The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1897-07-06
"a NEGRO WOMAN KILLED
STRANGLED TO DEATH IN FRONT OF HER
OWN DOOR.
Berry Cook, Her Paramour, Arrested on the
Evidence of Her Little Boy
His Story.

| News reached here Saturday about
noon that negro woman of bad char
aeter, Rosa Morgan, living in Marks
Greek township, had that morning been
found dead within a hundred feet of
her own door, and that foul play was
suspected.
Coroner Ellis at once went out to the
place, some two miles from Eagle Rock,
and about twenty miles from this city,
and that afternoon made thorough in-
!, vestigation. A jury was summoned,
composed of j. NJ Ferrell. ii. A.
Rhodes, w. NJ. Rhodes, Freeman Lilies,
Theo. Broadwell and z. Broadwell.
Il The body was examined, the surround
ings were investigated, and number Of
witnesses questioned closely.
As result the jury brought in YER
dict finding that Rosa Morgan came to
her death by strangulation at the hands
of one Berry Cook.
Now Berry Cook is dark mulatto,
of 45 years of age, tall, athletic and des-
perate. He has wife and children, but
has known the Morgan woman several
years and was a frequent caller at her
house.
He admitted this much to me yester-
day in Jail here. He put it even stronger;
he said that he was very fond of Rosa
and that she had been about the same
as a wife to him for long time. He
denied, however, any knowledge of her
death; said the last time he saw her
was the Sunday night before her death;
that he was not there the night she
died, and that he could not imagine any
reason that could induce anybody to kill
her unless it were jealousy Of some
other man. That he was jealous of her
he strenuously denied, and added that
he didn't know of anybody else who
could have been so.
The first thing he knew Of the muir
der, Cook said, was about 10 o'clock. He
was blowing in the field and somebody
, came along and told him that Rosa Nor
gan had been found dead in front of her
door, by Noah PAGES folks, who had
started off after some brush. AS soon
as he heard this he told his wife to take
his horse from the pillow and he would
!. go over and see about it. He went and
found great crowd there and they ar
rested him and Sunday they brought
him here to Jail.
The evidence on which Cook was ar
rested and committed to jail by magis-
! trate e. G. Scarborough was that of the
, dead woman's six-year old boy, Gus Nor
, gan, corroborated by other witnesses and
. ihuch circumstantial evidence.
According to the boys story he and
his mother and the other children had
gone to sleep on pallets ON the floor. (The
, house in which they live is small one
room hut He does not think he had
been asleep long when he was aroused
by some one knocking at the door and
calling his mother. She opened the
door and Berry Cook came in and stayed
] for sometime talking with his mother.
. They did not seem to be mad, but when
: Berry got up to go he asked her to go
J outside with him. She did SO, and the
next time he saw her was when she was
, found stiff and cold in the weeds near
the house the next morning, with swollen
throat and blood oozing out her nose
and ears.
Noah Pace and his wife, who live
within 100 yeards of Rosa's house, heard
some one scuffiing out in the yard and
heard Rosa cry out, "Oh, Lord, have
mercy, Berry, don't" But everything
soon became quiet and they gave the
matter no further attention. Berry,
they said, was frequent caller at
ROsa's, and they often made quite a
noise, playing sometimes, and sometimes
fighting. 1t was for this reason that
the PAGES did not investigate the matter
that night
The coroner's investigation showed no
bruises on the body beyond those about
ROsa's throat. she was very black wo-
man, and it would have been difficult to
have detected a bruise where the skin
was not broken. She was 80 years old,
Berry Cook thinks, and had seven child
rem, though all of them were not at
home the night of the murder