The Ashland union. [volume] (Ashland, Ashland County, Ohio) 1854-1868, 1859-08-17

The Ohio State Journal gives the following
story of a poor young Irishman who died in
the Penitentiary at Columbus:
"In the year 1858, three brothers by the
name of Shea-Patrick, John and Dennis
living in the country of Donegal, Ireland, hav-
ing heard of land of liberty, where the down
ceived and welcomed, tore themselves away from
theirag parents the scenes of their childhood,
and the land of their birth, with the intention
of making enough money to bring their be-
leved parents to the country of thtir intended
adoption. Two of them were men, but Den
mis-, the hope and pride of his aged parents,
was but boy of seventeen years, full of
youthful ardor. After receiving the blessings
of their parents they crossed the ocean and
landed in New York. They shortly started to
find employment. The eldest stopped in New
Jersey; the next found place in Pennsylva-
MIA; and Dennis came to Ohio with an ac-
quaintance, and found his way to one of our
public works.. near Athens, where there were
number of his, countrymen employed.
Not long after he arrived, on one of their
holy-days, two or three citizens were passing
along the road and found Dennis Shea, with a
dying man, at spring. Dennis had carried
him there and was engaged in washing the
face and cooling the temples of his dying
countryman. Those who found him in the po-
sitiou charged him with murder, arrested and
conveyed him to Athens, and lodged him in
jail The man died without being able to
communicate any of the facts of the case, and
the story of poor Dennis was not believed. He
was tried at the March term of the court n
that county in 1854, found guilty of murder
in the second degree, and sentenced to the
Ohio penitentiary for life. He arrived there
on the 11th of April following at that time
about eighteen years of age. Immediately af-
ter his confinement he began to dwindle away.
aud he told the narrator of these facts that he
could not survive a year, and wished his broth
ers tosbe kept ignorant of his misfortune and
disgrace. s5t
In the month of September following he
took his bed and senta message to our inform
ant. He wished for priest, said he could not
die without making his peace with God. Fa-
ther Meaher was sent for, and in the presence
of the warden, Mr.. Wilson and our Informant,
he told his simple story. The dying boy was
shrived by priest of his religion-said that he
would now die in peace, and in few moments
all was over. He stated on his death bed (and
it is substantiated by Lot l.. Smith, Esq, a
lawyer of Athens, and formerly private secreta-
ry to Gov. Medill,) that there existed an old
feud between what they call the Fardowns and
Cork onians- that few of them had met near
the spring on that day, in the absence of Den
mis-, and had fight, when they left this man
for dead and made good their escape. Dennis
came along short time afterwards, and found
him, dragged him to the spring, and, like the
"Good Samaritan" was trying to restore con-
sciousness to the dying man, when he was
caught in the charitable act, his story discredit-
ed-hnrried through the form of a trial, with
ont money and without friends, and sentenced
at The youthful age of eighteen, to drag out
miserable existence within the gloomy walls of
the Ohio, penitentiary-a innocent too
Who wonders that he sickened-that he died?
At the request of the dying boy our inform
ant wrote to his parents, informing them of
the untimely end of their darling child; and
who can realize or appreciate the agonizing,
heart-rending sorrow of the aged parents, as
their "grsy hairs go down in sorrow to the
grave ?"