St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1879-09-26
"Kemper's Best Citizens.

When the widow of Judge Chisolm
feared she should not live to tell the
terrible story of the butchery of her hus-
band, daughter COrnelia and son, before
jury, she wrote out the datails of this
mock arrest and assassination which is
published in full in the N. Y. Tribune
of last Saturday. 1t is a calm recital of
one of the most awful deeds of modern
times, and should be thoughtfully con-
sidered by the people of the North. In
it's editorial columns the Tribune of
same date speaks as follows:
The best citizens of Kemper, county,
Miss, have been acquitted. They killed
a man, shot his helpless daughter, muir
dered his baby boy, and still the law
had no terrors for them. They are still
the "best citizens of Kemper county"
1t is not easy to speak
calmly of the scene which occurred in
the Jail of Kemper county. Men and
women who want to understand the
Solid South should read the testimony
for themselves, carefully, thOughtfully
and patiently. 1t will bring tears, if a
reader has not a heart of stone; but
members of the jury shed tears when
they listened to it, and then went out
and voted to acquit the murderer, be-
cause it would hurt the Democratic
party to have him convicted. There
are not many counties, let US
hope, in which exactly such a scene
would have been possible. The sheriff
was the mere tool of the mob. The
guards, chosen by the victim himself,
in the hope that some lingering human
feeling might prompt them to do their
duty, kept their guns loaded until they
could empty them into the prisoner
they had undertaken to defend. Men
who had eaten bread with Judge CHS
ohm, and who had lived upon his bOun-
ty, were foremost among his murderers.
Said his heart broken wife, "An Arab
of the desert would refuse to stab a man
whose salt he had tasted" But these
were not Arabs of the desert. They
were the 'best citizens of Kemper
county"
In some countries men are considered
below the beasts if they are guilty of
cruelty to an innocent woman. If she
is helpless what man would not defend
herr But the "best citizens of Kemper
county" not only emptied their guns
into the arms and then into the body of
the brave little boy who tried vainly to
defend his father; they not only emp
tied their shot into the sweet face and
soft arms of the loving daughter who
tried to plead for her father in vain;
but after that father was murdered,
''the best citizens of Kemper county"
still had loads in their guns, and emp
tied them into the limbs of the helpless
and fainting daughter as she lay by the
body of her dying father.
This is chivalry. Yes, men of the
North, this is the Solid South Look at
it: The spectacle is not pleasant one.
But IL is high time that human beings
and hyenas should not meet at the bal
lot-bOX without knowing each other.
If we are to share the Government of
this country with the creatures who call
themselves "the best citizens of KEN
per county," it is worth while at least
to know enough of them to vote against
them. If there is a chance-even the
faintest chance that creatures like
these, who can be found in every cOun-
ty of the Solid South, are to become
rulers of this country, is it not time for
civilized and decent men to vote them
down, or to get out of the country as
one would flee from a jungle infested
by tigers The comparison is unjust.
Tigers never lived in Indian jungle so
cruel, so beastly and SO brutal as "the
best citizens of Kemper county"