The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1902-12-09
.B0THA is NOT
AFRAID To DIE
Little Concerned in Attorneys
Efforts to Save Him.
He TELLS OF HIS MURDER
DECLARES HE WOULD NOT HEsI-
TATE TO DO IT AGAIN.
1fIfILD. frightfully wild and nerv-

HfIfIAD. frightfulIy wild and nerv-
w Gus, but I wasn't crazy, and
would do it again and would
ole this minute to have the opportunity.
But who wouldn't be Economically wild
II they saw the only JOY they ever had
being snatched away like toy from
q enid? Yes, / was insaneIy Wild, but
spark of cunning remained in my
boiling brain While / murdered the be
trayer Of the girl, and / would do it
again.
Il hear that my attorney is trying to
delay the execution, but 1 don't care a
straw. l want it over and would die
TINS minute to protect the girl from the
man who ruined her and me-" and
Charles Botha'S lips quivered as he re-
called the death of the girl whom he
still loves with al the fierceness of his
wild and untamed nature.
He is now under sentence of death
Tor the murder of his child-Wife and
william Tibbetts near Monticello, and
has only three weeks more of life. For
the hrst time since he committed the
horrible crime of Paradise valley he
talked for publication at the state
prison yesterday, and raved like a mad
man in describing the emotions and in
cldents which led to the fatal shooting
Would Do It Again.
Botha is already staring at the rifle
OF the executioner, and realizes to the
FULLEST extent the enormity of the crime.
Yet he looked a guard straight in the
eye, and with every fibre in his body
quivering, screamed that he would do
1t again and again to protect the girl
he loved.
TAN and wiry, unkempt but cunning,
the bitter CLEAN in his eyes while talk
n n lie
ned his threat and commanded belief
A pair of intensely black eyes, set deep
plaeK under shaggy eyebrows, roVed
restieSSly and ceaSely round the room
as ne talked and peered unf1inchingly
INTO those of his visitors. As ignorant
as perfect isolation from either schools
or associates in childhood or manhood
could achieve, he still possesses a weird,
morose imagination which conjures the
blacklist thoughts when he alIudes to
the man he killed.
though speaking a broken Dutch
american brogue, he binds his listeners
IN a spell by the thrilling intensity of
ms story and gesticulates with a wild |
and reckless grace. All the demons |
down under the sea could not make him /
talk TO reporter, he said at first. be- |
cause they had lied about him and had |
told OF the folly of his girl-wife When |
ne finally consented, however, he spoke |
rapidly and Kissed and breathed curses |
upon the head of the man he had killed. |
Like a great boy he wept and tears
VeIled into his eyes when he alluded to |
his wife, but he recovered himself in
'tantly, and with all the pent-up energy
u ms mountain nature, told the guard /
nat he didn't care that-as he snapped /
MS hnger-when his execution took
place.
His Love For His Wife.
Way up on the mountain We lived.
he girl and t. for he always refers to
us wife as the girl, ''and from the hut
We called home could look far out on
he helds of Paradise valley, which
stretched for miles at the foot of the
lifts. She was but a child and loved
ne as strongly as / loved her, and she
vas loved as few women are. Never a
are nor ever quarrel till a man from
cross the valley came and stole Ter
lttle brain with tales of the big world
which she had never known
I asked him to stay away, and he
Id Tor time, and we forgot | sat
nth her in the door at night and tried
teach her the little that had learned
nd we laughed and loved until he came |
ack- worked far out on the noun |
ain away from the house, and he came
nile was away One evening came |
ONE and she was gone. Her clothes 1
al oeen packed in meal sacks and I j
-ent down into the valley to find her.
ieighbors laughed and said: Why,
'utch Charlie, don't you know she has
one with richer and better man. I
uttered curses, and with the help of
lends brought her back. Twice she
ent, but returned. On the third time
lie went, L was lying behind the bushes
aiting for his arrival
She went down the mountain and
lere, hidden from view, were two
orses, and together they rode away
nd l stood and gazed and sWore that
would be avenged. Like a mailman 1 |
dlowed, and when I had reached the
'ttage, long after they did, 1 rushed [
to the door with a rife over my arm.
he ran behind the door and Tibbetts +
God before me- 1 reached behind the