Case ID: howell-np_1/html/0161-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
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Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Superior' Court of Detroit
    
    HUGH S. PEOPLES vs. THE EVENING NEWS.
    
      Brief Beferenae to the Case — Opening Address to the Jury of Ool. John Atkinson, Attorney for the Befenda/nt.
    
    This was an action brought to recover damages for an alleged libel, which consisted in the publication of an article by defendant, which, plaintiff claimed, contained a charge_ that he was guilty of the murder, of Martha Whitla.
    Probably no case was ever tried in Detroit that attracted more or wider attention, not excepting the Railroad conspiracy and the Ward will cases.
    Of the opening speech to the jury of Col. John Atkinson, attorney for the defendant, which follows, it was generally remarked at the time it was delivered that it was one of the greatest forensic efforts in this country, in this generation.
    In the several trials groAving out of the Whitla murder, Maj. Geo. H. Penniman, attorney for Peoples in the Evening News case; Judge C. I. Walker, of counsel on the same side; Hon. Geo. V. N. Lothrop, counsel for the Post and Tribune, which Peoples also sued on a similar charge, and who was with Col. Atkinson in the NeAVs case; James Caplis, prosecuting attorney, and Geo. F. Robison, assistant, who, with Hon. Alfred Russell, conducted the prosecution of Peoples on a charge of murder in the Recorder’s Court; and Hons. W. C. Maybury and John D. Conely, who defended and procured the acquittal of Peoples in the same case : — all these distinguished counsel made speeches that were equal to the occasion, and we would gladly reproduce them all, but they would fill the whole book.
    The trial of the Peoples-News case resulted in a verdict of no cause of action, which was affirmed by the Supreme Court, (51 Mich.)
    OPENING ARGUMENT TO THE JURY BY COL. JOHN ATKINSON.
    May it Please the Court and Gentlemen oe the Jury:
    It has become my duty in this case to state to you the evidence which we expect to introduce to sustain the defense, and I join with counsel for the plaintiff in the request that he made to you that you prepare yourselves to consider the absolute rights of the parties.
    I desire at the outset that you should remember who brings this suit and against whom it is brought. This is a suit in ■ which Mr. Peoples seeks to recover large damages on account of some supposed injury to his reputation. It is brought against the Evening News association, a corporation acting under the laws of this State.
    You must bear in mind precisely what a newspaper is in the days in which we live, in order to judge properly in this case. Our great newspapers, I might premise, are
    THINGS OE MODERN GROWTH.
    Two hundred years ago such a thing as a daily was unknown to the world. In those days intelligence was very little spread among the people. We can scarcely form a conception, in looking over the history of those times, of the rapid growth that has since taken place, and which is presented in almost its full development at the present day. The great Battle of Waterloo only occupied half a column in the London Times, while the little warfare between the Boers and the British soldiers away in South Africa was published sooner in England than the news of Waterloo, and occupied an entire paper as they are now published. The cause of this growth is that since newspapers were started — the first newspaper in England being published in 1665 — there has been a continual extension of the freedom of the press to express their ideas upon all public questions. As late as the reign of Charles the Second it was decided by the twelve justices of England, at the head of whom sat the immortal Chief Justice Scroggs,
    WHOSE NAME HAS BECOME INFAMOUS
    to every student of history, that it was a crime to publish any news without the license of the king. From that day the license has gradually been extended to the press, till now we live in a time when it is supposed that the press may comment freely upon, and publish freely all public transactions.
    I will call your attention for a moment, that we may contemplate the change in this respect, to a statement of Macaulay as to what a paper was in 1665. Speaking of the newspapers of these times, he says:
    “None of these was published of tener than twice a week. None exceeded in size a single small leaf. The quantity of matter which one of them contained in a year was not more than is often found in two numbers of' the Times. After the defeat of the wliigs it was no longer necessary for the king to be sparing in the use of that which all his judges, had pronounced to be his undoubted prerogative. At the close of his reign, no newspaper was suffered to appear without his allowance; and his allowance was given exclusively to the London Gazette. The London Gazette came out only on Mondays and Thursdays. The contents generally were a royal proclamation, two or three tory addresses, notices of two or three promotions, an account of a skirmish between the imperial troops and the Janizaries on the Danube, a description of a highwayman, an announcement of a grand cock fight between two persons of honor, and an advertisement offering a reward for a strayed dog. The whole made up two pages of moderate size. Whatever was communicated respecting matters of the highest moment was communicated in the most meager and formal style.”
    NOT IN ACCORD WITH PROGRESS.
    I call your attention to this, gentlemen, from the fact that it was under a system-that promoted such newspapers as Lord Macaulay described, that many of the decisions were rendered which will be cited in favor of the plaintiff in this case. They are decisions which are not adapted to our times, which are not in accord with the progress we have made. I call your attention to the newspaper press of England at a later period. After showing its great growth since the revolution, Lord Macaulay says:
    “ Some weak men had imagined that religion and morality stood in need of the protection of the licenser. The event signally proved that they were in error. In truth the censorship had scarcely put any restraint on licentiousness or profaneness. The Paradise Lost had narrowly escaped mutilation; for the Paradise Lost was the work of a man whose politics were hateful to the ruling powers. * *' * * Prom the day on which the emancipation of our literature was accomplished the purification of our literature began. That purification was effected, not by the intervention of senates or magistrates, but by the opinion of the great body of educated Englishmen before whom good and evil were set, and who were left free to make their choice. During a hundred and sixty years the liberty of our press has been constantly becoming more and more entire, and during those hundred and sixty years the restraint imposed on writers by the general feeling of readers has been constantly becoming more and more strict. At length even that class of works in which it was formerly thought that a voluptuous imagination was privileged to disport itself, love songs, comedies, novels have become more decorous than the sermons of the seventeenth century. At this day foreigners, who dare not print a word reflecting on the government under which they live, are at a loss to understand how it happens that the freest pregs in Europe is the most prudish.”
