Hattie Newberry, the Vermont Beauty

“Society, for the Most Part, Creates the Crimes which it Punishes”—A Beautiful Girl on the Cars from Rutland, Vermont, on the Way to Bellows’ Falls, Beset by New York Rogues—A Detective Recognizes in Her the Former Playmate of his Own Daughter—He Encounters the Rogues at Bellows’ Falls, and Knocks One of them Down in the Ladies’ Room—They All Take the Next Train, and Move Southward, on their Way to New York—Incidents of the Journey—A Third Villain Gets Aboard at Hartford, Conn.—Why Hattie Was Going to New York—An Old Tale—The Detective Gives Hattie Much Good Advice—A Skilful Manoeuvre, on Arriving in New York, to Put the Rogues Off the Track—A Painful Discovery at Last—A Deep, Devilish Plot of the Villains Drives Hattie to Despair, and She is Rescued from a Suicide’s Grave—The Rogues Prove to Be the Most Heartless of Villains, and are Caught, and Duly Punished—Hattie Returns Eventually to Vermont, After Having Married her Old Lover—This Tale is One of the Saddest As Well As Most Interesting of Experiences Throughout

by George McWatters

It was my original intention when I contracted with my publishers for these sketches from my diary, to avoid such narratives as hinged upon matters of love between the sexes, and especially to avoid all those matters of abduction of females for unholy purposes, the detection and exposure of the schemes of procuresses, or the rescuing from a life of infamy girls of respectable parentage and home surroundings, from both the country and city—matters which frequently come into the hands of detectives, and with which old detectives, in particular, are painfully conversant. I could fill a quarto volume with what has come under my own eye of that nature, with recitals far more romantic in their truthfulness than are the cunning devices of the most imaginative novelists. Indeed, the… Read More