Democratic Northwest. [volume] (Napoleon, Ohio) 1869-1894, 1884-03-20
IspecIal Correspopdcnce of the portl

in the Murder.
Especial Correspondence OF the Post.
NAPOLEON. o., Mar. 17.-Wesley
johnson, convicted at the last term OF
court here of the murder i'm October last
of Mr.. and Mrs. Geo. w. Williams and
sentenced to be hanged May Doth has
begun to show his hand and reveal his
true character in all its baseness. His
latest move is another attempt to i'm
plicate in the Williams murder, Marvin
Collins the man he accused of burning
the barns of ]. HI. Williams, and who.
he claimed, gave him $40 to keep mum
about it.
The attempt was made in Johnson,s
usually clumsy and short-sighted way,
and in the eternal fitness of things, OF
course, shortly after came to grief. II
occurred In this way. In the Jail with
Johnson, was man named Weitzel, OF
Holgate, serving out sentence of con-
finement for an alleged criminal assault
near that place last Christmas. Welt
eel, somehow had won Johnson's conf
dence to such an extent that johnson
evidently thought he could trust him to
assist in a newly concocted scheme to
implicate Collins in the Williams mur-
der. He accordingly wrote a letter re-
Gently, purporting to be written by an
accomplice of Collins, of which the fol-
lowing is copy:
Oct. 81, 1Se3.-mr. Collins have lust
found out that George Williams has
sold his Clover Seed, And it will mount
about $500. And heve just found out
where he has Solid some hogs, and
Other things, that Amounts to One
hundred dollars. And he has been Sell
ing all his things, and is going to move
away. So man told me the other day
and George has about six or 7 hundred
dollars in the house now and we Can
get it With out much trouble meet me
on the Corner at the west Weary Schurch
tuesday evening and we will get it.
We will try and do better than we did
to Night Cant hardly see to write for
| it is dark and am in the old Chool
house, hear now be Shure and Come.
(Signed) CO"
AS Weitzel's term of service in Jail
was to expire on Saturday, johnson
confided the letter to his care, and ask
ed him to take it to an old school house
near Wauseon and hide it under stone
there. Weitzel then was glad to 90 and
tell some one that bloody shirt was
hidden under the stone. This was near
where the bloody shirt was found last
winter. A search for the shirt would
result in the finding of the letter, by
which Johnson hoped to again bring
suspicion on Collins. Weitzel in order
to draw Johnson out as far as possible,
asked what excuse he could make for
being in that vicinity and how he could
account for knowing the bloody shirt
was there. Johnson thereupon prepar-
ed diagram of the nelghborhood, and
gave Weitzefa a list of farms, there, fol
rent, as follows: Barber farm, J. HI
Williams farm, and the farms of Zine
Ager, and Nate Lingel, all about one
mile east of Wauseon.n "Tell them,'
said Johnson, "that you were there to
rent farm, and show them this dia.
gram of farms, there, to rent.n
Weitzel then tried to get an admission
out of johnson that he was mixed up
in the Williams murder, but johnson
would own to nothing. He confessed
however, that the property found on
him-the breast-pin, pen-holders and
watch and chain-beionged to Williams
and his wife, who were murdered, and
Vilou hO kJolASollI ltlU tllc WdICu Ill JIle
out building at the depot at Wauseon
as shown during the trial, but he re.
ceived the property from Collins.
This scheme, however, though plann-
ed with some degree of low cunning, fell
through at its incipiency almost. A
day or SO before Weitzel was to be lib.
Grated Johnson's supicions that Welt
eel might play him false in the matter
were aroused, and he demanded the let.
ter back he had given Weitzel to place
under the stone at the school house.
Weitzel refused to give it up, and John
son then asked the interference of the
Sheriff, who duly received the letter
and retained it in his possession. John
son for a day or so was pretty glum
over the affair but finally recovered his
former bravado, and issued orders and
manifestoes very much afer the man
ner of his counterpart in diabolism, the
late Mr.. Guiteau. Sheriff Aller says
that johnson is the most egotistical
person he ever saw, and has more self
conceit than any four men we ever met
He struts about the corridor like a lord
and nothing is good enough for him