    I read this to you, gentlemen of the jury, to show that in the opinion of the great thinker, Lord. Macaulay, the greater the freedom extended to the press the purer literature it produced.
    We must remember, gentlemen of the jury, that the ¡men of these times are not satisfied with such a paper as that described in the extract I first read to you — the paper of 1665.
    THE NEWSPAPER OE TO-DAY.
    We aslc, with oUr morning coffee, news from every part of the world. We want to know of all the battles that have taken place. We want to know of all the contests that are going on. We want to know every step of progress that is being made from one end of the world to the other. We expect it from the papers every morning, so that it is impossible that editors or reporters should deliberate, as philosophers and authors do, before they give us the news. But there is another thing that we expect especially from them. We expect not only that they will bring to us foreign news, but that they will comment freely upon everything passing at home ; that they will comment on the acts of the government of the United States, the acts of the government of the State, on the acts of the county authorities, the State authorities, and all other persons in authority. That they will lay before their readers all disorders that are prevailing in the community; that crimes may be published that they may be detected and punished. Starting out with the idea that this is the office of a newspaper, let us look into this case.
    WHAT SÍUST BE PROVED.
    It is alleged in the declaration here that the plaintiff was a good and reputable citizen, respected by all his neighbors, and that the Evening News, greatly envying his happy state, through malice, determined to destroy his reputation. This is the allegation that is made, and before you can render any verdict in his favor,■ it is necessary that you should arrive at the conclusion that these allegations have been proven; first that the plaintiff was a good and reputable citizen guilty of no fault, and second that the Evening News association, this incorporation, looking upon him, envied his happiness and determined through malice to destroy it.
    It has been well said by the learned counsel for the plaintiff that a corporation cannot be guilty of any malice, and the only malice that can possibly be proved in this case must be the malice of the agent; and as we go on, gentlemen of the jury, we will see whether that is in any sense proved.
    “the bag mystery.”
    0.n the 13th of March, 1879, two young men were passing down the river, and hear Clark’s dry dock discovered some object in the stream. They approached it and found it to be the. body of a woman tied up in' some sort of burlap. The limbs were tied up to the breast, there was a piece of linen tied across the mouth, apparently to drown the cries of the poor girl as she was thrown into the river. The doctors examined the body on the beach where these young men had drawn it out. It was taken from there to the. public undertaker’s, and for some days exposed to the. public sight.
    The first great question, when the body was discovered, was, who was the girl? The question was very natural. There lay the body of the woman, bearing upon it all the marks of a deliberate murder. There was no chance for a mitigating thought. There was no chance for accident. Everything showed murder, and murder committed with the most deliberate intent. It was not one of those cases where reason is dethroned, and through passion a person is killed¿ This girl bore upon her body the marks of deliberation, the marks of cruelty, the
    MARKS OF A. HORRIBLE DEATH.
    She lay there for what purpose? To have some one identify the remains. How should they be identified? How should the public know the facts? In our busy times, in such a city as this, we pay little attention to the suffering of others. But there was one great agent which has sprung up in modern times, one great way of reaching the people of this city, and the people of this State, and the people of this country, and that was to publish all that had been discovered upon this dead girl in the daily papers. The great dailies of this city came to the rescue of society in the work of identifying this body. They published all that Was known; a description of the clothing, a description of the trinkets that were taken from her pockets, and everything that could possibly lead to her identification. They kept publishing it from day to day, calling public attention to it, crying, as it were, to the four winds of heaven, saying to everybody,
    “come and identify this dead girl!”
    People stood around her, as my learned friend, Maj. Penniman, has most eloquently expressed, asking, with the poet:
    “Where was her home?
    Who was her father?
    Who was her mother?
    Had she a sister?
    Had she a brother? ”
    And I will take the freedom of furnishing him with the three remaining lines from the same poet:
    “Or was there a dearer one Still, and a nearer one Yet, than all other? ”
    These were natural questions. They were questions that every one looking upon that body must naturally ask, because I take it that in a community like this the life of a woman should not be taken thus ruthlessly and no inquiry made as to who were the murderers.
    These, gentlemen of the jury, were questions that were asked. How should they be answered? The only way of reaching the public, as I have said to you before, was to publish all the facts in the daily papers, and the publication brought a train of observers to look upon that dead girl that furnishes
    
      A PICTURE WE SHOULD NEVER DISMISS
    from our mind. Brothers came from distant States to look into that dear dead face, to see if they could discover there any trace of their own lost sisters. There • were old couples marching by in that procession, peering into those shapeless eyes in a way that told too truly the. story of their own misfortunes. Now and then a hardened criminal passed along the line to see whether it was one of his victims that the waters had surrendered up, or the victim of some one else. In the train of observers, if we are correctly informed, this plaintiff passed, but what his object was it will remain for you to say after we offer the proofs. I speak now only as I am told by a witness.
    For several days, as I have told you, that body lay there awaiting recognition. She had been so long in the water that her face was a mere mass of decaying flesh. There was nothing by which she could be identified, unless possibly by her clothing or the trinkets that remained.
