ROBBERY AT THE CUSTOM HOUSE.

Evening Post, Volume XV, Issue 285, 5 December 1877, Page 2

ROBBERY AT THE CUSTOM HOUSE.

A most impudent robbery was committed at the Custom House last night. Sotno rooms on the upper floor of that building are occupied by Captain Edwin, R.N., as an office for tho storm-signal department, for examination of candidates for masters' and mates' certificate, and for rating of chronometers. This office is accessible at any time by a staircase at the back of the main building. At the top of the staircase is a door which, it appears, is always left unlocked. Through this entrance the thief apparently must have found admittance. On Captain Edwin going to his office this morning, he at once noticed " a confounded smell of gas," and soon discovered that one of tho burners had been turned on since he was in the office last, and then only partially turned off) allowing the gas to escape for some hours. Half burnt matches were scattered about, and a meteorological form which he left lying on the table had been torn in two, one Diece evidently being used as a torch to light the robber at his unhallowed midnight task. On making a search Captain Edwin found that a fine swing mercurial barometer, used by him in his observations, had been wrenched violently from its fastenings, tho thief in his hurry having failed to notice that he could have lifted it out of the frame without any of the labor it must have cost him to tear the strong brass bar in two. Two other barometers hanging by its side were left untouched, the thief seemingly being aware that they were out"of order, and consequently useless. A valuable chronometer, left at the office for rating, was also carried off, two others being generously left behind by the robber, who also kindly abstained from carrying off the office tables and chairs, the cupboards and window sashes. It is not definitely known yet, however, how far his depredations extended, but Captain Edwin has given information to the police who anticipate the speedy capture of tHe culprit.