NYKINGS-L Archives

From:
Subject: Charles LISPENARD, Brooklyn kidnapped age 6 1863 > discovered in Logansport IN in 1889
Date: 10 Dec 2004 11:51:43 -0700

This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list.

Surnames: Lispenard, Allen
Classification: Biography

Message Board URL:

http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/rw/RUB.2ACI/4400

Message Board Post:

Trenton Times (Trenton, New Jersey) > 1889 > January > 7

AFTER TWENTY-FIVE YEARS.

A Brooklyn Boy of 6 years Abducted and Sold in Indiana for $25

One bleak evening in the fall of 1863 a small boy, 6 years of age, was hurrying through a street in Brooklyn with a basket of shavings on his arm, which he had obtained at a factory near by. As he ran ... he was seized by a big, burly man, hurried into a cab and driven swiftly away. All night long the mother of the kidnaped boy wrung her hands in grief, for the police, who had been notified of the little fellow's disappearance, brought no tidings to give her joy. Days, weeks, months and years went by. The mother had a good living and spent hundreds of dolalrs in search of her missing boy. She finally settled in the belief that he had strayed away and fallen off the pier.

Meanwhile Charlie, for that was his name, was brought to Indiana with a score or more of other children, and all were disposed of at various prices to cover expenses. Charlie fell into the hands of a farmer named ALLEN, who resided in Benton county. Allen paid the agent $25. The farmer was gruff and mean, and his wife was very unkind. [Charlie] ran away from his cruel home to go he knew not where. He set out and managed to get as far as Lewisburg, in the eastern part of Cass county. He was overtaken and returned to Farmer Allen. Allen and his two sons took the determined lad to the barn and hanged him with a rope by the neck. Neighbors interfered and Charley's life was saved. Allen and both his sons were sent to the penitentiary for attempting murder.

That was over twenty years ago. After that Charlie had many homes. He finally drifted to this city. He was married and settled in a comfortable home, and the husband and father was a constant student of the Bible and hoped to enter the ministry. One day a gentleman whom he had known in Benton county approached him and said: "Your name is not Charlie ALLEN. It is Charles LISPENARD, and your people live in Brooklyn, New York." The gentleman would say nothing more and left.

The name sounded peculiarly strange now, and revived memories that had slumbered long. A young lawyer, who resides in a suburb of Brooklyn, made search, but could find no person by the name of LISPENARD. He found that a family had lived in a certain ward there but had moved away long since. With this much as a starter, the record of the ward school was examined for the year 1863. There was the name Charlie Lispenard. Citizens were found who remembered the circumstance. It was also learned that a brother of the missing boy had lived in the ward until he was a young man.

By diligent inquiry George W. LISPENARD was found occupying a position of trust in a large jewelry store in Brooklyn. He had often heard his mother bemoaning the sudden and strange loss of her boy, who was two years older than George.

The story ws quickly told to the mother. In the joyful hope of discovering a long lost son and brother each wrote a letter detailing little incidents of the missing boy's childhood. The identity was completely established. Charles L. ALLEN is the abducted Charlies LISPENARD. Mr. Allen LISPENARD at once left for Brooklyn, and there was a meeting that brought joy too full and too deep to be measured by words. --Logansport (Ind.) Cor. Cincinnati Enquirer.

This thread:

• Charles LISPENARD, Brooklyn kidnapped age 6 1863 > discovered in Logansport IN in 1889 by