    She was not identified, and she was finally buried as unknown, and it seemed for a time as if this was one more of the mysterious deaths that occur too often in our midst, a mysterious murder, whose perpetrator had done his work so well that detection seemed impossible.
    The watchers who had stood about her lifeless form returned to their callings. The public undertaker,. I suppose, collected his bill, as he does in all these cases. Society drew a long breath, and seemed to fancy it had done its duty. What more could be done? What other agency was to be found than the publication made by the newspapers to ferret out this terrible crime?
    
      THE DEAD IDENTIFIED.
    About thirteen months later a woman living in the western part of the city was talking to a neighbor, and in some way the article published in one of these papers was brought to her attention. She was told that among the trinkets found upon the girl was a thimble marked “ M. W.” This woman was Mrs. Canton, whose name has frequently occurred in the testimony already given. Mrs. Canton recognized the initials “ M. W.” as the initials of Martha Whitla. She immediately came down to the police, looked at the thimble, looked at the clothing, and recognized them as the- property of the dead girl. She had seen her sew with this thimble a thousand times in her daily contest for bread. She recognized these articles thirteen months after. the girl had been buried, as the property of Martha. Whitla.
    The seed sown by the press had, as you will see, now begun to bear fruit. We knew one fact more than we knew to begin with. We knew before only the horrible fact that a murder had been committed. We had now the fact that the murdered girl was Martha Whitla, and who was Martha Whitla?
    The police of the city, with a vigilance that was becoming to them, immediately started on the scent. The name was all they had to begin with. Reporters of the newspapers, equally vigilant, and, as I hold, equally bound to the public, started also on the scent. The first we could learn of Martha Whitla was that she was left without a mother when two weeks old; that her father died before she was quite three years old. Left without a mother when two weeks old,
    
      THIS LITTLE ORPHAN GIRL
    had grown up to womanhood, and finally found her grave in the river that passes by our city.
    I can imagine, gentlemen of the jury, as the mother kissed that baby for the last time, and left her to the pity and charity of this world, that she might have thought with confidence that if this, her offspring, was ever ruthlessly murdered, society would punish the criminal.
    Martha’s life as a little girl we know little of. We only know that when she was nearly three years old she was adopted by Mr. John Whitla, who will be put upon the stand, and will tell you what you may desire to know, and what his honor will think admissible, of this girl’s life. She went to school, and her life passed in a commonplace sort of way, as far as we can learn. She learned rapidly, became very much esteemed for her neatness and industry, and seems to have formed some very firm friendships in her school days. When she was was about fifteen or sixteen she came to this county. Her sister, Mrs. Peoples, had come to this county before, married William Peoples, and went back to Ohio on a visit. Martha came to assist her in her household duties. So she came here, as near as we can ascertain, in 1865. At the home of William Peoples she first met the plaintiff in this case. She was then a girl' of sixteen. He was a young man of twenty, a young man whose education had been somewhat neglected, but who was bright, rather gallant and good looking. They seemed to have made a good impression upon each other. Shortly afterwards he went to Lake Superior to work.
    
      We are enabled, gentlemen of the jury, to get glimpses into their inner lives from letters which he wrote to her while on Lake Superior. Thei'e are a number of letters which will be exhibited to you. I will not attempt to read them now, because I think the better practice is to wait until they are offered in evidence, so that counsel may inspect them and object to them if they see fit.
    HUGH PEOPLES’ LETTERS TO MARTHA WHITLA.
    The first letter is written on the steamer when he goes up. The next follows shortly afterwards, and so they continue, showing that a continuous correspondence was kept up between Hugh S. Peoples and Martha Whitla from the day he left William Peoples’ till the time he returned. These letters, gentlemen of the jury, are not open avowals of love, but they contain those little delicate expressions of esteem and respect, which are even more powerful on the mind of a girl of that age than open avowals of love. They show izz fact that he was anxious to make her believe that he loved her, and anxious to make her love him in return. In one of these letters he mentions the fact that he had somewhere heard sung her favorite song, “Father, Dear Father, Come Home.” He describes the scene to her; how the little one pleads with her dr unken father to go home with her, to come away from the poisonous cup, and how the father lingers there, still unable to go. I can imagine, gentleznen of the jury, and I think you will follow me in the thought, when this girl read that letter, the feeling that must have possessed her soul. She said to herself: “I have impressed upozz this man a part of my own virtue. I have filled his heart with a holy sentiment, and although far away he sends me a greeting; that he is humming my favorite song; that he has listened to it with pleasure because it is my favorite song.” Before he went away he evidently presented her with the accordeon which is here mentioned, and with some other tokens of his affection and regard. In the last letter he tells her he is coming home. It is addressed to William Peoples, Mrs. William Peoples and to Martha, all the three, and we find it in poor Martha’s trunk. No doubt to William it was a mere message from his brother; no doubt to Mrs. Peoples it was a mere message from her brother-in-law; but to Martha it was a part of her lover, a part of the work of his hands, and she folded it to her heart and laid it away. Poor girl! She little thought that these missives that she was then putting away in her trunk should ever be used on such an occasion as this, as a proof of her lover’s perfidy, as the proof of her lover’s cruelty, as
    THE BBOOB 0E HEB LOVEB’S CBIME.
