Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1893-01-25
DEMPSEY is GUILTY.
Conviction in the Homestead
Poisoning Case.
The Jury Decides Upon Verdict in Little
Over all Hour.

PITTsBURG, Pa, Jan. 20.-Judge Stowe
delivered his charge in the Home
stead poisoning case against Hugh
F. Dempsey, district master workman
OF the knights of Labor, at
the opening Of court this morning, and
the jury retired shortly before noon:
At 20 0 clock the special jury returned
with verdict of guilty.
In his charge, Judge Stowe said:
"You will first determine as questions
OF fact whether poison was used by
Gallagher IN the mill as he says it was,
and if SO, whether w. K. Griffith, the
man named IN the indictment, was
sickened by such poison. and
if SO. whether Hugh F. Demp-
sey, the defendant, was party
10 such poisoning as alleged by the COM
monwealth. | have carefully avoided
anything like an opinion upon either
of these facts, because it is for you alone
to determine them and render your
verdict in accordance with such deter
mination without fear or favor"
The Jury returned at 1:20 with a YER
dict OF guilty as indicted. The court
room was crowded with friends of the
defendant at the time, and the verdict
created a sensation, but there was no
outward demonstration. The defend
ant turned pale at the announcement,
and at once left the courtroom in COM
pany with his counsel. He is under
$4,000 bail.
The case grew out of the numerous
and suspicious cases of illness among
the workmen in the Homestead mill.
At first those stricken with the sickness
showed all the symptoms of typhoid
fever and were treated by the physi-
clans for that disease. But after the
first few days the typhoid characteris-
tics disappeared and the doctors were
unable to diagnose the cases other than
poisoning from impure drinking water.
Numbers of the sick were brought to
Pittsburg hospitals, where they were
treated by prominent physicians, yet
six of the men suffering from the unex-
planned disease died, and IN all Of the
cases recovery was very slow. The
Carnegie Steel Company was not salts
fed with the explanation that the cpl
demic among their workmen was caused
by impure water, and, suspecting
something wrong, they put their
detectives at work to sift
the matter to the bottom. The result
of the detectives work was the arrest of
Robert J. Beatty, at Louisville. KY, on
December 10, on warrant charging
him with cOmpllclty IN the poisoning OF
men in the Homestead mill. He was
brought back to Pittsburg and given q
hearing, at which J. NJ. Davidson, one
of the former cooks in the mill. testified,
confessing his own connection with the
alleged conspiracy and duplicating Beat
ty aud Dempsey. The arrest of David
son and Dempsey quickly followed, and
to-day's trial is the result.
The indictment charges that Beatty
administered deadly poison to w. E.
Grifiths, an employe of the Homestead
mill, his purpose being to murder Crit
fths, and that he was inspired to
the crime by the defendants convicted
to-day. The murder of Charles Giles
ser is also included. CLOSER went
to Homestead after the open
ing OF the mill with non-union
men. He was taken sick and died IN a
short time with what the physicians
termed diarrhma. He lived only two
weeks after the poison was said to have
been administered. The body was
subsequently exhumed and the stomach
submitted to a chemist for examination.
CLOSER was the son of Jacob CLOSER. a
real estate broker of Allegheny, and
was associated with him in business.