Chapter 1

Our Waste Basket--Contemporaneous Records and Memoranda of Interesting
Cases,
Miss Ruff's Tribulations,
Astounding Degradation,
Fall of a Youthful, Beautiful and Accomplished Wife,
A French Beauty's Troubles,
Life on the Boston Boats,
An Eighty-year-old "Fence,"
Shoppers' Perils,

AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL

It is to be presumed that the readers of this book will expect a few
words on a subject "on which," as Lord Byron somewhere remarks, "all men
are supposed to be fluent and none agreeable--self." However much the
inclination and, I might add, temptation may run in the direction of
fluency and diffuseness in this case, my utterance shall be as brief as
possible. I, William F. Howe, founder of the law firm of Howe & Hummel,
was born in Shawmut street, in Boston, Mass., on the seventh day of
July, 1828. My father was the Rev. Samuel Howe, M. A., a rather
well-known and popular Episcopal clergyman at the Hub in those days. Our
family removed to England when I was yet very young, and consequently my
earliest recollections are of London. I remember going to school, where
I speedily developed a genius for mischief and for getting into scrapes.
I received a liberal allowance of the floggings then fashionable, and I
can recall the _hwhish_ of the implement of torture to this day. We are
all young but once, and when memory calls up the lively pitched battles,
and the pummelings I got and gave at school, I am young again--only my
waist is a good deal more expansive, my step is not so elastic or my
sight so clear. I could recall the names of some of those boys with whom
I fought in those happy school days, and tell how one now adorns the
British bench, how another holds a cabinet portfolio, how another fell
bravely fighting in Africa, and how several, striving neither for name
or fame,

"Along the cool, sequestered vale of life
Pursue the noiseless tenor of their way";

but it would be useless, as would also my experiences at church,
listening to my good father's sermons, and falling constantly asleep.

My youthful reminiscences of events which happened, and of which I heard
or read in my youth, are mostly chaotic and incongruous; but it is
otherwise with the murders. I remember with what thrilling interest I
read the story of Greenacre, who cut up the body of his victim, carrying
the head wrapped up in a handkerchief, on his knees in the omnibus, and
who was supposed to have nearly fainted with fright when, on asking the
conductor the fare, received the answer, "Sixpence a _head!_" Then there
was the horrible Daniel Good, the coachman at Roehampton, and the
monster Courvoisier, the Swiss valet, who murdered his master, Lord
William Russell. These atrocities and the trials at Old Bailey, no
doubt, gave my mind the bent for the criminal law, not that I was in any
sense conscious of the possession of superior powers. It was merely the
selective tendency of a fresh and buoyant mind, rather vigorous than
contemplative, and in which the desire for a special field of action is
but the symptom of health.

At the age of twenty, I entered King's College, London, with the son of
the great American statesman and historian, Edward Everett, and
succeeded in graduating with some distinction. Soon after, I entered the
office of Mr. George Waugh, a noted barrister. 1 had the good fortune to
meet the commendation of Mr. Waugh, and I was consequently placed at the
head of his corps of assistants, and frequently appeared in the English
courts in place of my employer. My connection with this office lasted
about eight years, and then, in pursuance of an intention long prior
formed and never relinquished, I returned to the country of my birth. My
earliest essays at the American bar have been fairly and impartially
told by another pen, and, as the autobiographical form of narrative has
its limitations as well as its advantages, the reader will pardon me if
in this place I drop the "ego" and quote:

"On arriving here, Mr. Howe entered the office of E. H. Seeley, Esq.,
one of our oldest legal practitioners. Here he remained one year,
studying American law and practice with persistent assiduity, and
frequently appearing in our courts, 'by grace,' until he was fully
licensed. And it may be here stated that out of a list of over one
hundred candidates for admission to the bar only eighteen passed, and in
that number was included the young lawyer from London.