    He came home, and soon after his return the relations between them seem to have entirely changed. They met as lovers beyond all question. They went to dances together, they sang together, they went where young people usually go together; and in some unfortunate moment Martha surrendered her virtue to this plaintiff, and then all was changed. I say this, gentlemen of the jury, and we will prove it, not merely by the lips of living witneses, but we will prove it, I am sorry to say, by the handwriting, the letters of Hugh S. Peoples found in Martha Whitla’s trunk after her identification. From that time on his attachment for her entirely ceased. It was the old story over again of Amman and his sister Tamar. You remember that when King David’s first-born had ravished his sister whom he dearly loved, he immediately began to hate her as deeply as he had loved her before, and the girl that he had professed the holiest affection for he ordered from his door, and told his servants to bar the door behind her. It was so with Hugh S-Peoples. Prom the moment this girl yielded to him her all, she became more clinging and more affectionate, while he became cold and anxious to get rid of her, yet unable to resist the impulses of his passion and lust. This second series of letters are all upon one subject. They appoint places of assignation, places where he shall meet her; places where he thinks they will be safe from the observation of his friends ; they are full of caution to her to be wary of the steps she takes, to be careful not to permit other people to know where she was going. In other words he guards his own reputation at the same time he gratifies his passion.
    It is true, gentlemen of the jury, in law as well as in philosophy, that a woman who has yielded herself in this way becomes reckless; she scarcely cares who knows how deeply she has sacrificed herself to the man she loves. She has sacrificed everything; she can look for nothing more. She has hot only lost her position in this life, but her hope of happiness in the next; while, on the other hand, under
    OTJIÍ PECULIAR CIVILIZATION,
    the man who has seduced her may yefc hope to marry a good and virtuous woman, and be regarded as a respectable and honest citizen. So it was in this case. Martha seems to have become rather reckless in her manner; and the plaintiff, who was still ambitious for a position in life, cautions her to be very careful of every step she takes in meeting him, in what she says about it, etc.
    We shall show this as supplementary to the testimony introduced, in addition to what you have already heard. We now have the testimony of his brother and his sister that if there was any correspondence between them it was unknown to the family, so that all this letter writing, all this correspondence, seems to have been clandestine, seems to have been secret, seems to have been with a purpose.
    Hugh S. Peoples, after his return from Lake Superior, worked a while in Detroit, and to Detroit came poor Martha. Hugh S. Peoples went from Detroit to Wyandotte; to Wyandotte went Martha. Hugh S. Peoples went out to Ypsilanti to school, and to Ypsilanti went Martha. She was
    THE SHADOW OE IIIS EIEE.
    He could no more get rid of her than he could get rid of the stain which the sin he had committed had made upon his soul. She followed him from place to place, and his life became one series of amours and assignations. After he came from school at Ypsilanti some little time elapsed. He came into Detroit and there set up housekeeping. Martha became his housekeeper, and, gentlemen of the jury, we shall be able to show you, I. think, by testimony of which you can have little doubt, that during the period she was. his housekeeper, she was recognized by many as his wife; that she was known in the neighborhood as Mrs. Peoples, that they lived together for years in open and shameless fornication. Neither of them being married the legal crime of adultery was not committed.
    THE CRIME OE ABORTION.
    In spite of their wishes their intercourse became-fruitful, and in these letters which we will read to you there are directions from Hugh S. Peoples to Martha, telling her how she may dispose of the offspring which she carried in her womb; in other words how she may have abortion committed. There is the enclosure of the filthy fee of $5, which seems to be enough to buy some ruffianly doctor of medicine to commit this horrible crime in this community.
    Now, gentlemen of the jury, we want to lay these facts before you and ask you to reflect upon them. The passions which God has given us, when properly exercised, are the sources of our holiest feelings. They inspire us with a love of home, a love of children, a desire for offspring. Under their influence a man approaches the woman of his choice almost like a god. To them is given the awful power to call a mortal soul from heaven, to clothe them with their own flesh and to stamp upon them their own peculiarities; but the man who approaches a woman with felon’s step, with bated breath, fearing detection, listening to every sound, that man walks with devils, and, although living,
    HAS ALREADY TASTED HELL.
    It was in -this spirit that Hugh S. Peoples approached Martha Whitla night after night, for many long and weary years. But a time came when he was anxious that this relationship should cease, and from one of these letters it would seem as though they determined to have it cease at one time and determined that they should see each other only in the presence of a third party, Mr. Stringer. But if that determination was ever made, it was soon broken. He resolved to get married, and before he could get married some kind of truce had to be patched up with Martha Whitla. What kind of truce would that be ? I know not what passed between them. The lips of Martha Whitla are forever sealed. - The plaintiff is not likely at this time to give us a statement of it upon which we could rely. The result was, however, that he gave her a note for $400 just before his marriage; and gentlemen of the jury, notwithstanding the evidence introduced here, we shall ask you, when this case is done, to believe that she carried that note until her dying day.
    WHO HAD THE MOTIVE TO KILL MARTHA?
    While she was living with him the fires that have been spoken of here occurred and she is supposed to have known all about them.
    Now, gentlemen of the jury, in inquiring into this case, it will be necessary for you at the outset to ask who had the motive to kill this poor girl ? What was in her life ? What was there in her relations to others to make them murder her ? Because the fact of murder here is not disputed. And in investigating that question, you will naturally inquire what were her relations to all the world besides ? Had she quarreled with any_ body who would be likely to kill her from anger ? Had she done anyone an injury who would be likely to kill her for revenge ? Had she entangled her life in anyway with the life of some one else, so that it would make it an object to that someone else to bring her existence to an end?
