THE BROOKLYN BARBER WHO BURGLED (1904)
Brownstone Detectives investigates the history of our clients’ homes.
The story you are about to read was composed from research conducted in the course of one of those investigations.
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Abe Miller was fond of burglary.
You might say that it was in his bones. He could not resist it any more than a child could resist candied apples at the fair. He burgled countless Brooklyn and Manhattan homes – more, certainly, than he was ever tried and convicted for – crossing the North River, at times, to burgle still more in New Jersey.
Miller, aka Abram Miller, aka Abram Skudden, aka Abe Skudin, &c., &c., &c…was a burglar, though, of little note. As his life of crime ran from the early 20th century through 1940, he had been caught, convicted, and sentenced many times over.
But he never reformed.
GETTING MARRIED, ARRESTED, & DRAFTED
Researching people who are long dead is like putting together the pieces of a puzzle that you find between the cushions of a couch – the pieces are a little dusty, some are broken, and usually they are not all there. In the end, if you do not have the puzzle’s box top, you are left to guess at what the whole picture looks like.
This was the case with “Abe Miller.”
THE PART ABOUT GETTING “MARRIED” & “DRAFTED”
Miller first shows up in government records in 1904 when he married Lena Silverman 14 August on Manhattan. Both were from Russia, the two remaining “aliens” into their later lives. The couple lived at 431 Blake Avenue, in the Brownsville section of Brooklyn, at least from 1918, when he showed up to register with his local draft board for the Great War.
On that document a member of the draft board has noted, “This man declared himself but his first and second paper are refused to him by the gov’t on acc’t of a criminal action.”
On that record, he lists himself as a “Barber,” showing that he worked in “Asbury Park, Monmouth NJ.” His daily one-way commute of some 64 miles indicates a few possibilities: 1) He lived in Asbury Park during the time of the week that he was working there as a barber, 2) he did not really work in Asbury Park, giving a fictitious address to show that he was working when he really was not, and/or 3) he worked only part-time as a barber, working the rest of the time in a profession that also began with a “B.”
THE PART ABOUT BEING “ARRESTED”
In one description of his activities, in a 1921 edition of “Finger Print Magazine,” one of Miller’s burglary sprees is depicted and his modus operandi described:
“During the spring of 1911 there were many flat burglaries in Newark and on June 24, 1911, Abe Miller, alias Skuden, was arrested on suspicion and his impressions were identified as those secured in two of the apartments robbed, and on November 24, 1911, he was tried and convicted and sentenced to 8 to 17 years State prison, Trenton, N.J., by Judge Thomas A. Davis, Newark, N.J., Essex County. Sentence upheld by upper courts.”
He served the lower end of that amount of time, as it was just seven years later that he appeared at his draft board along with his “criminal record.”
THE PART ABOUT THE FINAL ARREST
Miller’s career, though, seems to have ended around 1940 when he was about 65. At that time, he was caught after breaking into a home on East 26th Street.
When they ran Miller’s prints, they realized that they had a bail jumper on their hands. Miller, apparently, had been convicted of burglary ten years earlier after having been captured while emerging from a house on East 4th Street.
You see, Abe Miller was fond of burglary.
THE MUGSHOTS
Enjoy the time lapse progression of mugshots (courtesy of the NYC Department of Records). Let them be a lesson to those of you skirting on the wrong side of justice….
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Brownstone Detectives is an historic property research agency. Our mission is to document and save the histories of our clients’ homes. From our research, we produce our celebrated House History Books and House History Reports. Contact us today to begin discovering the history of your home.
