Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1873-11-18
Mrs. Jane Undertook, Mother of the Con
victed Murderer

| From the West Chester (Pa.) Local News1
| To-day the aged and heart broken mother of
VIM r. Undertook, now imprisoned 10 our jail
| for murder, paid us visit and told to us the
sad story Of her affections in this her trying
| hour of sorrow.
This good woman, for such we believe her to
be, fears that 10 The terrible ordeal which she
has been made to bear part. an unjust public
will attach to her name such associations as NAV
tend to break down her character, and it too
fall IN the awful chaos which is more than like
| ly to follow 10 the wake of the law which has
so set the seal of guilt upon her SON.
| To this effect and in the hope to counterfeit
| such impressions, she presents list of nearly
three hundred names-those of unquestionabe
veracity-who testify to her virtues as a good
and Christian woman. The parties thus giving
their names are those with whom she has asso-
ciated during her life time, representing each
| neIghborhood where she has lived being near
| ly all in Chester county.
Mrs Udderzook is woman probably seven
ty years of age, and her sad situation may be
far better imagined than described. Through
this trial her little savings accumulated by years
of hard labor have been taken from her to pros
ecute the case, and she is now left almost pen
uiess, to rely upon the charity of her friends
for the necessaries of life. She regrets having
been made to take SO prominent part in the
trial on behalf OF the prosecution.
There is sadoess connected with this terri
bic drama which now only crop out after the
| final seal of guilt has been branded upon the
| prisoner.
| His children, two of them just old enough to
| wonder at their parent absence, are constant
| ly asking for their pa, aud when on last Sun
| day week ago he failed to come among them,
| the little boy, in remembrance OF his former
custom, asked after him, aud said: why,
mamma, papa didn't use 10 work on Sunday
Why don't he come home to us?'
| Again last week, on the day when the little
ones were called to bid their father goodbye be-
fore returning to their home In Baltimore with
Mrs Goss, they both climbed upon his knees,
and 10 their prattling way entreated him to go
home with them
They did not visit him 10 his prison cell, and
their little minds are evidently filed with curl
Gus wonderings, which at times lead them to
| grleve and question into the mysterious absence
| of their parent.
| On Sunday last the scene In the wfe's and
mothers room opposite the prison, must have
| been a sorry one indeed
They watched each new phase In the aspect
of affairs of the day, and when the prisoner was
taken to the court house to receive the verdict
their hopes and fears for the result must have
warred against each other in a manner awful
iOr Tue Sy III pathetic uDIuu 10 Contemplate. A0O
! then when the bitter result was known. and
they saw the husband and son led back to his
cell, robed 10 the guilt put upon him by ju-
rvs verdict, then it was that sorrows ambition
reached it's climax, and the last ray of forlorn
hope was bIotted out.
The mother, true to her maternal iostincs,
has contributed as best she could to her son S
comforts. She has even taken the feathers
from out her own bed to form him an easier one
than the enc which the prison provided.
| Mrs Undertook denounces Mr.. Whitney
conduct from the beginning to the end. She
states hat bis chief reason as he SO expressed
it. was, 10 Withdrawing from the case, that be
did not wish to ergender the i'll will of the insu-
rance companies
The mother stoutly disbelieves in her son
guilt, and has the frmest faith in Mrs Goss be-
ing purely Christian woman. She adds, in
reference TO her SON. s situation, that if it is pos
sible that he is gully be has certainly been
made the tool of conspirators 10 every way more
designing and bad than he himself.