    Martha Whitla seems to have kept her letters carefully. We have the package of her letters here as they came from her trunk, and if she ever corresponded with any other man, she kept no record of it. Her life seems to have been entangled only with this one man. No one else seems to have been permitted to have any interest in her except him.
    Now, gentlemen of the jury, I have told you
    THE HISTORY OE THIS GIRL
    up to the time of his marriage. Martha attended the wedding ; and you can imagine, gentlemen, the feelings with which she looked upon that glad ceremony. There was the man that had once promised to marry her; there was the man who had seduced and ruined her, now about to pledge his hand and heart to another innocent girl and take her to be his wife. You can imagine, I say, the feelings of Martha Whitla, but she crushed them all back. Hope was dead in the heart of Martha Whitla. She went and bought a copy of the bible, and on its frontis-page presented it to him as a wedding present. In doing this the poor girl displayed a wisdom which was, perhaps, all unintentional. That volume, if he should read it afterwards, if any influence in this world could bring him back to the righteous thoughts that he should have, would be apt to bring him there; that volume would teach him his wrong to Martha Whitla; that volume would teach him the duty of reparation, his duty to others. She undoubtedly thought at the time that she had made a truce with him which might be lasting, but this kind of feeling in woman, though it may be smothered, is never killed. She went back to the house some time afterwards and she found that Hugh S. Peoples or some one else had become
    ASHAMED OF THE PRESENTATION
    in the front, ‘£ Presented by Martha Whitla to Hugh S. Peoples on his Wedding day,” and had torn out the page. Hugh S. Peoples knew his relations to this girl, and he was ashamed to have that appear there in his family. He was ashamed to have his friends look upon the fact that she had presented him the book which was lying on his parlor table, and so the page was torn out. Martha Whitla afterwards went to the house and discovered this fact, and what did she do ? She became very angry, just as the discarded wpman always becomes when she finds the man who has seduced her is ashamed of having his name associated with hers. When she became angry she determined to do him an injury; and how should she do it? She determined to do him just such an injury as women always are determined to do in such cases; to injure him in his domestic relations; make him feel that the relations he had contracted with another should not be happy, if he thus
    spurned the girl he i-iad seduced.
    So she turned over that bible, turned past the various books of the old testament, looked over the pages of the new tastament, but tore nothing there. But she came to the record of Hugh S. Peoples’ marriage ; she felt she had been injured by his marriage to another, and she tore to shreds the record of that ceremony. Now, gentlemen of the jury, why did Martha tear that particular part of the bible, and leave the rest intact 1 Because that referred to the wrong that had been done her. That referred to the injury that had been inflicted upon her. That referred to the relations she had once hoped to have with this plaintiff, but which had become impossible by his subsequent conduct.
    What did he do % He had her arrested and taken to the police court. But, gentlemen of the jury, if he had prosecuted that case, all the relations he had maintained with that girl would have gone out; and after he had her arrested and taken there he dropped the prosecution. Another truce was patched up, as we understand. They got together in some way and William Peoples agreed to pay this note which Hugh had given her. Hugh Peoples did not want to be bothered afterwards by her applications for money. Mrs. Wm. Peoples has stated to you she was always asking for money, and he was desirous she should not ask him, as it would naturally
    CREATE SUSPICION IN HIS FAMILY
    and among his friends. There was no exchange of notes, gentlemen of the jury, if we understand thefaets. However, as to that we possibly maybe mistaken. But there was an agreement on the part of Wm. Peoples to pay this note of Hugh Peoples. The object was to have Martha ask William for it instead of asking Hugh. And right here, gentlemen, I will ask you to consider, if their relations had been proper, if their relations had been legitimate, if there had been nothing wrong in them, then why, why, I ask you, was Hugh S. Peoples afraid to have this girl speak do him about money on a note which he owed, fearing that, it might attach suspicion or annoy him %
    
    After this truce Martha went out to service. We find her at different places, working hard, working zealously to earn a living. We find her still following Hugh S. Peoples as a shadow wherever he goes. To a most respectable lady of this city, who will be placed upon the stand, she declared, Hugh S. Peoples, married or unmarried, she never could give up.
    She went out for a time to service, and shortly before her death was at work at Mr. Theiss’s out in the country. On the 10th of January, 1879, she announced at Mr. Theiss’s her intention of
    COMING TO DETROIT TO COLLECT
    some money that was due her upon a note. W e have no record in the life of Martha Whitla of any' note except that of Hugh S. Peoples. One of Mr. Theiss’s boys took her in a sleigh and carried her as far as Dear-born on the evening of the 10th of January. She remained at Mr. Johnson’s, the hotel keeper’s, on the night of the 10th, and on the morning of the 11th Dr. Collar was passing the door and was called, and she rode with him to Detroit, and stopped at Eisenlord’s house. On the way she told the doctor her mission to Detroit was to collect the amount due on a note. At the Eisenlord house she told Mrs. Eisenlord her mission to Detroit was to collect the amount due her on a note. She went to Mr. Marsh’s, a jeweler on Michigan avenue, and had a pair of earrings fixed. She told him a man had agreed to marry her, but had married another girl, and he had given her a note, and she was going to see him that afternoon and collect it. She told the same thing to Stella Hoffman, a woman living at Ridgeway, who has been frequently alluded to on the part of the plaintiff in this case. She announced to them all that she was going to collect the money due on a note. To Mr. Marsh she offered to show the note, but he said it was none of his business, and he didn’t look at it. About 4 o’clock she leaves the house with the avowed purpose of collecting the note. We do not trace her along the streets from near Second street and Michigan avenue, but we next see her going into the Franklin house, and in the Franklin house, at the time she went in, was Hugh S. Peoples. The next that is seen of her she is passing below Mr. Marsh’s. He looks out and sees this same woman passing with a man, whom we suppose to have been the plaintiff in this case. That was 4:30 o’clock in the afternoon of January 11, 18.79, almost three years ago, now. It was wintry weather. The night was coming down upon ohem. Thus far we trace her steps with unerring certainty, and from that point on
    ALL IS VEILED IN MYSTERY.
