The Montgomery advertiser., 1906-11-10
THE FATE OF NEIL RIGSBY
 RESTS WITH ELMORE JURY

come into the possession of whiskey. and then be brought into court drunken and helpless. the case by tacit agree ment, went over until this afternoon. The young man, with watery ,s nuu'a and leering eyes, was carried into q cool jury room gesticulating fpoiisnly as he went and talking silly og ms case. A
 The investigation did not go far. but it went far enough to establish that m all probability the whiskey haa Dseh brought to the prisoner in Jail ana pe- hind bars by his mother Ihere WAS no doubt in the minds of those Whc witnessed the pitiful scene and heard the statement of Sheriff W. Q. Ropoins' that his old mother had hidden the pot. tTa nf vvhiskex in her bosom and snug gled 1t in jail to her unhappy son.
 Such was the burden of the statement made by Sheran w. Q. Robbins when ne was called before Judge Brewer to ,, s1s piaiu the drunken condition or Nei. Rtrbv. charged with murder. There had heen but two visitors permitted te see Neil RfRby, his mother ana hla s,ster sheriff Robbins said. The wfis- kev hs said. had been smuggied in the Iail in the Aosom of the mother.
 In a cool jury room during the moTh. ing and noon hours, Nen Hikpy ws rermitted to let the effects of the See srst ysThislxev wear themselves out
 The court met at the early hour of o'cIocfi in the morning, for tnefe w,are many witnesses to examine.
 The State went to work on the task that was before 1t, to carve out com nlete and applicable case Of It's cir- cumstantia1 evidence. An attorney ,r lor lire defense had described the state g casa as loose and scattering. It was the endcavor of the State, if possible. to reach out and draw It's pieces or uu1stantIal evidence Into one whoie, fiat would give 1t more convincing aspect than the first days testimony had thrown upon 1t.
 First Legal skirmiBh.
 The first legal slkirmish of the day vaa fought over the introduction of a playing card--the 'joker" of g deck or
 (ln the hiark space of the card the name of Neil Rigby was written. The card was found eight days after the killing by Ed Mccain of LoWndeS County, a brother of the dead man.
 Mir. Mccain took the stand to testify to the finding of this card at wire fence near the place where the assassin had laid in wait for the deputy sheriff.
 The defense protested against the courts permission that the card should be admitted as any sort Of evidence i. At some length the point of the card s legality as evidence. pro and con But Judge Brewer opened the door or the court for the card and 1t passed from juryman to juryman.
 During MT. MeCain's evidence~a nov able school blackboard was brought inc to court on which the witness had drawn map of the roads the housed and the points Of interest about the scene of the killing.
 He Identified Paulk's store and the roads that led to 1t, the house of Son Burney, where the negroes were hav- 1 ing their game the night of the Kill Ifng inc house Of Abe HewaRds fo which lthe dead man had gone for tvhtskeyl the place on the fence from which the paiing had been torn off; the place a' which the dead man received the dead | ly load of shot in his body, and the place where he fell in the road after { staggering back few paces. Several negro witnesses followed Mir. Mccain to the stand. They were all plantation negroes. the genuine sort without frills or qualifications. OId Plantation DarExies.
 More than once the plantation idiomt of the witnesses, or their labored ef- | fort to successfully insert some big word into their testimony.
 The first of these was Oliver Ander- son, a negro youth who had been to see ''his gaI' on the night of the kill ing. When he was coming back from | his gals" house about II o'clock he saw two men in the forks of the road g. short distance from where William Mccain later went to his death. They were John and Neil Rigby. Nell had gun, so the. witness swore. TheS l said nothing to him and he went on tc Abe Towards house. There he heard the shot that took the life of the dep uty sheriff.
 Saw Two Men Running.
 Two men, hiding and scurrying g shooting were described by Fanny Howard, the wife of Abe Howard There are two Abe Towards figuring l in the case, Abe Howard senior, and | Abe Hoard, junior, distinguished by the negro witnesses as Big Abe" and Little Abe"
 Fanny Howard swore to seeing two white men by the side of her garden fence neaY the smoke house. When they saw her they moved away and walked past the house to the road. As they passed the witness said to them
 Gentlemen, you needn't be cskeered CT me. aint never hurt nobody"
 But the men went o9 without say ing a word.
 | son Henry and a strange man talking in the road. When she asked. "Whs is thatT' a volce\said, Jack short"
 He then said, I'm Mir. Smith. In looking for a frolic. If Ncan't find a froiic tonight. I'm going toNget Into a game.
 The woman. told him that sht thought there was a frolic going or over at Tuckabatchie.
 In reply to a question from Johr W. A. Sanford of the counsel for de fense, the witness said hat Mir. Me. Cain had some whiskey at the hous, of Abe Howard which ne was sell. ing to the negroes.
 Big Abe's Testimony.
 Abe Howard senior. or Big Abe, ar ante -bellum negro, described a visit made to his house on Saturday morn. ing, the morning of the shooting They came to the house of the witness 1t a wagon to see Mir. Mccain who wal I at the house MT. Mccain and Nei Rigby went out Into the yard wher, they had a talk. The witness did mol know what they were talking about.
 He told of hearing his wife and Jaef Short talking on the outside of tho house.
 q heerd him say. he gwinter fnG CT frolic dat night" said the old negro with dignity and precision, "Den heerd her tell him, dey wuz ter have been a frolic in de quarters dat nigh but dey had corresponded de fFoiii until de followin' Satterday night" | The witness swore he heard tho shooting a little later and right after the shooting he heard two men run. ming between his house and his well.
 Eliza Mitchell, a negro woman, liv. ing in de new quarters near Abe Towards house." described a man she saw crouching in her yard under q big elm tree. This was about an l bour haFore ahe hoard the shot thai