Staunton spectator, and general advertiser. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 183?-1849, 1849-10-17

OF speched by the law. Dnrtng the delivery Of
the sentence the prisoner seemed much Affected
The following is copy of the
SENTENCE.
Thomas A. To denounce the
penalties of violated law against convicted felon
after jury shall have determined the extent those
penalties, would be of itself painful duty. But
my office does not end here. The law which you
have offended has added greatly TO my official
sponsibiiy in constituting its organ 10 ascertain
and graduate your punishment according to my view
of the enormiiy of your offence.
Your country has preferred against you the charge
of having crimnally appropriated to your own
the goods of another under circumstances which inn
ply the utmost deliberaOn. The confidence reposed
in your integrity caused you to be selected a sui
table agent to discharge the duties of responsible
public Office. Your station was humble one, to
be sure, but it conferred upon you extensive capaci
~ for mischief. The deputy post.m who con-
trolls the most obscure post office in the United States
IT he is aithess to his trust, may infct most Sc
rious evils on society. These evils by no means
to be measured by the mere amount of money he
may abstract from the mails passing through his Of
flee. When it is known that depredalons have been
committed on the mails, every postmaster on the
route, shares, to some extent, the odum of the act.
Public confidence i'm the honest administration of the
Post Office establishment, through all its extensive
qualifications, receives shock from which it can
only be relieved by the energetic prosecution of the
train of measures essential to the detection of the Of
fender. The means at the command ofthe Depart
ment for the detection of crime, most ample for that
purpose, are Immediately put in requistion and if
the guilty man, lued into sense of false security,
by previous lmpunity, perseveres in his pilferinu
course, he speedily finds himself over,aken by the
swift vengeance of the law. The pryng eye of
confidential agent of the Department is upon him,
and the cuprit is arrested before time has been al
Invo to fho nuilo nfh
once the offending post master feels the weight of
the laws hand upon him, MS fate is already sealed.
The proofs of his guilt then full, complete over
whelming, and nothing is then wanting to consum-
mate his ruin. The records of this Court, during
the present year, attesis in the most remarkable
manner, the truth of this remark. Like an unhappy
youth who was sentenced ut this bar six months ago.
for similar offence you have saved the Government
the necessity of establishing your guilt by the pro-
ducton OF the ready proofs in lis possession. BY
the advice Of able counsel who knew that your
conviction was inevitable, you have withdrawn your
plea to the indictment exhibited against you and
you now stand at this bar, convict by your own
confession. The crime of theft is aggravated in
your by the betrayal of confidence reposed, and
takes yet darker hue from the revolving, Heaven
daring sin of perjury!
! You are no stranger, Thomas A. Slickeman at
this bar. Eighteen months ago you Were arranged
and tried here for the offence which YOU have now
conf, ssed. The proofs then adduced such as to
exclude all rational doubt Of your guilt. The stolen
money and even the very letter from which it was
puroined was found in your possession and denti-
fled, and yet you escaped conviction The jury
who sat in Judgment upon you could not agree upon
verdict, and your case was continued. What pro-
duced result which astOunded most Of those who
attended your trial Think you that the proofs were
insufficient TO carry conviction toany well regulated
mind whose reasoning powers were unswayed by
| mr. Inv Nnt
of completeness in the evidence. but your compass
sionate jury yielded 10 appeal to their sympathes
SO powerful, that it cannot easily fade from the me-
mory Of those who witnessed it. There sat before
them one, who, guiltess herself, shared in full mea
sure the penalty of your crime. None who heard
them forget the stlfied sobs which escaped her
overburdened heart, when letter Astounding in ex-
pressions of tenderness TO her; written from your
prison in Harrison6uTS, read to the jury by the
counsel for the United States. That Jury knew the
mistaken consiancy of that womans soul under the
severest trials TO which she could be Subjected
They knew that your guilt and degradation had but
served to develope and noursh the deep affection
of this true hearted woman, and that she had been
your companion and comforter during the weary
hours of your long imprisonment. There was some
thing ineXpressibly stouchng in love so devoted, in
grief so real, so eloquent as hers. Manly eyes
grew dim with tears-manly bosoms throbbed with
sympathy. The admissions Of guilt which that let
\
which its tenderness evoked, and men who under
stood the constitution Of the human heart knew
| that conviction then impossible! But
though the amiable sentiments awakened in the bo-
SONS Of some of your trers screened you from con-
vction, it could not avail to secure your acquitlal
fou were still detained in custody to await your trial
at future term Of the Court. The humane provis-
ions of the law conferred upon you the right 10 be
released from confinement, on rendering sufficient
| bail tor your appearance to answer the Indictment
at future day. All previous efforts of Jealous
friends had failed TO procure the requisite security
but availing herself of the mingled feelings of pity
and admiration her devotion had excited your wife
| speedily accomplished your liberation. But the
fatality so often characteristic of crime has eminent
ly marked your subsequent career. II is morally
certain that you never designed to comply with the
condition of your bond. You forfeited your recog-
nizance, but instead of fleeing to some remote and
sparsely inhabited section of the country where you
might have reasonably hoped toevade the lynx eyed
vigilance of Post Office agents. You quietly sat down
in an adjoining State, in the midst of oe of the most
popuous communities in our country You vany
imagined that because you were surrounded by stran-
gers you could safely defy all the efforts of the off
GERS the law to ferret you out Perhaps, loo, you
supposed that the Government content with exact
ing from your suretles the heavy penalty of you
forfeited recognzance, would grow weary il
the pursuit of victim SO humble as yourself.
these were your views, you discover, when tor
late, that you labored under fatal deusion. II is
well that you, and all others who can only be re
strained fIom the commission of crime by the fear o
temporal punishment, should well understand, tina
though the penalty of your bond had been paid TO TIT
utterrnost iahBg the wounds inflicted upon the Grim
ina justice of tho country only be healed By III
prosecution and conviction of the offender ii wei
too that you should learn that your locality in TIT
State of Ohio was perfectly well known to the Pos
| Office Department, through a confidential agent