    This girl, gentlemen of the jury, whose life had been entangled with nobody else ; this girl, whose life had been a part of this plaintiff’s life, who lived with him and in him, as you might say, who revolved around Mm in an orbit as certain as the earth revolves about the sun, we leave upon our streets, in the peace of God, in the peace of the people of this State, on her way to tMs plaintiff, or with tMs plaintiff, it matters not which, for the purpose of collecting that note; and when next seen, her body is taken up from the Detroit river, bearing upon it all the marks of horrible murder.
    Now, gentlemen of the jury, these facts were discovered by the press; they were discovered by the police; and the question then came, was it lawful to set these facts before the world ? Was it lawful that the people of Detroit should know all these facts, so that they might supplement them with other facts and discover to a certainty the murdérer of this dead girl?
    I insist, your honor, that it was not only the privilege of the press, but it was the duty of the press to lay these facts before the public, so that anybody having any knowledge of this transaction might bring that knowledge to bear upon it, and bring the perpetrator to justice.
    THE ANCIENT LAW.
    I call the attention both of the court and of the jury to the ancient law upon this subject. I will first state it. My brothers will undoubtedly concede it.
    Before the days of newspapers, gentlemen of the jury, in the old days of the common law, the whole country was divided into neighborhoods, called hundreds; and it was the duty of any citizen who became cognizant of a murder to commence crying upon the highway, “ murder! murder! murder!” until the whole hundred was turned out. It was the duty not only of that hundred to turn out, but when they reached the next they also were bound to turn out, until all the hundreds from the center to the sea were crying “murder! murder! murder! ” until the perpetrator was discovered. Not only was the man authorized and bound to cry murder, but he was bound to state all the facts within his knowledge. He was bound to state not only the facts within his knowledge, but bound to state his suspicions; for suspicion itself is an important fact which may lead to inquiry.
    Mr. Penniman — If he called the wrong person he had to be killed himself, though.
    Mr. Atkinson — My friend is not accurate in regard to the law. A good many persons in those days brought actions against those who started the cry of murder on the streets; but it was invariably held, even under such lawyers as Justice Scroggs, that unless the man started it maliciously, he could not be punished; and if he did so start it, he was not hung; he was only sued, as the Major has sued the Evening News in this case, for damages. Of course my learned brother considers it equal to hanging to have a suit brought against it by himself.
    Now, gentlemen of the jury, I call your attention to this, the ancient law, upon the subject, and so that we may not have any misunderstanding about it, because this has a very great bearing upon the law as we shall ask it from your honor in this case, I read from Jacobs' Law Dictionary under the head of “ Hue and Cry.”
    Mr. Walker — If my brother reads it as law we object.
    Mr. Atkinson — I read it to your honor, because we desire not only to lay before the jury such facts as we Intend to prove, but also to notify your honor of such legal positions as we assume in this case, that they may be before you and the application of the testimony to those positions may be seen.
    Mr. Penniman — I submit, your honor, the doctrine of justification is so well settled here that the opinion of Justice Scroggs or Jeffries, or any other ancient authority my brother may find, will have very little effect upon this court ás a matter of law. Of course it sounds well, and has a little tinge of romance about it.
    THE ONLY MAN “COMPELLED.”
    The Court — Can I prevent counsel from stating what law he proposes to cite?
    Mr. Penniman — I submit he should not read this as a part of his speech.
    The Court — When I commenced practicing the court compelled counsel to read the statutes and state the law as a part of the opening.
    Mr. Penniman — If your honor feels compelled to listen to it—
    The Court — I do not feel compelled, Major. Go on.
    Col. Atkinson — No one feels himself compelled to listen to it but the Major.
    I propose, following this ancient doctrine, to show the gradual growth of
    THE DOCTRINE OR RIGHT
    and the doctrine of privilege from those days down to the present time. [Col. Atkinson then. read from Jacobs’ Law Dictionary, under the head of “Hue and Cry,” as before cited.] This, gentlemen, is a portion of the description of that ancient remedy; and I find it was the settled law of England, long before newspapers were established, that this hue and cry should be raised and that it should keep spreading itself by the cry being repeated until it reached the sea; and if it did not, then the neighborhood itself was to be punished for the crime. And indeed, gentlemen of the jury, I am not sure but it would make the people of Detroit more vigilant, more watchful of the lives of others, and especially of the lives of poor girls who are
    brought here and thrown into the river
    from time to time, or into the river Rouge, if we ourselves were punished unless we brought the offender to justice.