"His first case of importance in this city was one of extreme delicacy,
being a test question as to whether Col. Walter W. Price, a wealthy
brewer, was entitled to the position of Colonel of the First Cavalry
Regiment, N. G. S. N. Y., he having received the _second_ highest number
of votes. Mr. Howe took the ground that his client was entitled to the
office, being a resident of this city, while his competitor, Smith, the
founder of the great umbrella house, who had received the largest number
of ballots, resided in Brooklyn. This question was argued before the
Brigade Court, and, its decision being adverse, Mr. Howe carried the
case to the Court of Appeals, where a favorable decision was rendered,
and Mr. Price duly installed in the position. This was the young
lawyer's first technical victory of note, and it brought him almost at
once into considerable prominence.

"He soon after opened an office at the corner of Chambers and Centre
streets, devoted his entire time and energy to civil matters, was highly
successful, and soon achieved a considerable share of popularity. In
1859, finding himself crowded with business, he removed to his present
large suite of offices on the corner of Centre and Leonard streets,
which had formerly been occupied by the late Judge Russell, and from
that time down to the present he has made criminal matters a specialty.

"Mr. Howe's first appearance in the New York courts as a criminal lawyer
was in 1859. A man, by the name of Devine, had been tried and convicted
in the Court of Special Sessions on a charge of larceny. He took
Devine's case to the General Term of the Supreme Court, contending that
the conviction was illegal, inasmuch as the statute provides that
_three_ justices should sit, whereas at the trial of Devine but _two_
had attended. Many members of the bar laughed at him, declaring his
position untenable. In this he was opposed by Assistant District
Attorney, the present Chief Justice, Sedgwick. The Court decided the
point well taken and ordered the discharge of the prisoner, Devine.

"In defending a German named Jacob Weiler, indicted for the murder of
his wife, by shooting, in 1862, Mr. Howe took the ground that the
deceased shot herself, a discharged pistol being found by her side. This
case was very thoroughly canvassed by the entire press of the city, and
occasioned the greatest excitement among the German population. The
trial lasted eight days, and resulted in a disagreement of the jury. At
this stage of the proceedings, owing to a misunderstanding (which it
would hardly be in good taste to explain at this late day), Mr. Howe
withdrew from the defense. Other counsel were substituted, when the case
was re-tried, and the prisoner was convicted and sentenced to state
prison for life.

"Mr. Howe has tried more capital cases than any six lawyers in America
combined. There has not been a murder case of note for the past
twenty-five years in which he has not appeared as counsel. The records
of the Courts of Oyer and Terminer and General Sessions show that he has
tried more than three hundred homicide cases since the year 1860. Mr.
Howe, as a specialist in diseases of the brain, is regarded by
physicians as the peer of the most eminent alienists in practice."

The circumstances under which Mr. A. H. Hummel became associated with
me, first as an office boy, in 1863, at a salary of two dollars per
week, and subsequently, in May, 1869, as my partner, have been told more
than once in the public press. Mr. Hummel was born in Boston, July 27,
1849; came, with his parents, to this city at an early age; attended
Public School No. 15, on East Fifth street, and made my acquaintance on
a January morning before he was fourteen years old. I have at hand a
newspaper clipping, taken from the Rochester, N. Y., _Democrat and
Chronicle_ of March 25, 1877, in which is printed an elaborate notice of
the law firm of Howe & Hummel, in which the junior partner is thus
characterized:

"Soon after Mr. Howe opened his office, a bright lad, conversant with
foreign languages, applied on a cold January morning, in the year 1863,
for employment, and was accepted. His duties as office boy were to
answer questions, make fires, do errands, and do copying
andtranslations. Such was his winning address, his ready tact, his quick
perceptions, his prudence and discretion, that he not only performed his
duties to perfection but, in his few spare moments, learned law. While
he grew but little in stature, he made great progress in his chosen
profession. As he had fluent command of the German language--a useful
adjunct to the practice of a criminal lawyer in New York--and gave
promise of attaining a high rank as an advocate, Mr. Howe made him his
partner before he was admitted to the bar. To-day, in stature, he is
probably the smallest professional man in America; but size is not 'the
standard of the man,' and if Abe's stature were in proportion to his
merit he would be a veritable giant indeed."

With this sentiment I most cordially coincide, and at the same time
bring these somewhat rambling and discursive reminiscences to an end.

WILLIAM F. HOWE.

DANGER!