The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1903-07-19
FIGHT FOR A LIFE

I would gladly commute his sentence
but as il is much against my viii
am compelled to refuse to do so, while
condemning the one-sided manner II
which he was tried
I went to Bloomington and told JUS
tice Scott that 1 had done all in my
power as a man and a lawyer for my
client, meeting failure on every hand
and that ] would now lay at his feel
the life Of unfortunate Henry McNulty
ia whose legal innocence / had full be-
lief For some moments the oistln-
guished jurist appeared in much dis
tress Of mind, then he suggested that
ask the governor for a Teprieve for
McNulty until the supreme court met
four or five weeks later at Springfield
J declined. whereupon the justice him.
self wired Governor Palmer. and the
reprieve was granted-thirty-fiv days
ssThe case came in due time before
the supreme court. Only Justices Scot'
and McAliister favored granting SUI
peTsedeas. The rest refused. McNulty
must hang.
There was yet a faint hope. Ts
Governor Palmer succeeded Governor
Oglesby. and ] thought he might pos
sibly commute the sentence to life Inn
prisonment. / made application, Du,
he declined to interfere on the ground
that he would be governor only three
United States senator.
"Then one day an elderly woman
came into my Office and desired to see
my partner, the late William W
O'Brien and myself in reference to the
McNulty case. The story she told goes
TO prove truth stranger than fiction
Here it is:
7 am doctor and have practiced
for many years in ChillfoOthe. I am
the mother of the young lawyer who
was counsel for McNulty on his trial
On the night of the supposed murder
of Mrs. McNulty 1 happened to pass
her house on my return to my own
home after a professional visit, when
heard a moaning in vacant lot beside
her house. I went to the spot in the
darkness ana found Mrs. McNulty in
great suffering. She told me that in
attempting to cross the fence into the
vacant lot on her way to a neighbour
house she had fallen and struck upon
something that had caused severe in
jury to her side. I assisted her to rise,
brought her around TO her house and in
at the front door and made her as COM
Portable as I could on a lounge, not
realizing that she had suffered any Sc
rious injury. Then I went to my home.
was shocked when 1 heard next day
that the woman was dead and her hus-
band was arrested for murder
Why. in the name of mercy, didn't
you mention this befOre2' 1 asked her.
g oh, we'll, while I felt certain that
McNulty did not kill his wife-for he
was not at home-I had my mind made
up to let him go to the penitentiary to
punish him for abusing and beating her
as he did. But finding that they were
70 hi I NJ
fere. not wishing to have the sin of his
death on my SOUL
Accompanied by the woman doctor
and number of friends we went TO
Springfield and laid her startling evil
dence before Lieutenant Governor
Beverage. who had succeeded General
Oglesby as governor.
What was the outcome of il all? De-
spite that wOman's evidence, coming as
it seemed providentially. and his own
protestatiOns OF innocence. McNulty.
when his thirty-five days respite was
up, was taken from his cell and
hanged