    Now, this was the old rule. In 1665 there was a newspaper established in London known as the London Gazette, and just as soon as that newspaper was established the government availed itself of the fact and an act of parliament was passed providing that not only-should they raise this cry upon the highways but should publish in the paper all the facts which had come within their knowledge, so that other facts might be added; and unless the hundred published the fact in the London Gazette, then established, they were punished, even though they made the pursuit required by law.
    the press succeeds the “hue and cry/’
    Now, gentlemen of the jury, in the progress of modern times this institution known as the hue and cry has-gone out of existence. In that day it was the only way-of communioating the facts to all the people, so that they might be on the alert to arrest the murderer and bring him to justice. But in modern times the telegraph takes the news to every quarter almost as soon as it occurs. The press spreads the intelligence to everybody, and the press takes the place in modern society of the- hue and cry in ancient society. And thus I hold it to be not only the privilege of the press, but its right and its duty when a murder is committed, to spread the news broadcast everywhere; to spread all the facts that have come to its knowledge; so that the murderer, wherever he goes, may hear the cry of “murder! murder! murder! ” ringing in his ears, until his guilty soul gives up its secret, and he is brought to justice.
    Why, the counsel for the plaintiff asks you, gentlemen of the jury, “ Is it possible that a man who has committed this grievous crime is walking in our midst? ” Gentlemen of the jury, it is not only possible that
    THE MURDERER OE MARTHA WHITLA IS IN OUR MIDST,
    but it is morally certain that the murderers of half, a score of girls murdered within the last few years are walking in our midst. These men are not arrested. We know these crimes have been committed, bécause we find the dead bodies. We know to a moral certainty that others have been committed where we do not find the bodies. We know that girls are lost from time to time, and no traces are found of them. From the waters of this beautiful river come to the surface one by one the bodies of these dead girls. It is no fancy, gentlemen of the jury, that these 'murderers are in our midst. We know they are amongst us, because we know these crimes are being committed. What shall we do for their detection? If it be true, gentlemen of the jury, that the press cannot publish the facts, how are we going to detect them? Now I do not say that in publishing the facts the press have a right to lie about any citizen; but I say that the press have a right to publish in good fajth everything they can find out in regard to a crime of this kind; even if it will leave some citizen in a situation that he is called upon for an explanation.
    A MATTER OP PRIVILEGE.
    No great step has been made in modern improvement but what injury to individuals has sometimes resulted. You cannot run a lightning express through this State without occasionally frightening a farmer’s horse. Yet we would not stop the express. You cannot run a steamer up this river without making navigation in canoes a little dangerous, and although canoes have a more ancient right to these waters, we would not stop the steamer. So with the newspaper that is bound to publish the news, it may do a possible injury, but unless it does it maliciously it is not punishable, if it has acted in good faith and in the discharge of a public duty.
    Now, gentlemen of the jury, I have traced Martha Whitla up to that evening. She was either on her way to this plaintiff, or was with this plaintiff, whichever it may be.
    For three years society has reached just that point. It has come to this plaintiff, and then it has been thrown from the scent. If he has ever offered any explanation I have not heard it.
    HE LIES DIRECTLY IN THE PATH OE INQUIRY.
    He lies exactly before the parties who are calling “murder! murder! murder!” for this dead girl; and instead of giving the information within his possession, he snarls, and bites, and sues, and insists on damages, because they have reached that point in the investigation.
    Now, what was Mr. Peoples’ duty, provided he was an innocent man, when this article was published? Did. this girl reach him that night when she was on her way to find him to collect the money' on that note? If she did, then he can tell society the fact. And is not society entitled to all he knows on that subject, that it may discover the murderer- of this girl? If she reached him, and he paid her that note, then she had money, and that might be an object for somebody else to kill her. If she did not reach him, then who had any object to kill Martha Whitla? If she reached him he can tell us where she was a at later hour than anybody else who has seen her. He can tell us whether there were any fiends lurking around there to do this horrible crime. He can tell us which way she went, with whom she went, where she said she was going. In other words, he can advance this inquiry a step, so that we would be one step nearer the
    PERPETRATOR OE THIS HORRIBLE CRIME.
    But he does nothing of this kind. He lies there, as I have told you, right in the path of inquiry, blocking the way. We have probed the way all around him. We have gone into the byways, have gone into the paths that come up into the road as we approach him, but we find no way around Hugh S. Peoples, and we can get no information from him.
    Gentlemen of the jury, this is a case of circumstantial evidence. There is not a circumstance in the case that does not point directly towards Hugh S. Peoples. There is not a circumstance in the case that points towards anyone but Hugh S. Peoples.
    Now, in investigating a homicide of this kind, when a party is undensuspicion, it is always proper to investigate his conduct, to see whether he has done anything
    TO DIVERT SUSPICION FROM HIMSELF;
    to see whether he has done anything towards suborning witnesses. In other words, to see whether he has. acted like a guilty or like an innocent man. We' find these facts after the identification of Martha Whitla’s remains. We find Hugh S. Peoples, just as soon as he was informed that the body found was that of Martha Whitla, rushes up to Mrs. Canton’s, where Martha had a room, and tries to get into her room to examine the things she had in there, and see what was in her trunk. He was after that package of letters.
    Gentlemen of the jury, Hugh S. Peoples knew of this correspondence, though his brother and his sister and his brother’s wife were ignorant that he was corresponding with this girl. Mrs. Canton refused to permit him to go in there. The letters were finally turned over to the police, and through the courtesy of the police we are permitted to use them on this trial.
    
      THE THEISS BOYS CASE.
