June 28, 2025
SOLDIER, SAILOR AND
THIEF, IN THE TOILS.
"BOBBY" WRIGHT, 75, SPENDS
NIGHT IN HOLDOVER.
Built Missouri Telegraph Lines in
1862, Then Was Steamboatman
and Later Noted "Hotel
Worker."
"Bobby" Wright, 75 years old, formerly soldier, sailor and now the oldest sneak thief in point of experience int he world, stayed in the city holdover last night to avoid worse trouble. Wright has been in the city several weeks, but was not picked up by the police until yesterday.
Wright confided to a visitor through the bars last night that he was born in New England, but was brought up in the South. When the civil war broke out, however, he was loyal to the Union and joined the army, becoming a private in the miners and sappers' division of the army. He was assigned to General Lyon's army in Missouri and afterwards under General Fremont.
"I put telegraph wires clear across Missouri in the year 1862," he said.
After the war he became a sailor on a merchant ship and was for ten years a steamboatman on the Mississippi river. Then his criminal tendencies became assertive and he became a professional thief, if the records kept by the police departments of many cities are to be believed.
His advent into this city was in 1882 and he has been a frequent visitor since. On almost every visit he was entertained in the city holdover, and he has frequently been convicted in the municipal court.
Wright is whitehaired, partly bald and has white whiskers. He is stooped and tall. His particular branch of thievery is known as hotel work. He walks into a hostelry, goes upstairs, and when he finds a door unlocked enters the room and makes away with all the valuables he can conceal about his person. This is the police report on Bobby Wright.
"He is one of the cleverest men in the country at his trade," said Inspector of Detectives Edward J. Boyle last night.
Labels: Civil War, crime, hotels, Inspector Boyle, Seniors, telegraph, veterans
