National Affairs: Dillinger's Ghost

Sheriffs, deputies, policemen, constables, state troopers, Federal agents, some 10,000 strong, were last week led a merry chase by Desperado John Dillinger and Dillinger's ghost.

¶ In St. Paul police cars roared through the streets hunting for a bandit car reported seen with bullet holes in its windshield and rear windows. ¶In Wisconsin Rapids, Wis., Federal agents swooped down on a hospital to seize Dillinger's pal, George ("Baby Face'') Nelson whose presence was reported by an amateur sleuth. They found the patient to be a traveling salesman for a correspondence school, taken ill on the road.

¶ In Chicago's North Side, police found an abandoned Ford sedan, with blood-stained seats and empty cartridges lying on its floor, identified it as a car seized by the Dillinger gang in St. Paul last month. Promptly they scoured the city, north and south.

¶In Fostoria, Ohio, machine gun bandits headed by a red-haired man raided a bank, wounded five people, got away with $17,299. Said the assistant cashier: 'It was Dillinger without any question." ¶In Mooresville, Ind. Dillinger's home town, two residents reported seeing Dillinger in a car. Federal agents blocked all roads, donned bullet proof vests, took machine guns, raided the Dillinger farm, found Father Dillinger mending a fence.

¶ At Belfast, Northern Ireland, when the Canadian Pacific steamship Duchess of York put in, U. S. Consul General Lucien Memminger went aboard with a party of detectives, searched diligently but vainly for Dillinger.

¶ In Manhattan, Universal Newsreel offered $5,000 award to any one who would give it information leading directly to Dillinger's capture.

¶ In Washington the House of Representatives passed a series of Senate anti-crime bills, including one providing 25 years in jail for robbing a Federal Reserve member bank. Then on their own initiative indignant Representatives passed another bill, authorizing the Attorney General to offer $25,000 reward for the capture of public enemies dead or alive.