    What next does he do 1 In a conversation with one of the police officers one of the Theiss boys had dropped something in regard to marriage with Martha Whitla. It was an expression equally consistent "with innocence or guilt'; but the mere mention of marriage between them excited suspicion on the part of the plaintiff, and a prosecution was at once started against the Theiss boys by him for murder. He hired private counsel to prosecute them, and he remained in the court room during the first day. We shall show by Mr. Harris, who was defending the Theiss boys in that case, that when in the court room he said, “Your honor, our defense in this case is that the Theiss boys are not guilty, and that another man who sits here [pointing at the plaintiff] did murder Martha Whitla,” this man arose and left the court room, and did not return. He remained at Mr. Cheever’s office afterwards, and got such information as he could from time to time of the proceedings. The Theiss boys of course were discharged. There was no evidence against them. We will be able to show, I think, gentlemen of the jury, that during the examination of the Theiss boys,this man approached witnesses and tried to procure testimony against them, testimony that was false, and
    TESTIMONY WHICH HE KNEW WAS FALSE ;
    and this we suppose to have been done with a view of diverting suspicion from himself.
    We will show, gentlemen of the jury, a fact which already appears, I may say, by the testimony here, that from the 11th of January, 1879, when Martha Whitla was last seen upon our streets, up to a time some 16 months later, when Mrs. Canton recognized her, there was not a word of inquiry by this man for that girl. She had been almost his daily companion for years. She had been the shadow, as I have told you, of his life. She had loved him to madness. She had been annoying him by her importunities for money. Yet suddenly she is missing for 16 months from the community, and there is no inquiry of any kind made by him as to what has become of Martha. Poor old John Whitla, the generous old man who took this orphan girl • to his home and supplied the place of a father to her, went to where she was working at Theiss’s . and inquired what had become of Martha. He and his wife were looking round to see what had become of this girl so suddenly missing. But this man, to whom Martha’s face was familiar everyday, who had been annoying him by her importunities, and who had been loving him too fondly and too well, never makes an inquiry as to the fate of this dead girl until she was finally recognized.
    THE SUIT AND THE SEARCH.
    This article was published, and for more than a year we heard nothing from Mr. Peoples, when suddenly one morning a paper is served bearing the imprimatur of Major Penniman, suing this paper for $50,000 for-publishing this article. Since then we have been on the constant lookout to develop the facts in this matter;, and we have developed them, as I have stated to you, and as they will be laid before you. In doing this I must say we have hada long and weary work. We have been in the prisons of the country where those liable to aid this man in his work are incarcerated. We have heard their stories ; 'some saying they knew of this, some saying they did not. We have had to deal with almost every kind of character in looking for this testimony ; because we knew that this girl was killed by more than one person ; one could not have killed her and left her as she was found ; he must have had associates, and we know very well it is among such men he has found his associates, if at all.
    We will establish to your satisfaction, gentlemen of -the jury, that this girl was an innocent girl when she was 16 years old, when she came to the Peoples. We will show to your satisfaction, by his own letters, that they became lovers. We will show to your satisfaction that he afterwards
    SEDUCED AND RUINED THIS GIRL,
    and that for years she lived with him as his mistress. We shall show that she had this note the last day she was ever seen. When she was last seen she carried this note in her pocketbook with her thimble. When she was found everything was found except that note. That note is missing. That note has never come to light. Where is it % The thimble was there and the pocketbook was there ; the clothes were there; the earrings ; everything was left on this poor dead girl except the note she carried against Hugh S. Peoples; that was gone.
    What inference shall we draw from this ?
    PUBLISHED IN GOOD FAITH.
    Now, all these facts came to the possession of the reporter of The Evening News. We will show you that the reporter was told these facts; but the man whose life was so entangled with that of Martha Whitla, the name of that man, rather,- was not given to him. He believed these facts to be as I have stated. He believed them as I think you will believe them when the testimony in this case shall have been concluded ; and so believing he wrote the article counted upon in this case ; the printer set it in type; it was put in the form, and the great press rolled it out, and by midnight of that day these facts became known to 50,000 people. This paper which we defend here to-day,gentlemen of the jury, has spread this intelligence to all the world. These gentlemen need take no pains in proving the circulation. We have spread it, and we would spread it a thousand times as far if we had the power, believing it was our duty and our right to do so.
    NAUGHT OF MALICE.
    We will show you by the reporter that he did not even know Hugh S. Peoples, so that he could not have possibly been influenced against him. We will show you by the proprietors of the paper that they did not know Hugh S. Peoples, so that they had no malice in this case. And then we will submit this question to you, gentlemen of the jury, and if you find in this case we have not only exercised a right and a privilege, but that we have performed a sacred duty to the community, then your verdict can be only one way; and I think that you will say that this newspaper which is being prosecuted here to-day not only did its duty in publishing these facts to the world, not only exercised its right and its privilege then, but that it has rendered a much more sacred duty in developing these facts so that they may now be laid before this jury, and possibly attract the attention of the public authorities and
    
      J. T. Johnston, Geo. H. Penniman, and C. I. Walker for Plaintiff.
    
      John Atkinson and Geo. V. N. Lothvop for Defendant.
    BRING THE CRIMINAL TO JUSTICE.
    Human life is too cheap amongst us. The lives of women are too cheap. The characteristic of this age is to have respect and love for woman; and if we, citizens of this great country, are to stand idly by while they are seduced and murdered, and their bodies thrown into this stream, then we are unworthy the name of citizens or freemen.
    If this investigation, gentlemen, however expensive, shall bring the criminal to justice, then, although my client in this case shall have borne much more than its share of the public burden, we shall be satisfied with the discharge of the duty done.