Delaware gazette and state journal. (Wilmington, Del.) 1883-1902, 1883-12-20
Wilmington, Thursday, Dec. 20.l883.
henfenced 10 naaIh


The sentence of the court Ia that you
Z" be taken hence TO the place OF your
" confinement in the public jail OF this
" county and there be safely and |
" securely kept until Friday, the l4th
"day ct March next and that, on that
day, between the hours OF 10 O'Clock In |
"the forenoon and 2 O'Clock in the after
noon, you be hanged by the neck until
lyon are dead-and may God have
mercy on your soul %
Among all who sat in the court room |
Friday afternoon, environed by the |
hushed and GREATNESS tension OF the |
moment when the chief justice solemnly |
pronounced the sentence which doomed |
fellow creature, in the iullness OF his |
young manhood, to an ignominious death,
was there one who did not shrink at the
sound OF those few words of terrible
portents
Can we imagine then how appalling
they must have sounded to him TO whom
they We're spoken and TO Ills aged and
broken down father, who sat beside him
In the dock, trembling under the fearful
responsibility OF having paved his own
sons pathway to the gallowsY
Scenes OF oppressive sadness, of IN
awaiting sUTIow, il which human hearts
go down into untsthomable depths of
the BITTERNESS and darkness oil despair,
are not uniamlliar to tuose whose duties
call upyn them to be in regular attend
anee al the sessions OF our criminal
courts but never has there bsea a sadder
scene than that OF yesterday afternoon.
A gray Haired old man doomed to end
his days III jail, weighed down not SO
much by his own lead as by remorse of
the terrible burden of grief he must bear
for his share i'll bringing about the death
OF his son
And the wretohedness of that son,
condemned to die in three months, as he
sits In his lonely cell and counts the
weeks, the days, the hours, the minutes
as they pass, bringing him nearer and
nearer to death-and such death
We have no heart to dwell upon the
melancholy picture. Its bitter lesson to
others is told in the language of the court
in pronouneing the sentence.
The Lists were ably defended. Their
counsel, Messrs. Harrington and Sharpley,
did all they could for them. They shrank
from the fearful responsibility of the task;
but, having been selected by the court to
defend the accused men, they threw
their whole soul into the work and
labored with all their might, at first to
secure an aequUtal or, failing that, tc
mitigate the crime with which theii
clients stood charged, and afterwards, tc
obtain for them another trial before an.
other jury which might have proved
more lenient but all in vain. Had the
Lists been millionaires they could MOI
have secured counsel who would hay,
defended them more zealously, NOR,
earnestly and more persiFtently.
only one hope remains for tn,
younger man now-that Of executiv,
olemenoy. Unless the Governor inter
poses he must die on the l4th day o
next March, leaving to his desolate wifi,
and five young children heritage o
lifelong misery.
The verdict Of the Jury was untx
peetsdly severe, but let him who is dis
posed to oritioise it first place himself il
Imagination in that jury box, and, hav
ing disabused his mind of svery precon
ceived oppression, listen under oath t,
every syllehla that fon from tie lips 0
the witnesses, and to the language of tn,
court IL defining the Law OF the State il
regard seil-fetense-that before mar
can be Justified in taking the lite Of hi
assistant lie must be in imminent peril o
the loss oi his own life or of the suffer
ing Of great bodily harm and lie mus
hsve retleated, if there is way o
retreat apru to him, until he can go n,
further, II nsy seem harsh-in som,
cases perhaps unreasousbly so-but sucl
is the law as n has been expounded b,
orr courts lime and again and the jury
is bound 10 try the case upon the evi
dencs and the las.