Case ID: scl_43/html/0438-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Withers, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

The State vs. Milton M. Chaney.
    An indictment for negro stealing need not allege that the slave is of any value. Verdict of guilty upon an indictment for negro stealing sustained, though there was no direct evidence that the offence was committed within the district.
    Bill of sale not received in evidence upon mere proof of handwriting of subscribing witness.
    BEFORE GLOYER, J., AT LANCASTER, SPRING TERM, 1856.
    The report of his Honor, the presiding Judge, is as follows :
    “The prisoner was indicted under the Act of 1754, for inveigling, stealing and carrying away a slave named Toney, the property of Robert L. Crawford.
    “ About the first of August, 1854, Toney left his master’s service and was seen in Lancaster District the last of September or first of October, six miles above the Court House, within one half of a mile of the Waxhaw Church, and somewhat in the direction of the prisoner’s residence, which is ten miles further. The prisoner left Lancaster District about the middle of October, 1854, and was absent five or six weeks. On the 29th of October he arrived at the house of E. L. Powell, King William’s County, Virginia, four hundred miles from Lancaster, with Toney, whose name he said was Martin, and passing himself under the assumed name of Jerry M. Tobert. He left the 31st of October, professing a wish to purchase five or six negroes, and returned to King William’s County on the 2d of November with Toney, whom he exchanged with Powell for a woman and two hundred dollars, and executed a bill of sale calling him Martin and signed Jerry M. Tobert. He informed Powell that he had bought Martin in Tennessee, and exhibited a bill of sale from one Crayton. In October, 1855, Powell went to Richmond — where he had sold Toney — with Robert L. Crawford, who established his right of property and brought Toney home. Powell came to South Carolina, had a writ issued against the prisoner, and on the 17th October, 1855, with the sheriff and other persons went to his house. When the prisoner came up to the carriage, and Powell called him Tobert, he seemed to be alarmed and drew back, but said, ‘ I suppose you have come about the boy I sold to you and for your money, you are, like me, a poor man and shall not lose. I will satisfy you.’ The prisoner afterwards confessed a judgment in. favor of Powell which was satisfied by the sale of his property. When he agreed to satisfy Powell he endeavored to extort a promise from him that he would not be further dealt with. The reason he had changed his name in Virginia he stated was, because he learned from Toney- that the man he had bought from had not acted honestly, and that he would not have changed it in South Carolina. At his arrest the prisoner said he had bought Toney of David Crayton, at or near Charlotte, N. C., at a camp, for $700, and offered to show the bill of sale. . He was permitted to go in his house and make a fruitless search in a heap of cotton for the bill of sale, where he said he had placed it for safety; but soon after one of his children brought out a little trunk in which was a bill of sale, signed by D. C. Cray-ton, and the prisoner said he could prove that he had bought of Crayton.
    “ A short time before he left the State the prisoner said, he wished to see his grandmother’s will in Virginia, and that he had some interest there. After- his return he loaned $200 to William J. Cureton, and informed him that he had gotten some money from a widow lady in North Carolina, to loan out at seven per cent, for a short time, and he did not know how long before she would want it.
    “ In 1849 the prisoner worked a part of Mrs. Stinson’s plantation, where Toney was, and he and Mrs. Stinson’s negroes fed their horses at the same lot, and he was' seen once talking to Toney. Conversing with John M. Steel on one occasion respecting Toney, the prisoner said he was a great rascal. Sometime in 1849 or 1850, Steel saw Toney late on Saturday evening talking with the prisoner in his yard, and, as Steel approached, they separated, the prisoner going in the house and Toney coming out of the yard with a jug.
    “ In the fall of 1854, W. D. Hyatt saw the prisoner in Charlotte, N. C., who had a paper and said he was about to purchase a negro at Wallace’s camp, and asked Hyatt to go with him in an old field hard by. A man was there named Wallace, who said he was of North Carolina; another, whom'the prisoner ealléd Crayton, hailed from Florida. There was also a wagon and some horses. Hyatt saw no paper exhibited in the old field.
    “Wallace was arrested in Kershaw District in 1855, for trading with negroes, and the prisoner became his bail, and on that occasion he told William Windle, that he had been' two years with Wallace trading in liquor and tobacco. In July, 1855, John M.-Steel saw the prisoner on his way from Camden with a large roll of money, who said, ‘he had bailed Wallace out of jail.’
    “For the defence the bill of sale purporting to have been signed by David C. Crayton was offered in evidence. Dr. Wiley proved the handwriting of Wallace who had subscribed as a witness; but said he knew not the writing of Crayton, nor had he ever heard of such a person. Without further proof I refused to admit the paper in evidence.
    “ As no exception is taken to it, I will not repeat the charge given to the jury. The prisoner was convicted.”
    The prisoner appealed and now moved this Court in arrest of judgment, on the ground, that the indictment contained no allegation as to the value of the slave. And failing in that motion, then he moved for a new trial, on the grounds:
    1. Because there was no testimony going to show, that the defendant was ever in possession of the negro Toney, alias Martin, in this State, so as to create a case of stealing within this jurisdiction.
    . 2. Because if the possession in the State of Virginia as proved, raises a legal presumption that the defendant took or inveigled said negro from this State, that presumption was amply rebutted by the testimony.
    3. Because, it is respectfully submitted, his Honor, the presiding Judge, erred in not permitting the bill of sale, that the defendant held, of the negro Toney, alias Martin, to go to the jury as evidence of the character of defendant’s possession.
    4. Because there was sufficient testimony going to show that the defendant had the negro'Toney, alias Martin, in the State of Virginia innocently under what he supposed a good title, acquired in the State of North Carolina, and thereby all presumption in law of stealing or inveigling is rebutted.
    
      Clinton, for appellant.
    
      DawJcins, Solicitor, contra.
   The opinion of the Court was delivered by

Withers, J.

This prisoner has also been convicted of inveigling, stealing and carrying away a slave.

He assumes the same ground in arrest of judgment which has been considered and adjudged in the case of Gossett, and it must abide the same determination.

A new trial is claimed in this case also, because of defect in the evidence to show, that the offence was perpetrated within the jurisdiction. The circumstances, bearing upon this question, though not the same, are nevertheless pertinent to the inquiry; are resolvable alone by the jury; have been referred to them 'under instructions that have induced no complaint; whatever the prisoner thought proper to produce, per contra, has been heard and interpreted by the triers of facts, (for the contents, substantially, of the bill of sale were heard by the jury, though the specific paper was excluded;) and however terrible the consequences to the individual, it would be extra-official and of evil import to the cause of necessary justice to arrest its progress merely on that account, being able to assign no reason to show the error of the jury.

It is too plain to justify argument, that the bill of sale was not proved, and could not, therefore, be received in evidence; hut the prisoner has no pretence of complaint herein, for (as already said) its purport was not unknown to the jury. The fifth ground was abandoned, (touching newly discovered testimony;) and as to the rest, involving the broad question of the prisoner’s guilt, we should be wanton in saying that this Court can see any such ground to impute error to the jury as to warrant our interposition. The motions in arrest of judgment and for a new trial are dismissed.

O’Neall, Wardlaw, Whitner, Glover and Munro, JJ., concurred.

Motions dismissed.