Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1883-12-21
A SOrdid Tragedy.

The murder of the man Barrows in
kittcry, Me-, is one of those cruel Incl
dents which now and again come to the
surface of the humdrum rustic life of
New England 10 prove how fiercely
may burn the passions of ayarice and
hate beneath calm exterior. BarrowS,
it appears, was man of brutal and vio-
lent temper. He was the second huS-
band of his wife, and he had incurred
her enmity and that of her family by
refusing to allow her married daugh-
ter by previous marriage to live With
them. The Barrows family cultivated
small farm, wrestling n scanty sub
sistance from the sterile soil. The step
daughter and her husband thought ii
mean and base in the step-father that
they should have no share in the COM
forts which Barrows had appropriated
without having earned.
The facts are sufficiently common
place and sordid. There appear to be
no tragical elements in this family quar-
rel. 1t was poor and narrow farm
over whose meager yield family was
quarreling. To people who live COM
f0rtably and virtuously there was GER
tainly no occasion for any murderous
outbreak. Yet Mrs. Barrows and her
son-in-law. Blaney, according to his own
confession. conspired to kill Rarrows,
in order that they might have undis-
puted right To the possession of the lit
tie property. This was accomplished
by "A concert of action betwixt the two,
the stcp-daughter, so far as known,
taking no active part in the murder.
The wife sent her husband, Barrows,
into an ambush where the Son-in-l law Law
in wait. The Objectionable interloper
was put out OF the way, and the conspir-
atOrs prepared TO enter upon full enioy-
ment of the farm and its products. Ii
is not necessary here to inquire into the
causes that pricked the slayer To con-
fessiOn of the crime. He gave up the
story of the bloody deed, and the we'll
laid scheme of the pair brought ruin and
confusion upon both.
A murder so deliberate and wicked rs
this. and committed for so trivial an OBJ
lect, seems incOmprehensible to pros
porous and generous men. But one
must understand the bitterness of a
family feud and the corroSion of a
moral nature wrought upon by covet-
business in order TO realize how a dead
ly passion may grow and grow until il
breaks forth in murder. A family quar-
rel that begins in the division of prop
erty, or in a wrangle over some paltry
bit of possession, often becomes one OF
the most venomous, unnatural and un-
comfortable Of any that disgrace poor
human nature. The sordid tragedy that
astounded the peaceful neighborhood
on the borders of the Piscataqua was
only an outbreak of passions that had
long slumbered in the bosom of single
discordant family. These had been
deepened by brooding over real and
fancied wrongs, and had been intensi-
fed by the self-repression which might
have induced better purposes. The
hatred of years famed out in one tragic
al instant, and the simplicity and mea-
gcrness of a New England farmhouse
were suddenly invested with the name
less mystery and horror of a secret
murder. Men have been killed before
now, in a white heat of wrath, for tri-
fling provocation. The sudden desire
Of cove.ous and bloody-minded man
Tor another's paltry possession has often
reached out for the human life that stood
In the way of is Accomplishment. But
Of all the trivial and inadequate motives
leading up to homicide. family disa-
greement over poor worldly goods seems
the most deplorable.-N y. Times.
"A Philadelphia stsesi-car has ,