The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1903-10-04
THE STORY OF SING-SING'S
AWFUL HOUSE OF DEATH

chamber in Sing Sing prison began its
tragic history. The execution of the
sentences took place near midday with
an interval of twelve minutes after
each death. The hills in front of the
prison were covered with people. AS
each victim was led to the chair and
died n signal was waved from the WIN
dow to a man at the flagstff on the
warden's house, who sent up flag to
inform the impatient crowd that the
new agent of justice was working all
right and had successfully slain man.
The people being thus made party
to the dreadful ceremony, waved back
their congratulations, and even raised
a cheer which died away as the Sec
ond flag was broken loose, and the
awful promptness and seriousness of
the business going forward in the lit
tie brick house under it's tin roof forced
itself upon them. The four victims on
that day were Harris A. Smiler, James
]. Sloeum, Joseph Wood and Sherbrick
Juggio, a Japanese, all convicted of
burden in the first degree.
Since then thirty-four men have sat
in that chair, and in the condemned
cells in a room adjoining 1T seven pris-
OnerS under sentence now await it's
final offices.
The opening day in it's history has
not been repeated with respect to the
humber of victims. On April %, 1896,
Ii had a double task to perform, and
again on July 81, 1899, by killing on the
first named date, Lewis Hartman and
Charles Pustolka, and on the second
Lewis Pullerson and Michael McDon-
aid. One of it's victims was a woman,
Martha Place, a Brooklyn murderess.
1t has in every case done its work
well. There has been no serious mis-
hap, and in supplanting the gallows
hoS re al
ton and by the method of its use de-
prived capital punishment of some of
fits revolving features without weaken
ing thereby the position held by those
who oppose the death penalty upon
other grounds.
The quartette that wen to their death
In 1891 were not, however, the first vic
tins of the execution chamber. The
horses were first sacrificed to test the
machinery and to gatehr data upon
machinery and to gather data upon
age necessary to kill human being.
They have the further distinction of
being the only subjects for whom any
sort of plea of Innocence could be
made. They were old inmates of the
prison, and had labored long on the
Farm, so that their usefulness was
Iearly, if not quite, exhausted. Both
were slain with less than 1000 volts of
electricity the dynamo being rein
forced by other machines, wherefore
the standard voltage to Stay
a man was fixed at 100, which is the
measure of the current applied ever
since.
Other tests, however, are applied be-
fore each execution. Although cleo
tricians profess to be able to measure
their currents up to ninety-Seven or
ninety Eight per cent, the fact is that
under varying meteorological conditions
the measure is untrustworthy and
mysterious potentialities assert them
selves. In an execution at Columbus,
Ohio, the voltage was registered
at 100, but when the dead man was
carried to the dissecting table it was
found that a current of a much higher
power had been passed through him.
To avoid any such revolving mishap
in this state, the current is tested upon
raw meat a short time before it is APP
Piled to a human victim.
AS soon as the meat has been taken
off the chair new connection is made
with a group of sixteen candle power
incandescent lamps which rests on
board placed on the chair. The wit
nesses of an execution on entering the
death chamber find these lamps lighted.
They testify that the big dynamo, sit
uated across the prison grounds and
distant about two hundred yards, is all
ready TO 40 us ldldI WOTk- AS the
condemned man enters the room these
test lights are turned off and whisked
away. In twenty seconds he is seated
in his place and the current of cleo
tricity resumes its way, bringing dark
ness instead of light.
The legislation that provided for in
f1icting the death penalty by electricity
In this state was enacted in 1888. A
bill looking to that end had been be-
Of vtrNrreS
sions. Twice it had been lost in COM
mittee and once defeated on its second
reading in the senate, largely through
the efforts of Senator, now Judge, John
E. Smith, of Madison county. But it
was the day of the electric craze.
Everything previously done by steam
and gas was to be done by electricity.
We were to live by it and it was fit
ting to die by it, and so it's adaptation
to the extreme penalty was inevitable.
The electrical promoters willingly lent
their support, as the adoption of the
method was in sense an Endorsement
of their assertions of the omnipotence
IF the new energy as applied to all
schemes commercial and social.
Notwithstanding their support by
testimony of the feasibility of the
scheme, however, the manufacturers of
dynamos and their necessary appara-
tus were loath to furnish the ma
chinery. They based their disinclina-
ton upon the high grounds of con-
scientious scruples at being a party
even indirectly to taking a human life,
although it should be done legally
AS a matter of fact, they were appre-
hensive that their machinery would not
do its work decently, for although they
were confident that it would inf1ict
death they did not know what further
1t might do to the victim-perhaps rend
him, or reduce him to a cinder.
After the first machinery was bought
from the Westinghouse people, the SELL
ers-by accident, they declared
shipped it away, in fact, to Europe,
whence they were later on required by
order of the court, suit having been
entered by the superintendent of pris-
ons, to bring it back and make delivery.
In recent years this commercial mod
esty has disappeared and the electric
supply companies compete sharply for
the business of promoting the death
dealing machinery required by the
state.
The law as finally passed has much
to commend it. Executions by hang
Ing were conducted by the sheriffs of
the counties and were deprived of their
tmpressiveness either by the bungling
method with which they were per-
formed or by being degraded into
shows to crafty morbid curiosity