The Lost Tribe of Coney Island

by Claire Prentice

  After a few minutes’ consideration, Judge Houston announced that he was granting Truman a temporary release on a bond of two hundred dollars. He set the hearing for September 16. Truman signed his bond and the deputy sheriff led him toward a door at the rear of the courtroom. Pinkerton watched the door and waited, assuming they would return shortly, as Truman’s lawyer and bondsman remained in the room.2

  Five minutes passed. There was still no sign of Truman. Alarmed, Pinkerton rushed to the back of the courtroom and wrenched open the door. The showman was nowhere to be seen. His heart pounding, Pinkerton ran out into the hallway and began frantically searching the courthouse. It was useless. Truman was gone.3

  It was a disaster. Pinkerton could not believe that he had made such a rookie mistake. How could he have allowed Truman to get away?

  Pinkerton dashed through the lobby and outside into Adams Street. He ran as fast as his bulk and aging limbs would allow through the corridors of the neighboring Unity Building, sticking his head into every door he passed. He stopped for a moment to get his breath back, then hurried across the street to Kavanagh’s Saloon. The man behind the bar said he hadn’t seen anyone matching Truman’s description. Pinkerton continued on to the Goodrich Transportation Company docks. There he made a thorough search of the cabins and holds of the steamships Virginia and Chicago, the only two vessels that were due to depart that night. Still there was no sign of him. Next Pinkerton went to the Saratoga Hotel and the Grand Pacific Hotel. He examined the registers and talked to the staff, but no one resembling Truman had checked in. At 10:15 p.m., after almost twelve hours of fruitless searching, Pinkerton called off the hunt. Truman had disappeared into thin air.4

  Back in his office, Pinkerton sat at his heavy mahogany desk with his head in his hands. The room was dark and cluttered, its walls hung with family photos and mementos of successful cases. A row of handsome spaniels peered down at Pinkerton from dark wooden picture frames. There had been nothing dogged about the detective’s pursuit of his man that day. Every so often Pinkerton gave a groan. Sitting opposite him, his younger brother, Robert, couldn’t understand how he had let Truman get away. William Pinkerton speculated that the deputy sheriff who had led Truman from court was in cahoots with the showman and had deliberately taken him by the arm to give the impression he was still in custody, thereby giving him chance to escape.

  Just then, the telephone rang. Barker was on the other end of the line and he was in a foul mood. William Pinkerton began apologizing but Barker didn’t want to hear it. He ordered the Pinkertons to watch the depots and docks and scour the city until Truman was found.5

  Barker instructed the Pinkertons to circulate a description of Truman among all their detectives and their many contacts. It read:

  Dr. Truman K. Hunt

  Height: about 5'8"

  Weight: 145 lbs or more

  Age: about 36

  Usually dresses well; good figure and bearing; Dark hair; ruddy complexion; clean-shaven; round pleasant face; somewhat receding chin; somewhat pop-eyed; nervous manner. Has had good education. Drinks and smokes.6

  William Pinkerton mobilized an army of the agency’s best men and stayed out all night combing the city, but Truman was nowhere to be found. Early the following morning, the Pinkerton brothers met in their offices to discuss their next move. Truman might be a master of the disappearing act, but he was an opportunistic amateur compared to the villains in the Pinkerton back catalog. This was the firm that had captured the notorious “Napoleon of crime,” Adam Worth, whose felonies included safecracking, bank and diamond robbery, and the theft of the celebrated Thomas Gainsborough painting Duchess of Devonshire from a London art gallery. After twenty-something years at the helm, the Pinkerton brothers weren’t about to let a two-bit thief and fraudster like Truman ruin their track record.

  When Barker had first encountered Antoinette Funk, he had assumed that as a woman she would be an easy opponent, but she had proved to be “by nature a fighter” and a dirty one at that.7 Whenever Barker and Blum succeeded in finding Truman and having him arrested, Funk arrived to argue some obscure point of law or to apply for another writ of habeas corpus to have him released. Having the showman released on the grounds that he was insolvent was typical of the woman’s strategy. Blum, who had agreed with the government to prosecute all the cases against Truman for a flat fee of five hundred dollars,8 had learned that Truman had already paid Funk more than seven hundred dollars.9 For that money she was presumably prepared to do whatever it took to keep him at liberty.

