A Defaulting Banker's Confession.

Evening Star, Issue 8483, 7 April 1891, Page 3

A Defaulting Banker's Confession.

At the Sydney Police Court la3t week Jamee Raworth Bradley, ex-manager of Devonshire street branch of the Eoglißb, Scotlnh, and Australian Chartered Bank, was committed for trial on four charges of forgei y and embezzlement. Daring the hearing of the cases the following letter, which was received in Sydney shortly before Bradley's arre3t, was handed in, and an extract read to support one of the charges. Tne letter was written in an even businesslike hand, and the signature is very distinct and firm, considering the circumstances under which it was written:—

Sydney, February, 1891. The Manager E.S. and A.C. Bank, Sydney. Sir,—Before you receive this you will be aware that another scoundrel has been found among your officers, and that it is I. I am not writing to ask for mercy—l know that it 13 your duty to have me, in common with all other criminals, hauled down and punished. The bitterest punishment is less than I would give myself; the mo3t cruel name is kinder than I have called myrelf for years. I am a criminal, and am a beast hunted and alone, and I would gladly have meted out to myself the heaviest pun'shment that the blaoke3t crime deserves. But I am writing with bitter pain to entreat that you will have mercy and pity on those who are innocent of any Bin or dishonest intent; whose only fault was that they trusted in me. I have no rest, and cannot wait till I declare most solemnly that my assistants in the branch were in no way connected with me, and that my frauds were most entirely without their cognisance and suspicion. Further, had they ever dreamed of the slightest duhonesty or suspected it, they would instantly have reported it to you. I have had a fearful time trying to hide my doings—first with my customers—from my assistant?, from you, from the inspector and his officers, and from my wife. Again, as solemnly as I possibly can, I declare that my manipulations of different amounts are unknown to my assistants, and were worked principally in their absence from the branch, and by lies and misrepresentations of mine. I bad to nee every artifice to cover my dimes and prevent the knowledge of and lies till my life was hateful to me. Have mercy on them, I pray, for they are innocent I only am guilty, aid the experience they are passing through is the best guarantee that they will never be taken advantage of again. And for my poor wife I beg your pity, for she never e<sen guessed at such a dreadful thing until I broke the news of my dishonor and disgrace, May God pity her. I shall never forget her agony of shame and bitter distress. She was insensible for hours, and when she recovered her reason seemed to have left her. I deceived her all through, and had to, or my crimes would have been discovered long ago. She never knew my salary was so small; she always tried in every way to lead a life free from extravagance and debt, and when she heard the awful news her first thought was to part with everything to pay the bank. She refused to take a shilling of the little stock I had by me and asked only two things of me—to give up my intention of putting an end to myself and to send her to Borne place where Bhe would be unknown and perhaps unnoticed. Her misery would appeal to yon could you see it; the ruin of her life and hopes would move yon if yon knew her; and as we must all ask mercy; of the Judge above some day, so I entreat pity for her and annoy her as little as possible, for she never had the slightest knowledge of what was going on. She will never live with me again, and I can never forget her shame and sorrow. My defalcations have been going on for a very long time—some years; and all that time I have suffered the tortures of HelL The first sum was a little over LIOO, and was taken to save one from disgrace for whom I would gladly have laid down my life. There was every chance of repayment; I trusted it would be repaid, but my friend was never able to do so, and I had to take more to cover what was already taken. I did so deliberately, knowing the punishment, and meaning to take my own life when detected. For this purpose I always carried with me a small phial of poison or a loaded revolver, and never

entered the Sydney office or yonr presence or received an inspector's visit without either. I insured my life to cover defalcations to the extent from time to time of about L 7,000, but that would now be only a small portion of my crime. In a vain effoit to recoup myself I entered into rink speculations, and if my partner had not been a fool or a madman we would have done marvellously well, but he imnted on building immense plans and carrying on till the whole thing collapsed, and we lost all. I had to find money to carry on. There was only one way to do !0; I took it. Had I refused, instant exposure and the present disgrace would have been the result. My partner left the coun'tiy penniless. I had lost at the very least L 14.000, though I was too heartsick even to take count of my losses. This amount may seem incredible to you, so I give a few rough particulars t— Stock of skates and fittings for New South Wales and Queensland, L 1.500; alter'ng Exhibition building, Brisbane, and laying floor, L 700; one year's rent, L 300; building Sydney rink, L5,000i two years' ground rent at L6OO a year, LI,200; enlarging and rebuild : Dg Goulburn rink, LI.SCO; enlarging and rebuilding Newcastle rink, L 90 0; ground rent at Newcastle at L 1.200 per year, L 1.600; paid the owners for release to prevent my insolvency, LI,200; paid Skinner's creditors 7s 6d in the £as composition, LBOO. When this awful bubble collapsed I gave up in despair, and only planned from lime to time how to escape my disgiace by death. But deith never came my way, and by the most fearful luaue of lies, perjuries and figures I managed to cloak it over for a time, i hough I knew that some day it must come oat. I became by cods'ant practice an expert forger, and readily imitated signatures in the fixed deposit requisition book, by means of which I obtained many fixed depos r t reoripts. You will find on examination that I have obtained a 1 most all the siolen amounts by false receipts. To get large sums both for this and to make the bus>'ne£3 at the branch to increase by bounds, so as to jusi'fy my remaining there, I had to £,ive excessive interest, &■% much as 7 per cent, and 7£ per cent. Th:s additional money, which I gave in the shape of a bonus, of course I had to find, and I generally kepi about LIOO by me to meet demsnds for interest. . . .

I know I shall be credited with having converted some thousands to my own use, bat I attire you such is not true. That would mike me even a viler thing than I am, for my only care was to hide my frauds sijong as possible, and to give my wife and children as much happiness as I could before the storm burst. At the same t;me I bad to bide i'rom ber any excess of money for feir of arousing any suipicioni. Tou c:n imagine what a hell my mind was, and what 13itare I endured duiing the last th r ce years. Whatever I may have to go through, it cannot be worse than what I have experienced already. A\'2T glvicg particulars of some mining 'nvcsljients, tne letter continues:—"l can make no fuller statsment of my position. I shaU probably have to suffer the punishment of my cr"me3 by a long imprisonment, and I write this impelled by the hope that you wj'l consider .vith mercy the innocent ones I bave already mentioned." A long statement of the names of the psi~ons whose accounts have b en manipulated follows, and the unhappy man concludes :—" These siitemeni3 I declare are coirsct, and I make them to r.~sist you :n your investigations. I am waiting for my fats; lam not try'ng to c scaps it or from my punishment, I no mercy—l deserve none; but I plead, ai some day yon may need mercy yourself, help End spare tho3e I have mentioned, who have been unknowingly affected by my crimer,"