I’m curious, does anyone here know of any documented instances in which the “Spanish Prisoner” swindle [1] was used (or at least attempted) before, say, 1875? I’d love to hear about its appearance in North America and Europe (and elsewhere, of course) before that point.
Any press clippings of the time? Surviving letters themselves? Entries in diaries or notations in memoirs that may have been written before the end of the 19th century?
– Tammi Terrell
[1] The “Spanish Prisoner,” that grandfather to the modern 419 advance-fee fraud, has a fairly well-defined format. The scam, which was always conducted by exchange of letters, relied on convincing the mark that his aid was needed in securing the release of a prisoner (often Spanish and usually a stranger to the mark) who not only is languishing in a foreign jail, but who also has access to a vast, though well-hidden fortune that he is willing to share with some trustworthy and helpful soul. (Sometimes the con man casts out to the mark an additional lure, the mention of the prisoner’s lovely – and motherless – young daughter.)
The “Prisoner” and its cousin, the “Estate Swindle,” coexisted in the United States and England (and probably on the continent) in the late 19th century and well into the 20th. The latter, which was also carried out through the exchange of letters, involved duping marks into believing they may be heirs to unclaimed fortunes left by ancestors back in the old country.