  Barker and Blum had taken a scattershot approach to securing a conviction in Chicago, lodging dozens of separate actions against Truman in the hope that one would stick. A judge in the civil court had found the showman guilty of embezzling the Igorrotes’ wages and ordered him to pay back ninety-six hundred dollars to the tribespeople.10 But it was an empty victory because Truman had no money to give them. From what Barker heard, Truman’s wife had taken over the role of his banker. Presumably she had tired of her husband squandering their money and of being pursued by his many creditors.11

  Truman had failed to turn up in court when one of the criminal cases had been called, for the theft of seventy-six dollars from Feloa, and had thereby forfeited his bondsman’s thousand dollars.12 Blum was given the option of collecting the bond and dropping the charges, but declined. According to Funk, her client had been detained by business in New Orleans.13 Only weeks later had Barker learned that Truman had indeed been in New Orleans, where he had attempted to earn a quick buck by exhibiting a group of “New Orleans negroes as Igorrotes.”14 According to his source, the public was not fooled and “the show broke up after a few days of unsuccessful endeavor.”15

  Over the many weeks he had spent with the Igorrotes, Barker had gradually gained their trust. From their conversations the government agent compiled a timeline of Truman’s crimes, noting the date and location of each theft and assault. Shortly before Truman gave William Pinkerton the slip, Barker had traveled to Memphis to meet with a prosecuting attorney to discuss the possibility of pursuing larceny charges against Truman for the money he stole from Feloa, Dengay, and Julio in the North Front Street house. The attorney had expressed such confidence that they could secure a conviction that Barker had decided their best course of action would be to drop all the charges in Chicago and move their focus to Memphis. There was one important factor in the case being assembled in Memphis that might make it easier to secure a guilty verdict, and a prison sentence, than in Chicago. Crucially, Truman had used physical force to steal the tribe’s money, making it a criminal offense in Tennessee.16

  The only major difficulty to overcome in the South, reflected Blum, would be “the color of the prosecuting witnesses.”17 Blum had visited Truman’s business associate turned adversary Col. Hopkins in St. Louis. Hopkins didn’t need to be persuaded to testify against Truman, in fact, he’d volunteered for the job. By adding Hopkins and one or two other white-skinned Americans to the list of witnesses, Blum hoped they might be able to overcome any prejudices in the minds of a Memphis jury.18

  The cost of securing an indictment in Memphis was around $120.19 On top of that, there would be the expense involved in taking Truman, under guard, to Memphis. The government had already spent $4,19320 on deporting the Igorrotes who had sailed for the Philippines in July. Added to that would be the legal and detectives’ fees, Barker’s time, and the cost of travel, food, and accommodations for the Igorrotes and all other witnesses. Barker knew the bureau chief was eager to keep further costs to a minimum, and had been relieved when McIntyre had agreed to pursue a prosecution in Memphis. Had Pinkerton only done what he was assigned to do and kept Truman in his sights, the showman would be in Memphis by now awaiting trial.

  At least the five witnesses were happy. Julio, Maria, Feloa, Dengay, and Tainan had been moved to Riverview after their friends departed for the Philippines, and there they were enjoying the company of Schneidewind’s group. Julio and Dengay had been enli
sted to work on a scholarly side project with Antero and some of the others, assisting Dr. Carl Seidenadel, a linguist who had taken up residence in the village, where he was busy compiling a major study of the language of the Bontoc Igorrote tribe. While the Pinkertons scoured Chicago for Truman, the tribespeople, who had grown accustomed to the cruelest treatment, rose each morning to explain the basics of their language to the courteous and studious Seidenadel, who sat all day scribbling feverishly in his notebook. The Igorrotes took comfort in the calm routine of the work, which they found stimulating and rewarding. The witnesses felt content for the first time in months, and stopped nagging Barker about when they were going home.21

  The first American to undertake a major study of the Bontoc Igorrotes’ language had been Albert Jenks, who lived among the tribe in Bontoc pueblo for five months in 1903. In the preface to his book, Jenks had thanked an upstanding public servant named Truman Hunt for his generous help. It was a curious irony that the Igorrotes’ eventful journey around America was bookended by these two scholarly studies. Much had changed in the intervening years, not least that Truman had turned from hero to villain.

