ON SATURDAY, AUGUST 10, CHRISTIAN AND WALTER RODE THE train to New York City. Christian knew they would be meeting with Superintendent Walling, but he didn’t know why. Even though Christian’s brother Joseph had heard about the Mosher brothers more than a week before, Christian had not been told about them. Walling greeted Christian at his hotel and introduced him to Captain Hedden, who made plans to meet with the Rosses in the morning.
That night, tragedy struck Germantown. In spite of earlier summer rains, a drought had depressed Philadelphia’s rivers, leaving the Wingohocking Creek so parched that it revealed the sharp rocks usually hidden underwater. Staggered storms arrived on Friday, August 9, and when they turned into a steady downpour lasting more than twenty-four hours, the basins overflowed.
Germantown’s home owners had changed the patterns of the town’s streams by digging outlets around their properties, creating man-made angles that trapped branches and dirt during storms. North of the Ross home on Washington Lane, a little bridge crossed a stream called Honey Run. Throughout the storm, gas and water-main pipes trapped driftwood, sand, and trash underneath the bridge piers, and the force of the water unsettled the bridge’s foundation. On Saturday night, a concerned neighbor stood with a lantern near Honey Run. No gas lamps were lit along the route, but the watchman managed to warn an oncoming wagon or two to turn away from the unstable bridge. There was one he couldn’t save: eighty-five-year-old James Sherrard and the fifteen-year-old son of his employer, a boy named Henry Steel, were headed for the train depot. They traveled too quickly to see the lantern or heed the warning; before morning, police joined neighbors in a search for the bodies.
Somebody found the corpse of the drowned horse first. It had been trapped, attached to the buggy, underneath pieces of the bridge. About 250 feet away from the horse, Sherrard’s body had settled against the riverbank. Just before noon, somebody spotted the boy. His hand appeared to be reaching above the water’s surface further downstream, held in place by the ruins of another broken bridge.
Superintendent Walling became so determined to track Charley himself that he tightened the flow of information in his investigation, even instructing Captain Hedden not to tell Christian about the Mosher brothers. Walling wanted to do it himself, but only after Hedden asked Walter to identify a possible prime suspect. The following morning, the Captain took Walter and Christian on a walk outside their hotel. Pointing out a man who stood a short distance away, Hedden asked if Walter had ever seen him before, perhaps in the buggy that carried Charley away.
“No, sir, never,” Walter answered.
Hedden turned to Christian. “I did not think he was one of the persons who took the children, but I wanted to be certain he was not; yet I believe he is connected with the matter, and is in communication with the abductors.” Hedden took Christian and Walter back to police headquarters, where Walling told Christian about Clinton “Gil” Mosher and his brother Bill. Walling also identified the man Captain Hedden had asked Walter about earlier in the day. His name was William Westervelt, and he was Bill Mosher’s brother-in-law.