed deposited $5,710,913.38, and the New York
Printing Company deposited $384,395.19, making $6,095,319.17. Further,
$103,648.68 is believed to have been deposited by Ingersoll in a
different bank, so that the whole amount of the audit, except
$113,583.52, was really collected by persons in connection with or in
collusion with Tweed. Ingersoll collected $3,501,584.50 of the warrants,
and he received from Garvey, out of his collections, $47,744.68. Of that
aggregate he paid over to Woodward $1,817,467.49, or a little more than
half of his whole receipts.
"Garvey deposited warrants amounting to $1,177,413.72. He, Garvey, paid
to Woodward $731,871.01, or over two-thirds of the whole amount of his
receipts. Woodward deposited $1,032,715.76, and he received in checks
from Ingersoll and Garvey enough of these collections to make a total of
$3,582,054.26. Of this amount he paid over $923,858.50 to Tweed.
"Woodward was then, and is now, a deputy clerk to Young of the Board of
Supervisors, on whose certification, according to Mayor Hall's
resolution, as well as on that of Mr. Tweed, the bills were to be paid.
It is unknown to whom Woodward made other payments, but those he made to
Tweed are established beyond doubt. The tickets accompanying the
deposits are in the handwriting of Woodward, and the teller in the
Broadway Bank swore that they were generally made by Woodward in person.
"Including $104,333.64, Tweed received a handsome aggregate of
$1,037,192.14.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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