  While the Igorrotes helped Seidenadel in Chicago, newspapers across the US reported that a group of Igorrotes had ambushed a party of American soldiers who were shooting the rapids of the Abulung River in northern Luzon on a bamboo raft. Seven Americans were wounded and the party was unable to return fire because the Igorrotes were hidden on the wooded banks of the river. “This outbreak is inexplicable as hitherto the Igorrotes have been peaceable,” wrote the agency reporter in Manila.22

  On September 14, 1906, nine days after he disappeared from right under William Pinkerton’s nose, Truman surprised everyone by showing up in court in Chicago again to answer one of the charges against him. Truman regarded the charge as a relatively minor one and presumed his attorney would have no difficulty in getting him off, or at least having the case postponed. Funk hoped that by dragging the cases out her opponents would tire of trying to prosecute Truman and drop all the charges. Truman was conferring with his attorney at the front of the courtroom when a local sheriff approached them and told the showman he was arresting him under requisition from the governor of Tennessee. Truman reacted angrily. He hated surprises. As he was led from the courtroom, Funk told him that she would have him released in no time.

  On October 10, nearly a month later, Truman was still stuck in his flea-ridden jail cell. The showman’s mood was bleak. The loss of his liberty had hit him hard. He felt permanently on edge and for the first time he had begun to fear that he might be convicted. What little patience the showman had had long since run out. He had given Funk what remained of his fortune. He wasn’t paying her to leave him languishing in a vile jail cell. Sallie had written to him begging for help, describing how she was being pursued day and night by men claiming Truman owed them money. Baby Patty wasn’t sleeping at night and Sallie had no money to pay the rent. Truman needed to get out. He called to one of the guards. The two men had become friendly in the weeks since Truman’s arrest. The showman asked the guard to get word to his attorney that he wanted to see her.

  Truman lay on his mattress, staring at the flaking paint on the opposite wall. He heard footsteps in the distance and the sound of keys. The guard stopped at his cell and unlocked the door. The showman got to his feet, assuming his attorney had at last succeeded in having him released. But instead of Antoinette Funk, a man stood with the guard. In a languid southern drawl, he introduced himself as a sheriff from Tennessee. Truman was getting out of jail but he was not a free man. Handcuffing himself to the showman, the sheriff told Truman that they were going on a journey. They would catch the next train to Memphis.23

  28

  In the Care of the Government

  FORT SHERIDAN, ILLINOIS, OCTOBER 11, 1906

  The barracks at Fort Sheridan army base, Illinois

  THE FIVE FILIPINO witnesses eyed the high iron gates nervously. Fort Sheridan was located thirty miles north of downtown Chicago and was perched high on the bluffs overlooking the steel-gray waters of Lake Michigan. The army base occupied over six hundred acres, its sixty-four buildings linked by landscaped paths and curving roads. The tribespeople looked at the group of soldiers standing guard outside. Feloa said something to the others in Bontoc. Noticing the rifles in the soldiers’ hands, Maria reached forward and tried to loop a protective arm around Tainan, but the boy pushed forward and pressed his face between the bars of the gates. A soldier shouted at him to get back.

  Barker handed an envelope to one of the guards. Inside was a letter of introduction from the bureau, listing the names of the tribespeople who would be staying at the barracks. Since arriving in America they had seen the inside of amusement parks, courtrooms, and squalid cold-water apartments. Now the five remaining members of Truman’s troupe were to become uneasy residents of an American army base. The accommodations weren’t ideal, but Barker needed somewhere cheap and secure to put the Filipino witnesses up in Chicago while they waited for Truman’s trial date to be set in Memphis.

