Disputed Handwriting | Page 5

handwriting, and personal
application has demonstrated that the facts and suggestions given will
be found absolutely correct. The aim has been to make this the standard
work on this subject.

In conclusion, the author wishes to acknowledge a debt to the leading
handwriting experts of the United States and Europe for many
suggestions that have materially assisted him in the preparation of this
work. We trust it will prove a material aid to the bankers, business men
and professional men of the United States.
THE AUTHOR.

DISPUTED HANDWRITING
CHAPTER I
HOW TO STUDY FORGED AND DISPUTED SIGNATURES
All Titles Depend Upon the Genuineness of Signatures--Comparing
Genuine With Disputed Signatures--A Word About Fac-simile
Signatures--Conditions Affecting Production of Signatures--Process of
Evolving a Signature--Evidence of Experience in Handling or
Mishandling a Pen--Signatures Most Difficult to Read--Simulation of
Signature by Expert Penman--Hard to Imitate an Untrained Hand--A
Well-known Banker Presents Some Valuable Points--Perfectly Imitated
Writings and Signatures--Bunglingly Executed Forgeries--The
Application of Chemical Tests--Rules of Courts on Disputed
Signatures--Forgers Giving Appearance of Age to Paper and
Ink--Proving the Falsity of Testimony--Determining the Genuineness
or Falsity by Anatomy or Skeleton--Making a Magnified Copy of a
Signature--Effectiveness of the Photograph Process--Deception the Eye
Will Not Detect--When Pen Strokes Cross Each Other--Experimenting
With Crossed Lines--Signatures Written With Different Inks--Deciding
Order of Sequence in Writing--An Important and Interesting Subject
for Bankers--Determining the Genuineness of a Written
Document--Ingenuity of Rogues Constantly Takes New Forms--A
Systematic Analysis Will Detect Disputed Signatures.[1]
[1] Note illustrations of various kinds of forged, simulated, and genuine
handwriting in Appendix, with careful descriptions of same.

The title to money and property of all kinds depends so lately upon the
genuineness of signatures that no study or inquiry can be more
interesting than one relating to the degree of certainty with which
genuine writings can be distinguished from those which are
counterfeited.
When comparing a disputed signature with a series of admittedly
genuine signatures of the same person whose signature is being
disputed, the general appearance and pictorial effect of the writing will
suggest, as the measure of resemblances or differences predominates,
an impression upon the mind of the examiner as to the genuine or
forged character of the signature in question. When it is understood that
to make a forgery available for the purposes of its production it must
resemble in general appearance the writing of the person whose
signature it purports to represent, it follows as a reasonable conclusion
that resemblances in general appearances alone must be secondary
factors in establishing the genuineness of a signature by
comparison--and the fact that two signatures look alike is not always
evidence that they were written by the same person.
As an illustration of the uncertainty of an impression produced by the
general appearances and close resemblance of signatures, even to an
expert observer, is manifested when the fac-simile signatures of the
signers of the Declaration of American Independence, as executed by
different engravers, are examined. On comparing each individual
fac-simile made by one engraver, with the fac-simile of the same
signature made by another engraver, they will be found to exactly
coincide in general appearance as to form and pictorial effect, and so
much so, that the fac-similes of the same signature made by different
engravers cannot be told one from the other. On examining them by the
use of the microscope they may be easily determined as the work of
different persons. While this is likewise true of the resemblances in
general appearance which a disputed signature may have when
compared with a genuine signature of the same person, it is also true
that the measure of difference occurring in the general appearance of a
disputed signature, when compared with genuine ones of the same
person, are not always evidence of forgery.

There are many conditions affecting the production of signatures,
habitually and uniformly apart from the causes which prevent a person
from writing signatures twice precisely alike, under the influence of
normal conditions of execution. The effect of fatigue, excitement, haste,
or the use of a different pen from that with which the standards were
written, are well known conditions operating to materially affect the
general appearance of the writing, and may have been, in one form or
another, an attendant cause when the questioned signature was
produced, and thus have given to the latter some variation from the
signatures of the same person, executed under the influence of normal
surroundings.
In the process of evolving a signature, which must be again and again
repeated from an early age till death, new ideas occur from time to time,
are tried, modified, improved, and finally embodied in the design. The
idea finally worked out may be merely a short method of writing the
necessary sequence of characters, or it may present some novelty to the
eye. Signatures consisting