The Portland daily press., 1892-07-13
A MYSTERIOUS DEATH.
A Well Known Maine Clergyman sus-
pected as the Murderer.

The little town Of Hampton, N. H.,
is all excited over the mysterious death
OF Joseph Wasson, and it is thought the
results of the coroners jury and autopsy
will reveal foul play. Suspicion has
been directed to Rev. Joseph Garland.
In conversation with reporter, Rev.
Mr.. Garland said:
II have been minister of the gospel
for As years. l graduated in class of
36, in the class of Al, from Bowdoin
College They are all dead but IA, and |
am the oldest of them all-S0 years old.
l was the oldest when l entered. l think
[ was 80 years old them he said absent
ly. II was in the same class with Hon.
Henry Ingalls,, one of the honest
three when the Democrats tried to steal
the State of Maine. From college went
to the Bangor Theological Seminary, and
! was ordained and settled at Woolwich,
Me-, opposite Bath, where l remained
three years. In 1S4S was ordained over
the Congregational church in Sandwich,
Mass. After six years service removed
to Bristol, N. H., where / also remained
six years. Subsequently | exercised my
ministry in Acton, Mass, and Charles
gational minister. [ have supplied at
least 20 different churches in Maine. /
was a licensed preacher of the confer
ence without charge for many years, and
acted as missionary among the strug
CLING churches. I preached last at North
Wolfboro, N. H., two years ago, in 1890.
/ came back here last fall
Twenty-Five years ago Dorothy Was
sons husband died. Josiah WATSON then
became a member of her household as
hired man. Dorothy's brother, Joseph
Garland, paid her visits at long intervals
only to find that WATSON, the deformed
hired man, was growing more and more
in his sisters favor. Finally Dorothy,
who had intended to leave $4,000 in
property to her brother, made WATSON
her heir Then Garland came back to
the household, for what purpose must
be surmised. By that time Dorothy was
confirmed invalid, palsied and deaf,a
was naturally deformed and of simple
mind, but he alone could talk to the deaf
heiress.
Garland seemingly continually
brooded over the fact that WATSON
had supplanted him. He circulated
stories concerning WATSON, most of
which the neighbors refused to credit.
AT breakfast, on last Tuesday morning
Garland, who had been in the habit of
reading terrible rebukes from the Old
Testament for Wasson' s benefit, reopened
the Jeremiads with Paul's rebuke Of the
Corinthians for certain practices. It
was evidently intended for WATSON.
Then they left the breakfast table, Gar
land to shake out some hay in the yard
and WATSON to hoe some corn in a little
field across the road. Back of that field
is a patch of woods, and through the
marsh back of these woods, 500 yards
away, the sluggish Hampton winds.
WATSON was never seen again alive ex-
cept by Garland, and Garland denies
that he saw the deceased after he left the
yard with the evident intention Of going
to hoe corn.
The body was found at bend in the
river on the shore opposite the farm
house, and lay in the shallow water near
the bank. If it had been carried down
from the railway bridge above it would
certainly have followed the channel of
the river, and could not have reached the
position mentioned. The current is not
strong enough to carry body from the
bridge to that point unless the corpse
had been in the water long enough to be-
come distended, and therefore buoyant,
which Wasson's body was not.
Thirdly, supposing the body entered
the river at, or very near. the point where
it was found, tits utterly impossible that
the deformed and helpless WATSON could
have crossed the country between the
house and that point, for the distance is
a third of a mile, and the marsh is inn
passable to anyex cept sure-footed, ac-
tive man. That is not ALL The bank at
all points is formed of soft mud and yet
there was terrible cash under Wasson's
eye, and the lungs were full Of air, show
ing had been stopped before the body en-
tered the water, as the effect Of the blow
The deceased hat has not yet been
found, though continuous search has
been made, the idea being that perhaps
its position may furnish clue to the
route by which the body reached its rest
ing place.
Garland is perfectly cool, denounces
the dead man bitterly and talks of the
details of the tragedy without emotion.