  Though the Igorrotes didn’t know it, they already had a historical connection to the base at Fort Sheridan, which had served as a mobilization, training, and administrative center during the 1898 Spanish-American War. Then it had played a role in delivering the Philippines into American hands. Now it would be the place where five displaced Filipinos would wait it out while the wheels of the American justice system slowly turned.

  The thirty-five tribespeople in Schneidewind’s group had left Chicago on the 6:30 p.m. train the previous night, bound for San Francisco en route to the Philippines. They’d been joined by a woman from Truman’s group, Tanao,1 who had offered to act as a witness but whom Barker had decided they could manage without.2

  That morning, Feloa, Dengay, Maria, Julio, and Tainan had woken up feeling utterly alone. When they appeared in court, they would represent the whole tribe. The weight of getting Truman convicted rested heavily on their shoulders.

  Two and a half months had passed since the other members of Truman’s original group had set sail for Manila. After four hundred and sixty days in the United States, twelve thousand miles by train and sea on the outward journey alone, and thousands of tribal performances before millions of Americans in fifty towns and cities, their financial rewards came to just thirty dollars and eighty-five cents each.3

  Their departure had been celebrated by anti-imperialists, Democrats, and newspaper editorials alike. Together they called for an end to the Igorrote exhibition trade, arguing that the ignorant tribespeople were ripe for exploitation by unscrupulous showmen, “for they are helpless as children in this strange land. Nor is there any good purpose to be served by parading their dog-eating and like barbarous practices before the American public. There is nothing edifying or educational enough in these exhibitions to atone for their evil effects upon the poor savages who are supposed to be the nation’s wards, not its playthings.”4

  The soldier at the gate studied the bureau’s letter and glanced over at the tribespeople. Then he looked down the list of visitors who were expected that day. Sensing an opportunity, Tainan reached over to touch the cannon that stood in front of the gates. The soldier barked at them to enter, giving Tainan the fright of his life. Another man stepped forward and said he would escort them to the barracks.

  He led the Filipinos past a vast oval-shaped parade ground where soldiers were practicing their drills. The parade ground was lined on the south side by barracks, two stories high, which stretched as far as the eye could see, with bachelor officers’ quarters and single-family homes varying in size on the east and north sides. Barker noticed the grim expression on Dengay’s face as he took in their new surroundings.

  Tainan alone was enthusiastic for their new home. The young boy looked up in awe at the huge water tower across from where they stood. It was as tall as a dozen head-hunting watchtowers stacked one on top of the other. The soldier walked over to one of the barracks and pushed the door
open, indicating to the tribespeople to enter. Inside, he pointed to a row of bunks and told the tribespeople to make themselves comfortable. The room was dark and dank, but the Filipinos had grown accustomed to much worse.

  They laid their possessions down on the cold stone floor. On top of their blankets, they piled a small gong, a few pieces of native jewelry, a copy of the Independent featuring an interview with the tribal chief from back when they were at Coney Island, and a postcard showing four Igorrotes posing beside a man dressed as Uncle Sam. It was a pathetic bundle of mementos to show for everything they had endured in America.

  They had their trunks too, though they were in storage and contained little beyond their blankets and extra American traveling clothes. When the rest of Truman’s group left in July, the showman had refused to give back their trunks. Laughing, he had claimed “he had a lieu [sic] on those effects for a breach of contract!”5 How typical of the man. After weeks of searching, the bureau had finally discovered the trunks, only to find that all the locks had been broken and the lid of one was smashed.6 The contents had been rifled through and anything of value stolen.

  In the fifteen months he had had charge of them, Truman had taken everything he possibly could from the tribespeople. As the showman had grown more desperate, the Igorrotes had become increasingly inventive. One of the few times they had succeeded in preventing Truman from getting his hands on their money, they had hidden it inside their ears.7 Barker would not have believed this were possible had Julio not demonstrated how they had done it, rolling the dollar bills tight and packing them into their ear canals. They were lucky they hadn’t damaged their hearing. How desperate they must have been.