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Adventures of Harry Newcomer.
A scout and spy in the Army of the Cumberland.
Among the many spies and detectives employed by the commanders of the
Union armies, in procuring information concerning the condition, purposes, and position of the enemy, or the evil deeds of rebel sympathizers, none perhaps, has passed through more interesting adventures, than he whose name appears at the head of this sketch.
We have compiled from the police record of the “Annals of the Army of the Cumberland,” the following history of some of his adventures and escapes.
Harry Newcomer is a native of
Pennsylvania, and was born in
Lancaster county, in March, 1829.
He was born and brought up in a hotel, and was employed as a bar tender in his boyhood.
At the age of fourteen, his mother died, and his father broke up housekeeping, and soon afterward he was apprenticed to a miller in
Ohio.
After serving out his time, he continued for some years in the business, until his brother-in-law was elected sheriff of
Ashland county, Ohio, when he was appointed one of his deputies.
In 1857, he removed to
Cleveland, and was employed by United States Marshal
Jabez Fitch, as a detective officer.
He retained this situation for about three years, and was successful in ferreting out and bringing to punishment a number of noted cases of crime, especially of counterfeiters.
At that time the authorities had ascertained that a large business was done in the manufacture and sale of counterfeit money in
Geauga county, Ohio, but all attempts to obtain any positive evidence to fasten the guilt upon the suspected
