New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1871-04-23


In former eras, and in countries which
would, in the estimation Of the present
generation, have ranked with the Valley
of Rasselas, or with Sir Thomas Nore's
Utopia, there have been communities
among whom the inventor Of means
Of accelerated destruction, such as the
direful revolver, would, instead Of reap
ing reward and honor, have been doomed
to be put away from of the face Of the
earth as an enemy Of the human
species.
The boasted enlightenment d the pres
ent age views the subject differently; and
the inventor of death weapon combin-
ing facility with appalling certainty Of
human destruction receives the honor
and consideration which the world gives
to success-the same whether its re-
cipient has bestowed some great good
upon his fellows OF originated a: horrible
evil
Ideas of right or wrong are not shaped,
any more than circumstances are created,
by public opinion but the reverse of this
is the case, and public opinion is, if not
formed by, at least qualified by change Of
circumstances. n.
Years ago, when the Queen Anne musket
Brown Bess) and the single barrel flint
pistol were the desdliest weapons that
science had yet devised when homicide
was slow affair, and when, as the statis-
teal calculations of that time proved,
a soldier fighting twelve hours day for
|. three days killed an average of one man
in those slow old days, there were some
strongly defined ideas respecting the liza
bility of man to account to the law when
! he had shed the blood of his fellow. At
that time, the respectability Of the she'd
der of blood, or hD standing in society,
did not for one moment shield him from
the consequences of violation Of law.
Endless instances could be adduced to
prove the correctness of this; but we
quote only +wo-one the case Of Governor
Wall, who was executed for Wnrder at
London in 1902, and the other that of
Lieutenant Richard Smith, who died
under the gallows for similar crime in
1916.
In 1852 Wall was an officer in the Brit
ish army, and held the post Of governor
at the military station of Goree. on the
| coast Of Africa. One of the men in his
command had committed some act which
was considered to SAVIOR of insubordina-
ton, for which he was subjected by the
governors order to trial by an informal
court martial, and received severe fog
ging, from the effects of which he died
| shortly afterward. Twenty years after
this occurrence Wall was tried for it, and
underwent the death penalty in London.
About the year 1916 Richard Smith,
lieutenant in the United States navy,
being on leave at Philadelphia, met with
an attractive woman named Ann Carson,
who represented herself to him as
widow. The unhappy young man was
tempted into iiaison, which was i'm a
short time interrupted by the arrival of
Captain Carson, the husband of the sup
posed widow, who had been absent on
sea voyage. Some idea may be- formed
of the disturbance that followed. Goaded
and instigated by the woman who had be-
guiled him, in an evil hour he shot Car
son with pistol, inhicting wound from
the effects of which death ensued in some
fifteen days. For this homicide Smith
was tried, convicted and executed, not
withstanding all the efforts Of able ooun-
sci, and all that money and influence
could command; for the unfortunate man
had wealthy connections, among others
New Orleans millionaire.
Compare these two cases, occurring
little more than q generation ago, with
what happens in our midst almost every
day.
1t was but q short time before the late
civil war thata a physician of New Orleans,
on visit to New York, slaughtered fel-
low lodger while in frenzy Of inebria-
ton. For this crime he was sentenced to
few years imprisonment, and portion
of the then existing press in this city
raved about the conviction as if the cul-
prit ranked with the noble army Of mar
tyrs. He was pardoned after some time,.
and returning to New Orleans, was, with
in the time to which his sentence would
have reached, killed in an attempt to
commit another murder.
What is taking place among US almost
every day? We need not look as far back
as Washington, or the case of Whitaker
who killed barkeeper with the ever-ready
death weapon, because he did not sufi-
GENTLY hasten to give him light for his
cigar. We need only refer to the past few
years to reoollect murder after murder,
one causeless blood-shed after another,
and no other consequence follow to the
shedder of blood than q few weeks inn
prisonment and the expense of counsels
m - eo-or~n ,v,oe% ,okn,o1 1lv 1vov,n