The solicitor was usually a very old looking man. This usually worked. If it did not, a messenger boy would show up with a message saying that it must be delivered at once. If this failed, there would come a letter from some prominent institution, sent in an unsealed envelope, addressed to the man offering him a job at an unusually high wage. One or the other of these devices would usually establish touch with the man wanted. It was like changing baits in a trap.
An interesting case was that of Harry W, who was brother of another Mr. W sentenced to the workhouse for violation of the Espionage Act. Harry did not register, but was picked up in the City Council Chamber. He desperately tried to convince the A. P. L. men that he was too old, but the operatives got his birth record and proved that he had wilfully evaded registration. Indicted and sentenced to one year in the workhouse.
A deserter from Camp Sherman, in December, 1917, was located wearing civilian clothes as late as September, 1918. He was hidden by a certain woman, who had secreted his uniform and who had supplied him with liquor repeatedly. We learned that this was an illicit relation. The woman had furnished the man with money from time to time. The A. P. L. took her case up with the District Attorney. The woman is awaiting indictment of a charge of furnishing liquor to a soldier and harboring a deserter. Her lover is back in camp.
The division had a good case on certain German sympathizers believed to be sending certain information to the enemy. A dictaphone was installed in a hotel room which they occupied, and the place was watched day and night for a week. Just at the time when it seemed that some information was going to be reported, a parrot which the people had in the room started to chatter and beat them into the dictaphone. Nothing was discovered at that time and the Chief reports, "I regret we cannot print what came over the dictaphone by the parrot."
Adolph R, a German of the Germans, was within the draft, but resisted in every possible way, and said he would kill any members of the League who came after him. He even called up individual members and told them he was going to shoot them. When an order came he told the A. P. L.
