The Green Forest tribune., 1902-11-01
FOR HERFATHER,S PARDON
Faithful Work of an Arkansas
 Girl at Washington City.

The following Washington dis patch of Oct. 25th, concerning the work of an Arkansas girl in securing pardon for her father who had been in prison for four teen years reads like a romance. The dispatch says:
 The president has commuted, the sentence of Joe Martin, convicted in the western dis trict of Arkansas for the mur- der of Ernest Adams, and sen- fenced to be hanged. President Harrison, on July 30, 1889, com- muted the sentence to life impris- onment in the Ohio peniten- tiary, where the prisoner has been confined.
 Dora Martin, the prisoners daughter, who has been in Wash ington watching the proceedings in her fathers case, leaves to- night for the west, bearing the official warrant for his release. She is only Is years old, and came from her home in Yell county, Arkansas, to fight for the freedom of her father.
 Miss Martin arrived in Wash ington some ten days ago, and since that time has been a con- stant visitor at the department of justice. She told her story in a simple, straightforward manner, and the papers in the case were sent to the president with favor able recommendations by the at torney general.
 Last July Miss Martin started from her home, which is about 100 miles west of Little Rock, to journey into a country larger and stranger than the narrow limits of Yell county. She had never been on a railroad train before. For fourteen years the family had worked and saved at every corner to provide for the trip. Single handed and alone, she bravely set forth on the journey, going first to Columbus, O., where her father was incarcera- ted. His child was only 4 years old when Martin was committed to>prison for murder, a charge which he yet denies. There was, of course, no mutual recognition when they first met. The father looked on a daughter, strong, brave, hearty and loving. The daughter saw a father bent with years, and the pallor of prison casting it's siclSly hue over features that had grown hopeless after long years of languishing behind prison walls.
 Leaving her father, the girl went to Indianapolis, where she secured from the district attorney, who was in Indian Territory at the trial, recommendation that the man be pardoned. Then she came to Washington.
 s'It was long trip,' said Miss Martin, "but Pm here, and the papers have been sent over to the president, and he is going to sign them. 1 never went to school in my life, and we have saved everything ever since 1 was a little child to get papa out of jail. Mamma, my sister and two brothers-all of us, have worked so hard, and"
 The girls face beamed as she thought of the forthcoming par don.
 Every day she has been at the department of justice, faithfully pleading her fathers cause. The city was big to her, the peo- ple and all the surroundings magnificent in contrast to the simple farm life in western Ar kansas. Yet she did not falter, but worked with the grim deter mination that had been her very life since she was able to remem- Der.
 Joe Martin was sent to prison, charged with killing Ernest Ad- ans. both parties residing at that time in Indian Territory. A watermelon was the indirect cause of the tragedy. There had been some quarrel over thls trifIe, and Adams, 1t IS alleged