Bennington banner and reformer. (Bennington, Vt.) 1903-19??, 1903-02-26
STRANGE OLD CASE.
Murder Case That Attracted the Attention Of
the World.


to memory the case of Stephen and
Jesse Boorns Of Manchester, one OF
the most celebrated murder cases ever
tried in America.
Jesse and Stephen Boorns we're two
brothers, who lived in Manchester in
the early part of the century just pass
ed. Russell Colvin, who had mar
ried their sister, was a man of weak
and not perfectly balanced mind and
for that reason was somewhat of a
burden to the family Of his brothers
in law.
These three men were working to-
gether in the fields, May 10, 1872,
when a violent quarrel arose and one
Of the brothers struck Colvin on the
head with a club telling him to the
ground. When the brothers returned
home, Colvin was not with them. He
had disappeared.
Suspicious, that Colvin had been
murdered, aroused by his continued
absence, smouldered. A few months
later they were again famed to a flame
by the finding of his hat in the field,
where the men had quarrelled. Time
passed and suspicion again subsidized,
The circumstances are we'll stated in
a note in Greenleaf on Evidence"
from whom the following is quoted:
'In 1919 one of the neighbors, hav-
ing repeatedly dreamed Of the murder,
with great minuteness of circumstances
both in regard to his death and the
concealment of his remains, the pris-
oners we're vehemently accused and
generally believed guilty of the muir
der. Under strict search the pocket
knife of Colvin and a button of his
clothes were found in an old open
cellar in the same field, and in a hol-
low stump not many rods from it,
we're discovered two nails and num-
Der Of bones, believed to be those OF a
man..
The Boorns boys were arrested and
tried for murder in 1919, seven years
after Colvin disappeared. The evil
dence, though circumstantial, was so
strong that it was a foregone con-
clusion that they would be found
guilty.
At this time, the brothers made
further proof unnecessary by con-
Tossing that they had murdered Colvin,
giving in detail the circumstances of
the murder, as we'll as the place and
manner of the concealment of the re-
mains and expressing great remorse
and sorrow for their awful deed.
On the day of their conviction, after
having been sentenced to death, they
applied to the legislature for CON
mutation of the sentence of death to
one of life imprisonment.
The legislature of 1919 was not so
fond of weeping on the shoulders OF
convicted murderers as was the legis-
lature of 1908, for the request was
granted only as to one, but not as to
the other. The man, who was con-
demned to death, now withdrew and
contradicted his confession, but no at
tention was paid to this later state
ment.
The day set for the execution Of the
unfortunate man drew near. The trial
which had ended in confession and
conviction, had been the sensation of
the country since its commencement
A few days before the date set for
the execution (some say the day be-
fore), and when the preparations for
the hanging we're completed, and the
affair was to culminate in the death of
one brother and the Imprisonment of
the other, Russell Colvin, he sup
posed victim, appeared in Manchester.
Someone, who knew of the.trial, had
met Colvin in New Jersey and per-
suaded him to return to Manchester,
in time to save the life of man, who
had confessed that ne had murdered
him.
A friend of the Boorns boys had
made them believe th at the evidence
against them was so strong, that they
would certainly be found guilty and
that by making a penitential confes-
sion, they would receive a life sem
tence and escape death.
The bones were those of some ami
NAL. Colvin had fed to New Jersey,
fearing that the Boorns brothers
would eventually kill him, if he re-
mained.
This case was the subject of an ex-
tensive article by Leonard Sergeant
of Manchester, who was formerly
Lieutenant Governor of this state and
at one time the law partner of Hon H.
X. Fowler of the same town.
Greenleaf in his work on "Evi-
dence" devotes copious note to the
of II T