Shenandoah herald. [volume] (Woodstock, Va.) 1865-1974, 1896-09-25
For The SHENANDOAH HERLD.


SIR. EDITOR -
In your issue oil Sept
18th, | notice a communication from some
one calling himself Justice" He wants
TO "put Ia q few words IN defense of that
much abused jury" and says he is "glAd
we have such Mobile and intel igent men
ia our county" / did not think there
was o man IN this county that would
have the brazen "cheekp to defend set
Of men bringing in verdict contrary to
the law and the evidence, less the jury
themselves or the attorneys for the de-
fence. Justice" saws. the men compos-
ing that jury were noble and intelligent.
Now would like to know by what stan
dard he would Judge a mans nobility or
Intelligence. Had they been noble men,
t. ey would not have been influenced by
the false pleading of lawyers. Had they
been intelligent men, they would not have
mIsconstrued the evidence, and the in
structiOns of the court. There was not
one ota of evidence introduced to prove
that woman an adulteress, and there can
be none, unless perjured. But there can
be an abundance OF evidence produced to
prove that Wetherholtz himself was an
adulterer Of the worst stripe. Had that
woman been an adulteress she would not
have been forced to 60 from house to
house in the dead of winter with two
small children, half clad, and half fed,
while her husband was away from home
earning $1.50 per day and spending it In
drunken revelry and houses of Ill repute.
She would not have been compelled to
90 into the fields and harvest wheat, hay,
and corn, in order to have a home for
herself and children had she been an
adulteress. There would have been no
necessity for he, to 20 out that bleak,
cold, damp dTeary, fatal morning of
Feb 4th, to milk another mans cows,
and do the work of q servant had she |
been an adulteress. 1t is true there was
double murder in Louisville but the
man that committed it did not conceal
himself and lay 10 wait, and hie wife was
not engaged honorably and worthlly at
the time of the murder as Mrs. Wether-
holtz was. 1t is true too that Daniel
Slckles killed Barton Keys, but he did it |
like a mar. he did not act the william
like Wetherholtz by concealing himself.
The very act of wetherholtz conceal
ing himself and lying IN wait, proves the
falsity OF his accusations against his
wife, and should be evidence sufficlen
with any man having the intelligence of
q baboon that the crime was not justi-
fable.
By bis adultery, dissipation, IMPROVE
dence, and brutality, his wife was forced
to ask the law for protection, aud when
by miscarriage Of justice las in the recent
murder trial she was refused that pro-
teciIon and compelled TO shift for herself,
then 1t was that thus black hearted,
Jealous demon accused her of criminal
intimacy with other men.
And when she had no place to 90, aud
begged the good wife Of a respected and
industrious man for few day shelter
land it was granted) and when those few
days heightened into weeks, then il was
that Weatherholtz accused this man of
being his wife's psramOur.
And when she was at this mans home,
he took steps to have her removed to the
aims house, which can be proven by the
OTerseer of Poor for Lea District
Just as well night Justice have said that
Judge Newman (whO has endeared him
self to the people of Shenandoah county
by bis honorable and Just course) is not
noble and Intelligent. He had just as
we'll say that Col. j. c. Bake had no
right 10 prosecute Wetherholtz. He had
iu It 40 we'll say to the peofle OF this
county get behind the bush and shoot
down your man ifyou choose for my
name Is "iustice" and insure jury of
noble aud Intelligent men. He had jos
as we'll say that murder committed by
lying in wait Is not murder in the first
degree.
Justice proposes to yindicate the
shameful verdict Of that jury, the brutal
murder by slandering that poor woman
(who was shot down like beef without
being given an opportunity to ask her
God for any torgiveness) and calling her
an sdulteress.
1t would require the entire space of
the HERALD to record all the misdeeds of
this demon, (WeStherholtz) lie has
ALWAYS been menace to society. and
peace, 10 the locality in which he lived
and those people will forever laud aud
uphold the honorable, dlguIiied, and COM
mendable course of the court, and the
attorney for the Commonwealth. They
will forever condemn aud dsnouncs tn
verdict of that jury, ard the conduct OF
the defence. CITIZEN