The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1900-05-05
MADE GRAVE BLOOM
EFFECTIVE CLIMAX IN CONDUCT
OF A MURDER TRIAL.
The Jury Was Saturated With Super
stition, But the Lawyer Resorted
to Sort of Homeopathic Cure
and Removed the Cause-Hand-
some Negress Was Acquitted.
CChlcago Inter OceanN

!
mont county, Ohio. from the eastern
mountains Of Kentucky, a colored fam
/ lily by the name of Turner This fam
lily was of generous proportions. nume-
/ erically, consisting of William, the
father, Susannah the wife, and seven
children. The Turner's were not desti-
tute by any means. The first thing they
did after striking Ohio soil was to in
vest their savings in a small farm sit
uated near LindaIe, a rambling village,
in the central part of the county, and
then they buckled down to hard, earn
est work
"Of the children, Belle, the second
/ daughter, was a, general favOrite As
remember she was really a. pretty girl.
Mamie, her elder sister, was a gentle
kindly girl. but she lacked the physical
attractiVenesS and mental activity that
gave Belle her popularity. In direct
contrast to the two girls was Aaron,
the third child and oldest son. Aaron
was the blot on the Turner family's es-
cutcheOn. He was a most repulSiVe
| looking fellow. The coarse features pc
culiar to his kind were accentuated in
him until they became positive facial
deformities, and when to his grossness
you add a heavy, dropping lower jaw,
| thick, snaky, black skin, and ever roll
ing, senseless eyes, you have a picture
of ugly, bestial idiocy which. for
| tunately, few people represent so thor
oughly as did Aaron Turner.
Belle Turner was II years old when
the tragedy in which she figured took
place. On Dec. II, 1874, William Tur-
ner took four bushels of corn to the
grist mill on East Fork creek to be
ground into meal. The day was warm
and Turner took his wife and small
children to mill with him for an out
ing. 1t was o'clock in the evening
when they reached home.
The Death of Mamie.
Turner stopped in front of the house
at the foot of the ledge that night, and.
tumbling his family out into the middle
of the road, he babe them scramble up
the steep incline while he drove back to
the stable. Hardly had he turned the
horse into the narrow driveway lead
ing from the main road when his at
tention was arrested by the sound of a
pistol shot which rang out from the
rear of the house. He sprang from the
wagon, and leaving the horse standing
in the mire, he ran toward the kitchen,
from whose one thinly curtained win
dow faint light was cleaning. The
OminOuS sound had also reached Mrs.
Turner and her flock. They came push
ing up the ledge in a body, and when
Turner opened the back door all
crowded feaTfully into the kitchen The
first person they saw there was Aaron
He stood near the woodbOx. lOlling out
his tongue in a vain effort to speak
and pointing in terror to the bedroom
beyond. When the parents turned their
eyes in the direction they found Mamie
lying at length in the doorway while
Belle bent over her, frantically chatting
her and caressing her in an attempt to
restore her to consciousness. A revol-
yer lying on the floor beside the girls
told the story. or at least as much of
it as an inanimate witness could ever
tell
"Conjectures were rife as to the man.
ner and cause of the shooting. At the
inquest Belle Turner testified that the
affair was a case Of accidental suicide.
Mamie she said, had forcfbly taken
the revolver from Aaron ard in the
struggle for its possession the fatal
shot had been fired. Aaron, on the
other hand, insisted that Belle had
taken the revolver from it's place. in
the bureau drawer and had, without
warning or the slightest pTOvOcation so
far as he could see deliberately shot
down her sister in cold blood. Belle was
placed under arrest and brought before
the local justice of the peace for a pre-
iiminary hearing. I was associated at
that time with Homer Kahn, one of the
shrewdest criminal lawyers the county
seat could boast
The trial was held before SQUIRE
Temple in the LindaIe dry goods and
grocery store, which had been fitted up
as temporary court room. The corO-
ner and his associate witnesses testi-
fed that the position of the wound was
such as to make it possible and even
probable that the dead girl had indeed
committed suicide, whether intention
ally or accidentally, no one could say.
In like manner there was a total fail
ure to show reason why Belle Turner
should murder her sister, and after a
half day spent in useless questioning
and cross-eXamining the case was dis
missed as unworthy the attention of
The grand jury.
Turner Family's Troubles.
This violent death proved to be the
forerunner of a series of calamities that
befell the Turner family in rapid sue
cesSiOn. On Jan. 10 George. the baby.
died. Then the mother followed. and
by the latter part of the next March
there were six graves of varying sizes
made side by side in that section of
the Baptist cemetery which the trus-
tees had considerably set apart for the
colored Baptists of the community, and
Of the once prosperous and happy fam
lily only William Turner and Belle and
Aaron remained.
Il had continued to read bits of law
with Kain at intervals throughout the
winter, and when spring came 1 was
still with him. AS l sat at the front
window Of his Office one day in the
latter part Of April idly reading and
bordering l CHANGED to look toward the
street and saw standing iuss outside
the window the justice before whom
Belle Tuner had been tried the pre-
ceding December. He saw me. recog-
nized me, and without a word of cere-
mony came trudging into the office and
pumped himself down in Kain's EASY
chair.
came into town today he said.
to see the prosecuting attorney MY
conscience is not easy. There have
been recent developments, and impor-
tant developments, too, in the Turner
case
I was really taken aback at his
communication. You don't mean it,
! said. What-who?
Belle" he said, concisaly, A mo-
tive has been discovered. There was
a man in the case-rivalry-jealo
and-oh. well you know the rest. 1t is
the regulation story
But what are these facts?' I asked.
What is the proof to which you al
lude2'
The justice bent his tall, lanlky fig
ure forward into a bOw-knot shape and
said, mysteriously: The grave itself
is all the proof needed. Not the tint
est blade of grass is to be seen there.
You know what that means. Only the
grave of a murdered person fails to
grow at least scattering shoots of
green.