8 h 25 minAudiobook14 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at cost
Audiobook edition · 8 h 25 minPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
A trusted agent reports a huge robbery. What makes Allan Pinkerton doubt his story?
In The Expressman and the Detective, Allan Pinkerton recounts an investigation involving the Adams Express Company. The case begins in 1858, when express companies carry money, bonds, and valuables by rail and coach. An agent reports a robbery, but Pinkerton and his operatives begin to question the account.
Published in 1874, this is the investigation as told by the man who directs it. Pinkerton takes you into a world of patient watching, careful disguise, and slowly earned trust. His proud voice shapes the telling, while the central challenge stays sharp: how do you test a story that sounds convincing?
What you’ll discover
- A story under scrutiny Follow the doubts that turn a trusted agent's report into a case demanding closer attention.
- The discipline of doubt See how checking places, times, and people challenges a comfortable first version of events.
- Disguise and earned confidence Watch operatives work in secret, using patience rather than simply arriving with questions.
- Valuables on the move Enter a world where express companies carry money and bonds across the country.
- Pinkerton in his own words Meet a confident investigator whose account reveals both his methods and his pride.
Who will love it
You will enjoy this if you like true crime, detective methods, disguises and undercover schemes, or nineteenth century America. It suits anyone who likes a case told by the man who solved it.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A trusted agent and a locked pouch
- Pinkerton reads the evidence and names his man
- The mind cannot keep a secret
- Shadowing the agent in a Dutchman's coat
- An old trunk nobody thinks to search
- Jenkintown becomes a stage for detectives
- A marriage notice turns a whole town
- White goes to jail as a pork packer
- A jealous letter and a cellar in Jenkintown
- What the detective believes his work is for
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The Expressman and the Detective
by Allan Pinkerton · 1874
A disguised Dutchman trails an express agent across the South to find forty thousand missing dollars.
Medium level2–5 hours to readEnglish
Excellent
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In short
What do you do when the suspected thief is the most popular man in town, and every detective before you has gone home beaten? That is the problem Allan Pinkerton faces in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1859.
The Expressman and the Detective at a glance
- Reading time
- About 4 h 45 min3 h 45 min fast, 5 h 40 min slow
- Length
- 68,200 words
- Library level
- Medium longer sentences, everyday words
- First published
- 1874by Allan Pinkerton
Reading time at 238 words a minute (fast 300, slow 200). How long the classics take to read · Updated
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A trusted agent and a locked pouch
The story opens in Montgomery, Alabama, where cotton is king. Planters bring their families to town to spend freely and to bank their money. The Adams Express Company carries almost all of it, over every rail, river and stage route in the South.
The system depends on trust and on locks. Each messenger carries a pouch he has no key to. The agent at one end locks it, and the agent at the other end opens it. Nathan Maroney runs the Montgomery office. He is warm, popular and good at his work. His one weakness is a love of fast horses, which brings him into the company of gamblers.
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Which edition is right for me
- 15-minute summary
- The key ideas of the whole book in about 14 minutes. A good first look, or a refresher.
Details
- First published
- 1874
- Language
- English
- Reading time
- 5 h 30 min
- Level
- Medium level
Cite this edition
Pinkerton, Allan. The Expressman and the Detective. Library of Alexandria, 2026, libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-expressman-and-the-detective.
Pinkerton, A. (2026). The expressman and the detective. Library of Alexandria. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-expressman-and-the-detective (Original work published 1874)
Pinkerton, Allan. The Expressman and the Detective. Library of Alexandria, 2026. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-expressman-and-the-detective.
@book{pinkerton2026expressman,
author = {Pinkerton, Allan},
title = {The Expressman and the Detective},
publisher = {Library of Alexandria},
year = {2026},
url = {https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-expressman-and-the-detective},
note = {First published 1874}
}
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What is The Expressman and the Detective about?
It tells how Allan Pinkerton and his operatives investigate the theft of ten thousand and then forty thousand dollars from the Adams Express Company in Alabama, using shadowing, disguises and a woman detective.
Is The Expressman and the Detective a true story?
Pinkerton says it is true and taken from the records of his offices, with only slight embellishment. It was published in 1874 and covers events from 1858 to 1860.
Who is Nathan Maroney?
Maroney is the popular Adams Express agent in Montgomery, Alabama, who is suspected of the thefts. He loves fast horses, lives at the Exchange Hotel and has a wife named Mrs. Maroney and her daughter Flora.
The author
Allan Pinkerton
1819–1884 · Scottish-American detective and memoirist
Allan Pinkerton (1819–1884) was born in Glasgow, Scotland, and moved to the United States in 1842. He founded a detective agency in Chicago in 1850 and worked for the Union during the American Civil War. He wrote The Expressman and the Detective, published in 1874. He died in Chicago.
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